The Gods of the City: Protestantism and Religious Culture in Strasbourg, 1870-1914

The Gods of the City

Studies in Central European Histories Edited by

Thomas A. Brady, Jr., University of California, Berkeley Roger Chickering, Georgetown University Editorial Board

Steven Beller, Washington, D.C. Atina Grossmann, Columbia University Peter Hayes, Northwestern University Susan Karant-Nunn, University of Arizona Mary Lindemann, Carnegie Mellon University David M. Luebke, University of Oregon H. C. Erik Midelfort, University of Virginia David Sabean, University of California, Los Angeles Jonathan Sperber, University of Missouri Jan de Vries, University of California, Berkeley

VOLUME 43

The Gods of the City Protestantism and Religious Culture in Strasbourg, 1870 –1914

By

Anthony J. Steinhoff

LEIDEN • BOSTON 2008

On the cover: The St. Thomas Foundation Building (Thomasstift) in Strasbourg circa 1914. This structure housed the Lutheran Directory, the St. Thomas Foundation, and the Protestant Seminary. The church visible in the left part of the photograph is St. Thomas, while the Catholic cathedral’s spire appears in the background (upper right). Source: Album von Strassburg: 50 Tafeln in Helio nach photographischen Originalaufnahmen (Strasbourg: J. Manias, 1914). This book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data A C.I.P. record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

ISSN 1547-1217 ISBN 978 90 04 16405 5 Copyright 2008 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands

In memoriam Lydia Eunice Joubert

CONTENTS List of Illustrations .........................................................................

ix

Acknowledgements ............................................................................

xi

Note on Translations and Usage .......................................................

xv

Abbreviations ..................................................................................

xvii

Introduction ................................................................................

1

Chapter One

From Grande Ville to Hauptstadt .......................

23

Chapter Two

Strasbourg Metropolis ....................................

83

Chapter Three The Parish Milieu ..........................................

121

Chapter Four

Contested Visions: Church and State in the Reichsland .......................................................

171

Chapter Five

The Worshipping Community .......................

225

Chapter Six

Beyond the Culture Wars: Religious Education in School and Parish ....................

293

Chapter Seven

Ministering to the City ...................................

339

Chapter Eight

Urbanizing Alsatian Protestantism ................

389

Conclusion ..................................................................................

431

Appendices ......................................................................................

437

Bibliography ...................................................................................

445

Index .............................................................................................

497

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figures 1.1 1.2 1.3 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 4.1 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 5.7 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4

The Reformed Church in Alsace and Lorraine (c. 1870) .............................................................................. The Lutheran Church in Alsace and Lorraine (c. 1870) .............................................................................. The Reichsland Alsace-Lorraine ....................................... The expansion of Strasbourg intra muros, 1875–1879 ...... The development of German Strasbourg, 1879 –1914 .... The statistical districts for Strasbourg intra muros .............. The extension of religious space, 1871–1914 ................... The creation of the St. William inspection ...................... Émile Solomon’s New Church (1877) ............................... The rebuilt New Church, cross-section and foundation views ................................................................................... The organization of interior space at St. Thomas and Young St. Peter .................................................................. Communion at the Reformed church, 1880 –1913 .......... Communion at St. Thomas, 1874 –1913 .......................... Handlungen at the Reformed church, 1880 –1913 .............. Handlungen at the inner-city Lutheran parishes, 1877–1913 .......................................................................... The religious press in Strasbourg, 1876 –1914 ................. The evolution of the conservative Protestant press in Alsace ................................................................................. The evolution of the liberal Protestant press in Alsace .... Lutheran visitation districts, 1894 .....................................

44 45 74 89 91 104 115 194 246 246 248 277 277 282 282 361 363 364 381

Tables 1.1 Strasbourg’s 1789 –1866 2.1 Strasbourg’s 1866 –1910

civilian population by confession, ......................................................................... civilian and military populations, .........................................................................

34 99

x

list of illustrations

2.2 Percentage of Strasbourg’s population in the primary city sectors, 1866 –1910 ............................................................ 2.3 Evolution of Strasbourg’s civilian population by confession, 1866 –1910 ....................................................... 3.1 Strasbourg’s civilian Protestant population intra and extra muros, 1866 –1910 ....................................................... 3.2 Parish registration in Strasbourg intra muros, 1872–1913 .......................................................................... 5.1 Lutheran communion trends, 1871–1913 ......................... 6.1 Strasbourg’s school population, 1870 –1910 .....................

102 109 125 126 278 304

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In the course of working on this book, I received assistance from many quarters, which I now take great pleasure in thanking. The book began as a dissertation at the University of Chicago under the direction of John W. Boyer and Michael E. Geyer. For their encouragement, suggestions, and support long after the dissertation was completed, I am most grateful. I am equally indebted to David Blackbourn, whose comments on the finished dissertation proved invaluable for transforming it into the present volume. The research in France and Germany for this book was made possible through the financial generosity of several institutions and foundations. I am grateful to the Friedrich-Ebert Stiftung, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the Institut für Europäische Geschichte in Mainz, and the University of Chicago for supporting the initial work, and to the National Endowment for the Humanities and the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga for summer fellowships that underwrote the subsequent research and writing. I have drawn on considerable archival and library materials for this book. My deepest thanks to the staff at the libraries and archives that graciously and patiently assisted me in consulting their collections: the Archives Départementales du Bas-Rhin (especially Christian Wolff, now retired); the Archives Départementales du Haut-Rhin; the Archives Municipales de Strasbourg (particularly François Schwicker); the libraries of the Faculty of Theology and the Institutes for Alsatian and Contemporary History at the University of Strasbourg; the Bibliothèque Nationale et Universitaire de Strasbourg; the Archives of the Diocese of Strasbourg; the Bibliothèque Municipale de Strasbourg; the Archive of the Archdiocese of Trier; the Bundesarchiv-Koblenz and the former Bundesarchiv-Potsdam; the Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz Berlin-Dahlem; the Political Archives of the German Foreign Ministry (then at Bonn); the Vorpommerisches LandesarchivGreifswald; the Library of the Institut für Europäische Geschichte (especially Martin Vogt); the Stadt- und Universitätsbibliothek Frankfurt am Main (particularly Jochen Stollenberg); and the Universitätsbibliothek Tübingen. I am very indebted to the presidents of the Lutheran and the Reformed Churches of Alsace-Lorraine as well as the pastors of the

xii

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city’s Protestant parishes for allowing me to work extensively in their private archives. Without that access, this book would not have grown into its present form. Similarly, Gustave Koch and Madame Pig-Lagos made it possible for me to take full advantage of the rich collections of the library of the Séminaire Protestant (Collegium Wilhelmitanum) in Strasbourg. My sincerest thanks to the staffs of the Regenstein Library at the University of Chicago, the Adelstone Library at the College of Charleston, and the Lupton Library at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga for their assistance in procuring research materials. While I take full responsibility for any errors and omissions in the text, any success that it might find owes much to the exchanges I have had with a number of scholars and friends on both sides of the Atlantic. Christian Baechler, François Igersheim, Marc Lienhard, and Bernard Vogler not only facilitated my research in Strasbourg, but they helped me to understand a culture that was not at all my own. In Germany, my work benefited greatly from conversations with Wolfgang Schieder (then at the University of Cologne) as well as from my interactions with the fellows and staff at the Institut für Europäische Geschichte (particularly Ralph Melville and Claus Scharf ). Sam Goodfellow, Steve Harp, Amy Leonard, Rebecca McCoy, Wendy Norris, and Peter Wallace have engaged me in many conversations about Strasbourg and Alsace over the years, for which I am very grateful. Andrew Lees has been generous in sharing his insights into nineteenth-century European urban history. I am also indebted to my friends and colleagues who have actively explored the importance of religion in modern Europe. My work has gained appreciably from the encouragement and feedback from this company of scholars, especially Margaret Lavinia Anderson, Jim Bjork, Olaf Blaschke, Jeff Cox, Anselm Doering-Manteuffel, Paul Hanebrink, Róisín Healy, Dagmar Herzog, Lucian Hölscher, Hartmut Lehmann, Antonius Liedhegener, Hugh McLeod, Jan Palmowski, Rebecca Rodgers, Helmut Walser Smith, Till van Rahden and Peter van Rooden. At the annual meetings of the American Historical Association, German Studies Association, and Society for French Historical Studies, the conferences organized at the German Historical Institute-Washington, the University of Amsterdam, and the University of Chicago, and seminars held at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, the University of Tübingen, and Vanderbilt University, I fleshed out many of the ideas that appear in the pages that follow. My thanks to the participants and audience members for their insightful remarks.

acknowledgements

xiii

I offer special thanks to Matt Berg, Jim LeSueur, and Paul Steege for their encouragement and advice regarding the publishing process. I also wish to acknowledge my debts to my colleagues (past and present) at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga for their support as I brought this project to completion. Amy Froide, Aaron Althouse, Victoria Steinberg, and Jim Ward all willingly read sections of this book and, through their comments and criticisms, helped make it better. Jeffrey Zalar, too, offered his keen mind and editorial savvy on numerous occasions, for which I am deeply grateful. Many thanks are due also to Roger Chickering and Tom Brady for their contributions as series editors, and to Franz Peter Hugdahl for his generous assistance with the final copyediting. On a more personal note, I thank my good friend Linda Gaus for her sense of humor, practical advice, and encouragement. My parents, Ray and Jeanne Steinhoff, have also been a constant source of love and support, without which this book would have been much more difficult to complete. Finally, I dedicate this volume to the memory of my maternal grandmother, who first opened my eyes and mind to the wonders of other worlds and cultures.

NOTE ON TRANSLATIONS AND USAGE Writing about Protestantism in late nineteenth-century Strasbourg and Alsace-Lorraine for an English-language audience raises a series of technical challenges, which I have tried to resolve in the following manner. In this linguistic borderland region, I use the French variant of place names where that has become standard English usage, hence Strasbourg and not Straßburg, Colmar and not Kolmar, Mulhouse and not Mülhausen. In all other instances, I have employed the French version when referring to towns during the period of French rule and German appellations for the period of German rule (e.g., Bouxwiller and Buchsweiler respectively). In citing titles, documents, or songs, however, I have retained the original place names that appeared. Similarly, the official bulletin of the Lutheran church in France (and later Alsace-Lorraine) appears under two names. It is the Recueil officiel prior to 1872 and again after 1918, but the Amtliche Sammlung between 1872 and 1918. The German territory of which Strasbourg became the capital in 1871 was formally named the Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen, or the Imperial Territory of Alsace-Lorraine. I use the terms “Reichsland” and “Alsace-Lorraine” interchangeably throughout this book. For the most part, I have avoided the locution “Alsace-Lorrainer” to refer to the territory’s inhabitants and opted instead for Alsatians and Lorrainers. This choice reflects the fact that the pieces of Alsace and Lorraine that became the Reichsland had no ties to each other prior to 1870 (apart from the shared membership in the French state) and that, long after the annexation was accomplished, the native inhabitants still thought of themselves either as Alsatians or Lorrainers. The phrase “AlsaceLorrainer” (Elsaß-Lothringer) did exist, but it was created and used largely by the immigrant Germans (a.k.a. “old Germans” in contemporary parlance), particularly in official documents. I use the term in this restricted sense. For ecclesiastical terms and titles, I have translated pasteur and Pfarrer when referring to Protestant ministers as “pastor” and rendered the Catholic curé and Pfarrer/Priester as “priest.” I have translated réformé and reformiert as “Reformed” rather than “Calvinist,” since not all the Reformed Protestants in Alsace were, strictly speaking, Calvinists. However,

xvi

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because the word “Reformeds” doesn’t exist in English, I have translated Réformé and Reformierte (used as nouns) as “Calvinists.” For the sake of clarity, I rendered the Lutheran term inspection/Inspektion as “inspection” when it denoted a geographical unit, but used “inspectoral assembly” (Inspektionsversammlung) to refer to the delegations gathering from the consistories in the inspection. The inspection’s administrative head, the inspecteur ecclésiastique or geistliche Inspektor, has been translated as “religious inspector.” Lastly, I have rendered confession and Konfession as “confession” when referring to Catholics, Protestants, and Jews as religious groups instead of “denomination,” since the latter term generally denotes divisions within a religious tradition. I have also translated most of the French and German titles of political officials and administrative units into English. Préfet became “prefect,” and the Ministre/Ministère des cultes the Minister/Ministry for Religious Affairs. Likewise, Bezirk became “district” and Kreis “county.” I have called a division head within the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine, the Unterstaatssekretär, an “undersecretary” (e.g., undersecretary for justice and religious affairs), and the civil servants in a division (Räte) either “counselors” (e.g., ministerial counselor for Ministerialrat) or “senior civil servants,” depending on the context. I chose to translate Präsident in the titles Oberpräsident and Bezirkspräsident literally, thus “Superior President” and “District President,” instead of using “governor,” to call attention to the unique set of duties associated with these offices in Alsace-Lorraine (in comparison to Prussia, for instance). For similar reasons, I opted not to translate the title of the highest political official in Alsace-Lorraine for the period 1879–1918: the Statthalter (singular and plural). The term “viceroy” has colonial connotations that are out of place in this context, while “governor” or “territorial governor” fails to capture the Statthalter’s considerable power and autonomy. Finally, all translations provided here are my own unless otherwise noted.

ABBREVIATIONS ADBR ADHR AEA AEK AELKZ AHR AKZGM AMS AS ASPC BAK BAL BCW BNUS BSHPF CEH DR ECAAL EL ELJ ERAL FB GFMFM GG GStA HZ JMH JUH KAK KB

Archives Départementales du Bas-Rhin Archives Départementales du Haut-Rhin Archives de l’Église d’Alsace (= AEK, 1945–) Archiv für elsässische Kirchengeschichte (= AEA, 1929–1945) Allgemeine Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirchenzeitung American Historical Review Arbeitskreis für kirchliche Zeitgeschichte, Münster Archives Municipales de Strasbourg Amtliche Sammlung der Akten des Ober-Konsistoriums und des Direktoriums der Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession (= RO 1870 –1918) Archiv der Straßburger Pastoral-Conferenz Bundesarchiv-Koblenz Bundesarchiv-Lichterfeld (Berlin) Bibliothèque du Collegium Wilhelmitanum (Séminaire Protestant) Bibliothèque Nationale et Universitaire de Strasbourg Bulletin de la Société de l’Histoire du Protestantisme Français Central European History Deutsche Revue (Archives de) l’Église de la Confession d’Augsbourg en Alsace et Lorraine Elsaß-Lothringen (Alsace-Lorraine) Elsaß-Lothringisches Jahrbuch Église Reformée en Alsace et Lorraine Evangelisch-Lutherischer Friedensbote aus Elsaß-Lothringen German Foreign Ministry Files and Microfilms Geschichte und Gesellschaft Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz, BerlinDahlem Historische Zeitschrift Journal of Modern History Journal of Urban History Kirche Augsburger/Augsburgischer Konfession (= ECCAL) Evangelisch-Protestantischer Kirchenbote

xviii KS LBY MGkK MSV NCIR P. PA-AA PB PBK PBKR RA RHPR RK RKA RO SA SB SD SG SN SP SPG SPJ SPV ST STIR SWIR TN VBSS VPLA-GR ZGO

abbreviations Konsistorium Straßburg (Ref. Consistory of Strasbourg) Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook Monatschrift für Gottesdienst und kirchliche Kunst Mitteilungen des Synodalvorstandes der evangelisch-reformierten Kirche von Elsaß-Lothringen New Church Inspection Report (ADBR 172 AL 242) Packet Politisches Archiv des Auswärtigen Amts (Berlin) Protokollbuch/minutes PB des Konsistoriums (consistory) PB des Kirchenrats (parish council) Revue d’Alsace Revue d’Histoire et de Philosophie Religieuses Reformierte Kirche (Reformed Church of Strasbourg) Reichskanzleramt Recueil Officiel des Actes du Consistoire et du Directoire de l’Église de la Confession d’Augsbourg (= AS 1840–1870; 1918–) (Archives) St-Aurélie (St. Aurelia) Elsässisches Evangelisches Sonntagsblatt Straßburger Diözesanblatt (Archives) St-Guillaume (St. William) St-Nicolas (D = Deutsch/German parish, F = Français/ French parish) Straßburger Post Straßburger Pastoralgesellschaft (Archives) St-Pierre-le-Jeune (Young St. Peter) (Archives) St-Pierre-le-Vieux (Old St. Peter) (Archives) St-Thomas St. Thomas inspection report (ADBR 172 AL 226) St. William inspection report (ADBR 172 AL 244–45) (Archives du) Temple Neuf (New Church) Verwaltungsbericht der Stadt Straßburg Vorpommerisches Landesarchiv-Greifswald Zeitschrift für die Geschichte des Oberrheins

INTRODUCTION The dawn of the twentieth century unleashed a torrent of reflection on the expiring age as well as the one about to commence, much like the recent arrival of the newest millennium. Many European commentators regarded the year 1900 as the beginning of a new era that would continue to multiply and share the political, economic, social, and cultural benefits of modernity amongst an increasing share of the people in Europe and the rest of the world. Other observers were less comfortable with the nature and direction of change at the fin de siècle. They mourned the decline in traditional ways of life and expressed anxiety about the consequences of trends such as the emergence of democratic politics and mass culture.1 Yet another perspective was expressed by people like Michel Knittel, a Lutheran curate and religious inspector in the Alsatian city of Strasbourg, who took a more balanced approach and acknowledged contemporary problems while maintaining a guarded optimism. Reporting on the religious situation early in 1901, he remarked: The superficial observer of social life and activity at the end of the century will find reason enough for complaint. He can point to the growth in a materialistic world view, the erosion of public morality, the rising degree of pleasure-seeking, and the ever increasing amount of indifference towards church and religion. Anti-Christian tendencies, too, are striding ahead more and more, and celebrating ever greater victories. . . . And yet, despite all the clouds that darken the religious horizon at the end of the century, a clearer look reveals that the [ Protestant] religious sense is stronger and more visible today than ever before, because it is more evangelical.2

Although this appraisal was consonant with the general mood at the turn of the century, it was a most unusual characterization of the contemporary religious climate. Most of Knittel’s European peers, who toiled in the cities and held conservative theological positions (as he did),

1 Cf. Eugen Weber, France: Fin de Siècle (Cambridge: Belknap, 1986) and August Nitschke, Gerhard A. Ritter, Detlev J. K. Peukert, and Rüdiger vom Bruch, eds., Jahrhundertwende. Der Aufbruch in die Moderne, 2 vols. (Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1990). 2 St. Thomas-Strasbourg Inspection Report (hereafter STIR) 1900, Archives Départementales du Bas-Rhin (hereafter ADBR) 172 AL 226.

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found little if any solace in nineteenth-century religious developments. In cities such as Berlin, London, and Paris, ministers bemoaned the dwindling size of their congregations. They lamented the drops in the number of baptisms and church weddings, as well as the growing signs of disinterest in organized religion. Many of these pastors, priests, and rabbis were also in agreement as to the root cause of these trends: the rise of the modern, big city. The rapid growth of urban Europe after 1850 created many cities with too few churches and ministers for the traditional understandings of priest and parish to function. New residential patterns and work rhythms made it difficult for both established inhabitants and immigrants to maintain regular ties with their faith communities, which was consequently reflected in rising crime rates, alcoholism, and births out of wedlock. Indeed, given this discourse of the big city as a modern day Sodom and the clerical complaints of a moral, religious world that seemed utterly lost, it is hardly surprising that the German sociologist, Ferdinand Tönnies, asserted in his classic work from 1887, Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft, that the demise of religion in the city was part and parcel of the paradigmatic shift from traditional communities to modern societies.3 Given the strength of this fin de siècle chorus of religious decline, it is tempting to dismiss Knittel’s sentiments as an aberration. More charitably, one might suggest that the situation in Strasbourg was somehow unusual. In light of recent work on European religious life in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, however, another reading seems likely. Namely, the inspector’s comments are representative of a much larger body of evidence that shows that religious communities were not worlds lost in urbanization’s wake. Rather, they were transformed worlds, whose members and institutions participated actively in the construction of urban modernity. To understand this transformation and its broader ramifications for religion in Europe and the modern condition, this book explores the experiences of one urban faith milieu during the high season of European urbanization: the Protestants in Knittel’s own Strasbourg. Certain factors made Strasbourg’s situation between 1870 and 1914 unique. The coexistence of many Catholics, Protestants and Jews gave rise to a highly competitive confessional On the religious dimension of the late nineteenth-century antiurban discourse, see especially Andrew Lees, Cities Perceived: Urban Society in European and American Thought, 1820 –1840 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1985), and, more recently, Lees, Cities, Sin and Social Reform in Imperial Germany (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2002), esp. 23 – 48. 3

introduction

3

climate in the city that took on new energy following the German Empire’s annexation of Alsace-Lorraine in 1871 and its designation of Strasbourg as the capital for the new imperial territory (Reichsland). At the same time, Strasbourg’s situation speaks to the experiences of a type of European big city—the regional administrative, commercial, and cultural center—which has not received sufficient attention in the scholarly literature. It is this combination of factors that make Strasbourg’s example so useful for reassessing the myth of the secular big city as well as examining anew the complex relationships among religion, cultural integration, and national identity in Imperial Germany. Religion and the Modern Big City The notion that modernity was essentially an urban phenomenon emerged most powerfully from the turn of the century ruminations of social thinkers like Tönnies, Durkheim, and Weber. Their understanding of the European big city—that is, places with at least one hundred thousand inhabitants—and their personal experiences in such environments led them to conceptualize the late nineteenth-century city as both the exemplar and engine of a fundamentally new social, political, and economic order.4 In their seminal writings, these founders of modern sociology identified the city as the centerpoint of modern state formation and capitalist production. It was also where new and influential forms of social relations and cultural activities were taking shape and subsequently being spread beyond the cities’ walls due to urban concentrations of political and economic power and the expansion of city-based communications and transportation systems. In short, the sociologists predicted that rural Europe would take on the characteristics of urban society (Gesellschaft), which was not only atomized and differentiated, but rationalized and demystified (entzaubert)—in a word, secular.5

4 Adna F. Weber discusses the designation of cities with over 100,000 inhabitants as “big cities” or, in German, Großstädte, in The Growth of Cities in the Nineteenth Century (New York: Columbia University Press, 1899), 16. Useful on the connections between German sociologists’ urban experience and their understanding of modernity is Ira Katznelson, “The Centrality of the City in Social Theory,” in The Divided Heritage: Themes and Problems in German Modernism, ed. Irit Rogoff (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 253 – 64, and Jennifer Jenkins, Provincial Modernity: Local Culture and Liberal Politics in Fin-de-Siècle Hamburg (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2003), 1–2. 5 Owen Chadwick, The Secularization of the European Mind in the 19th Century (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), 5–8.

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The equation of urbanity with modernity has exerted a powerful influence over scholars’ thinking about social and cultural change in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The years following the Second World War, in particular, witnessed the elevation of such modernization theories to the status of social science orthodoxy. Academics on both sides of the Atlantic not only turned to thinkers like Weber for theoretical and methodological inspiration, they also defined their research in terms of the modernization paradigm. Among Clio’s adepts, for instance, the history of modern society became a matter for serious inquiry, in which analyses of the urban working class or urban industrialization took pride of place.6 In retrospect, this intellectual commitment to urbanization qua modernization seems warranted. Over the course of the twentieth century, the world—and the Western world in particular—has become decidedly more urban. More people live in urban settings than in rural ones. Furthermore, the political, economic, cultural, and social currents emanating from cities largely shape the everyday life of both urban and rural residents.7 Curiously, while social scientists and social historians pursued their research with great rigor and analytical sophistication, they did not examine some of their theories’ key premises. Now that scholars have begun to explore these assumptions as well, the old predictions about the course of urbanization and the spread of urban influences beyond the city seem less compelling. Despite the importance of the big city for theoretical notions of modernity, the history of modern urban Europe received little attention, even in the land of Weber. Indeed, only with the fruition in the 1980s of the first generation of labors from the “new urban history” movement have we begun to appreciate what urbanization in Europe between roughly 1860 and 1918 actually entailed.8 In particular, this

See especially Thomas Mergel, “Geht es weiterhin voran? Die Modernisierungstheorie auf dem Weg zu einer Theorie der Moderne,” in Geschichte zwischen Kultur und Gesellschaft. Beiträge zur Theoriedebatte, ed. Thomas Mergel and Thomas Welskopp (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1997), 207–32, and for the situation within the historical profession in particular, Georg G. Iggers, New Directions in European Historiography, rev. ed. (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1984). 7 Cf. Klaus Tenfelde, “Urbanization and the Spread of Urban Culture in Germany in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries,” in Towards an Urban Nation: Germany Since 1780, ed. Friedrich Lenger (Oxford: Berg, 2002), 13 – 42. 8 See especially H. J. Dyos, ed. The Study of Urban History (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1968); Derek Fraser and Anthony Sutcliffe, eds., The Pursuit of Urban History (London: Edward Arnold, 1983); and Jürgen Reulecke and Gerhard Huck, “Urban 6

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5

newer research had demonstrated that the stark opposition between (traditional) community and (modern) civil society was often an exaggeration. While rapid urban growth destabilized many traditional forms of community, it also permitted the development of more localized forms of social organization in the big city, based on neighborhoods, voluntary associations, and cafés.9 In his insightful essay on the modern condition, Anthony Giddens even suggests that such configurations or “partial societies” are a consequence of modernity. They represent the successful reinsertion of urban social relations into specific temporal and spatial contexts that provide vital sites of intimacy and informality in what can otherwise be a large, impersonal world.10 Recent research is even more critical of the argument that religion’s decline in the big city, as evidenced by decay both in religious sentiment and in organized religion’s broader social, cultural, and political salience, drove a more general, long-term process of secularization.11 Despite their prominence, these ideas about religion and the encounter with modernity never rested on a solid footing. Durkheim’s and Weber’s own claims about a “disenchanted” urban society depend primarily on anecdotal and other prima facie evidence, which does not reveal rigorous empirical research. Subsequent scholarship has not corrected this omission. After 1945, Marxist and social science scholars took advantage of the disdain for “pre-modern” forces in the theory of modernization in order to ignore religion altogether, whether in the city or the countryside. Meanwhile, those who did take an interest in matters religious, especially academics affiliated with churches, treated secularization as History Research in Germany: Its Development and Present Condition,” Urban History Yearbook (1981): 39 –54; as well as early synthetic accounts by Paul M. Hohenberg and Lynn Hollen Lees, The Making of Urban Europe 1000 –1950 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985); and Jean-Luc Pinol, Le Monde des villes au XIX e siècle (Paris: Hachette, 1991). 9 Indicative of this work are Genevieve Massard-Guilbaud, “The Genesis of an Urban Identity: The Quartier de la Gare in Clermont-Ferrand, 1850 –1914,” JUH 25 (1999): 779 – 808; David Garrioch and Mark Peel, “The Social History of Urban Neighborhoods,” JUH 32 (2006): 663 – 676; W. Scott Haine, The World of the Paris Café: Sociability Among the French Working Class, 1789 –1914 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996); and Klaus Tenfelde, “Die Entfaltung des Vereinswesens während der Industriellen Revolution in Deutschland (1950 –1873),” in Vereinswesen und bürgerliche Gesellschaft in Deutschland, ed. Otto Dann (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1984), 55 –114. 10 Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity (Berkeley: The University of California Press, 1990), esp. 140–44. 11 Hugh McLeod, Secularisation in Western Europe, 1848–1914 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000), esp. 1–30, provides an excellent overview of scholarly opinions on the secularization thesis.

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historical fact. Instead of questioning whether secularization occurred, their studies strove to record and quantify its progress.12 In this manner, social science helped advance the Friedrich Nietzsche’s claims in the Gay Science that created a picture of modern Europe where God was indeed dead or, at least, largely absent. In the 1970s and early 1980s, scholars started to consider more carefully religion over the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and it became evident that the secularization paradigm misrepresented both basic facts and wider trends. The modern era, an ever growing body of revisionist literature demonstrates, was hardly a period of unmitigated religious decline. Neither churches nor other religious institutions were incapable of adapting to changing political, social, and cultural conditions.13 In fact, instead of killing off religion, modernity helped give churches and other forms of religious community a new lease on life. The professionalization of clerical training and the rationalization of ecclesiastical institutions, Olaf Blaschke usefully points out, enabled the established churches to establish a much more extensive and pervasive public presence after 1820 than during the “confessional age” of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.14 The expanded schooling

12 See Wolfgang Schieder, “Sozialgeschichte der Religion im 19. Jahrhundert. Bemerkungen zur Forschungslage,” in Religion und Gesellschaft im 19. Jarhundert, ed. Wolfgang Schieder (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1993), 11–28, esp. 11–21; but also Jeffrey Cox, The English Churches in a Secular Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982), 3–20; Callum G. Brown, The Death of Christian Britain (London: Routledge, 2001), 18–28; and Claude Langlois, “Trente ans d’histoire religieuse,” Archives de Sciences sociales des Religions 63 (1987): 85–114. 13 To name just a few of the more influential early works in this literature: Cox, English Churches; Ralph Gibson, A Social History of French Catholicism 1789 –1914 (London: Routledge, 1989), esp. 227–68; Emmet Larkin, “The Devotional Revolution in Ireland, 1850 –1875,” AHR 77 (1973): 625–52; Wolfgang Schieder, “Kirche und Revolution. Sozialgeschichtliche Aspekte der Trierer Wallfahrt von 1844,” Archiv für Sozialgeschichte 14 (1974): 141–70; and Jonathan Sperber, Popular Catholicism in Nineteenth-Century Germany (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984). Rejecting secularization theory’s model of linear decline, some historians have proposed viewing European religious history in the longue durée as a constant ebb and flow between “secularization” and “sacralization.” Cf. Schieder, “Säkularisierung und Sakralisierung der religiösen Kultur in der europäischen Neuzeit. Versuch einer Bilanz,” in Säkularisierung, Dechristianisierung, Rechristianisierung im neuzeitlichen Europa: Bilanz und Perspektiven der Forschung, ed. Hartmut Lehmann (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997), 308–13; Gérard Cholvy, La religion en France de la fin du XVIII e siècle à nos jours (Paris: Hachette, 1991), 189 – 92; and Joel Harrington and Helmut Walser Smith, “Confessionalization, Community and State-Building in Germany, 1555–1870,” JMH 69 (1997): 77–101. 14 Olaf Blaschke, “Das 19. Jahrhundert: Ein zweites konfessionelles Zeitalter?,” GG 26 (2000): 38–75, here 72–74.

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and improved literacy, coupled with advanced transportation technologies and new media, promoted religious renewal and the development of new forms of piety.15 Trains brought pilgrims to Lourdes, while steam ships carried missionaries to Africa and Asia.16 Furthermore, the emergence of the “social question” encouraged churches and religious groups to engage in new types of social and cultural endeavors,17 which frequently used the modern bourgeois vehicle of collective action—the voluntary association.18 Furthermore, the spate of new research on European religion shows that religion contributed significantly—and positively—to the construction of European modernity. The struggle of British nonconformists for political rights led to the expansion of suffrage and the reorganization of Parliament, while the political mobilization of Catholics in Imperial Germany around the Center Party helped usher in a new era of massbased politics.19 The renewed vitality of faith communities in modern

15 See, among others, David Hempton, Religion and Political Culture in Britain and Ireland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996); the essays in Olaf Blaschke and FrankMichael Kuhlemann, eds., Religion im Kaiserreich: Milieus—Mentalitäten—Krisen (Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser, 1996); Christopher Clark, “The New Catholicism and the European Culture Wars,” in Culture Wars: Secular-Catholic Conflict in Nineteenth-Century Europe, ed. idem and Wolfram Kaiser (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 11– 46; W. J. Sheils and Sheridan Gilley, eds., Religious History of Britain (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994); and on the connections between literacy and piety in particular, Jeffrey T. Zalar, “ ‘Knowledge is Power’: The Borromäusverein and Catholic Reading Habits in Imperial Germany,” Catholic Historical Review 86 (2000): 20 – 46. 16 David Blackbourn, Marpingen. Apparitions of the Virgin Mary in Nineteenth-Century Germany (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1994); Suzanne Kaufman, Consuming Visions: Mass Culture and the Lourdes Shrine (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2004). On the missions, see Brian Stanley, The Bible and the Flag: Protestant Missions and British Imperialism in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (Leicester: Apollos, 1990); Klaus J. Bade, ed., Imperialismus und Kolonialmission: Kaiserliches Deutschland und koloniales Imperium (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1982); and Gerard Cholvy, Christianisme et société en France au XIX e siècle (Paris: Seuil, 1997), 149–58. 17 Sperber, “Kirchengeschichte or the Social and Cultural History of Religion,” Neue Politische Literatur 43 (1988): 13–35, here 13–16. 18 E.g., Wolfgang J. Mommsen, “Die Stiftung bürgerlicher Identität: Kunst- und Museumsvereine in Deutschland, 1820 –1914, in Bürgerliche Kultur und politische Ordnung. Künstler, Schriftsteller und Intellektuelle in der deutschen Geschichte 1830 –1933 (Frankfurt a. M.: Fischer, 2000), 46–58. 19 Gerald Parsons, “Liberation and Church Defence: Victorian Church and Victorian Chapel,” in Religion in Victorian Britain, vol. 2, Controversies, ed. idem (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1988), 148 – 65; Rainer Liedtke and Stephan Wendehorst, eds., The Emancipation of Catholics, Jews, and Protestants: Minorities and the Nation State in Nineteenth-Century Europe (Manchester: University of Manchester Press, 1999). Among the numerous works on the German Center Party, see Margaret Lavinia Anderson, Windthorst: A Political Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981); David Blackbourn,

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Europe had other important consequences. In Protestant lands like Britain and Germany, commonly considered the most “secular” areas of Europe, the state explicitly drew on religious symbols and notions of confessional belonging to foster a sense of national identity, that is, membership in a characteristically modern form of supra-local community.20 As the century progressed, religious affiliation increasingly structured social interaction in Europe. From Germany to England and from Holland to Switzerland, it determined where one lived and whom one married. It conditioned the terms of schooling and employment and it established the parameters for interacting or identifying with the state.21 In this light, the British scholar Callum Brown contends that the most momentous shifts in Europe’s religious landscape took place not during modernity’s prime, but rather in its twilight, the 1960s.22 These assaults on the secularist orthodoxy have been so persuasive that religion has become as broadly accepted a category for analyzing modern Europe’s past as class and gender.23 Nevertheless, revisionist

Class, Religion and Local Politics in Wilhelmine Germany: The Center Party in Württemberg before 1914 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980); Wilfried Loth, Katholiken im Kaiserreich: Der politische Katholizismus in der Krise des wilhelminischen Deutschlands (Düsseldorf: Droste, 1984); and Sperber, Popular Catholicism. 20 Hugh McLeod, “Protestantism and British National Identity, 1815–1945,” in Nation and Religion: Perspectives on Europe and Asia, ed. Peter van der Veer and Hartmut Lehmann (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999), 44–70; Hartmut Lehmann, “ ‘God Our Old Ally’: The Chosen People Theme in Late Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century German Nationalism,” in Many are Chosen: Divine Election and Western Nationalism, ed. William R. Hutchison and Hartmut Lehmann (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1994), 85–107; Helmut W. Smith, German Nationalism and Religious Conflict: Culture, Ideology, Politics, 1870 –1914 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995); and Caroline Ford, Creating the Nation in Provincial France (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993). 21 On the reactivation of confessional identity as a social marker, see especially Wolfgang Altgeld, Katholizismus, Protestantismus, Judentum. Über religiös begründete Gegensätze und nationalreligiöse Ideen in der Geschichte der deutschen Nationalismus (Mainz: Grünewald-Verlag, 1992); Olaf Blaschke, Konfessionen in Konflikt: Deutschland zwischen 1800 und 1870: ein zweites konfessionelles Zeitalter (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002); Clark and Kaiser, Culture Wars; Hugh McLeod, “The Age of Religious Polarisation,” The Annual Review of the Social Sciences of Religion 6 (1982): 1–22; and Helmut Walser Smith, Protestants, Catholics and Jews in Germany, 1800 –1914 (Oxford: Berg, 2001). 22 Brown, Christian Britain, esp. 1–15. Mark Ruff makes a similar point in his recent study of post-war German Catholic youth groups, Mark Edward Ruff, The Wayward Flock: Catholic Youth in Postwar West Germany, 1945 –1965 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004). 23 Notable in this regard are Dick Geary, “The Prussian Labour Movement, 1871– 1914,” in Modern Prussian History, ed. Philip G. Dwyer (New York: Longman, 2001), 126–45; and Ann Goldberg, Sex, Religion, and the Making of Modern Madness: The Eberbach Asylum and German Society 1815 –1849 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999).

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scholarship remains enthralled to secularization theory in three crucial respects. First, scholars largely continue to talk about religious activity in terms of the secularization paradigm. Lucian Hölscher’s massive Datenatlas epitomizes one dimension of this dilemma. By accepting the emphasis on quantitative analysis that is concomitant with secularization theory, the work validates a narrow definition of “religious,” by ignoring, or at least marginalizing expressions of religious activity that lacked official (church) sanction or took place outside of formal church settings.24 The desire to quantify also advances the discursive strategy of secularization by framing discussions about modern religious practice and piety in terms of a premodern standard. This approach idealizes the premodern character of religion and makes all modifications negative.25 The “milieu studies” that have dominated research on religion in German-speaking Europe over the past fifteen years typify another dimension of the methodological conundrum.26 Scholars working in this vein concede the point about traditional religion’s decline, following the secularization thesis, and thus devote little attention to it. Many works in this mode, which include Antonius Liedhegener’s volume on Münster and Bochum and Dietmar von Reeken’s analysis of north German Protestantism, do investigate official, church-based religious practice (Kirchlichkeit).27 This exercise is, however, perfunctory, because their arguments about the vitality of modern religious activity depend on new developments like the emergence of the confessional milieu 24 Lucian Hölscher, ed., Datenatlas zur religiösen Geographie im protestantischen Deutschland von der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts bis zum Zweiten Weltkrieg, 4 vols. (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2001). 25 Callum Brown urges moving away from the reductionism of quantitative studies in Death of Christian Britain, 10 –12. 26 The definition of “milieu” derives from M. Rainer Lepsius’s influential essay, “Parteisystem und Sozialstruktur: Zum Problem der Demokratisierung der deutschen Gesellschaft,” in Die deutsche Parteien vor 1918, ed. Gerhard A. Ritter (Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch, 1973), 56 – 80. On the use of the milieu paradigm to study religion in modern Germany, see Arbeitskreis für kirchliche Zeitgeschichte, Münster (hereafter, AKZGM), “Katholiken zwischen Tradition und Moderne: Das katholische Milieu als Forschungsaufgabe,” Westfälische Forschungen 43 (1993): 588 – 654; and Olaf Blaschke and Frank-Michael Kuhlemann, “Religion in Geschichte und Gesellschaft: Sozialhistorische Perspektiven für die vergleichende Erforschung religiöser Mentalitäten und Milieus,” in Blaschke and Kuhlemann, Religion im Kaiserreich, 7–56. 27 Antonius Liedhegener, Christentum und Urbanisierung. Katholiken und Protestanten in Münster und Bochum 1830 –1933 (Paderborn: F. Schöningh, 1997); Dietmar von Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch zur Moderne: Milieubildungsprozesse im nordwestdeutschen Protestantismus 1849 –1914 (Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser, 1999).

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and its voluntary associations and media organizations as well as the new types of piety, such as the Cult of the Sacred Heart.28 Studies of popular religion are also guilty of this kind of intellectual bait and switch when they draw important attention to the activity outside the realm of “official religion,” but simultaneously imply that the “old religion” no longer warrants sustained consideration.29 Third, these new works in modern European religious history maintain the fundamental hypotheses about religion and the modern city essentially intact. Revisionist historians have only rarely directed their gaze at the situation in Europe’s big cities. Those few examples focus on Europe’s “giant” cities, places like Berlin, London, and Paris.30 But the emphasis on such cities is consistent with a singular understanding of the modern urban experience that urban historians are beginning firmly to reject.31 For their part, urban specialists have been no more 28 Cf. Norbert Busch, Katholische Frömmigkeit und Moderne: Zur Sozial- und Mentalitätsgeschichte des Herz-Jesu-Kultes in Deutschland zwischen Kulturkampf und Erster Weltkrieg (Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser, 1996). 29 For instance, Ellen Badone, ed., Religious Orthodoxy & Popular Faith in European Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Wolfgang Schieder, ed., Volksreligiösität in der modernen Sozialgeschichte (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986); and Sarah C. Williams, Religious Belief and Popular Culture in Southwark c. 1880 –1939 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999). 30 Hugh McLeod discusses this situation in his introduction to European Religion in the Age of Great Cities 1830 –1930 (London: Routledge, 1995), 1– 39; and McLeod, “Die Kirche in Großstädten,” in Kirchliche Zeitgeschichte. Urteilsbildung und Methoden, ed. Anselm Doering-Manteuffel and Kurt Nowak (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1996), 210 – 29. See also, Jacques-Olivier Boudon, Paris, capitale religieuse sous le Second Empire (Paris: Cerf, 2001); Cox, English Churches; Kaspar Elm and Hans-Dietrich Loock, eds., Seelsorge und Diakonie in Berlin: Beiträge zum Verhältnis von Kirche und Großstadt im 19. und beginnenden 20. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1990); McLeod, Piety and Poverty: Working-Class Religion in Berlin, London and New York 1870 –1914 (New York: Holmes & Meier, 1996). Exceptional in their attention to religious conditions in smaller big cities are: Liedhegener, Christentum; Thomas Mergel, Zwischen Klasse und Konfession. Katholisches Bürgertum im Rheinland 1794 –1914 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994); Jan Palmowski, Urban Liberalism in Imperial Germany. Frankfurt am Main 1866 –1914 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999); and Till van Rahden, Juden und andere Breslauer: Die Beziehungen zwischen Juden, Protestanten und Katholiken in einer deutschen Großstadt von 1860 bis 1925 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000). 31 In addition to Hohenberg and Lees, Urban Europe, esp. 215–47 and Pinol, Monde des villes, 34 – 44, see for France, Maurice Agulhon, ed., Histoire de la France urbaine, vol. 4, La ville de l’âge industriel: le cycle haussmannien (Paris: Seuil, 1983); William B. Cohen, Urban Government and the Rise of the French City: Five Municipalities in the Nineteenth Century (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1998); John Merriman, ed., French Cities in the Nineteenth Century (London: Hutchinson, 1982); and for Germany, Jürgen Reulecke, Geschichte der Urbanisierung in Deutschland (Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp, 1985); and Wolfgang R. Krabbe, Die deutsche Stadt im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1989).

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eager to incorporate religious elements into their analyses of the modern city, even when addressing social and cultural life. There, too, the image of the secular big city remains alive and well.32 I contend that it is time to dispense with this urban legend. The big city was not nearly as inhospitable to religion as was long presumed. The changes brought on by urbanization certainly challenged traditional faith communities and forced them to adapt and innovate. But they did survive. This survival made it possible for religion to remain an important force in the big city and become a part of the influences referred to as “urban modernity,” which transformed life in the city and countryside alike. Exploring the dimensions of religion’s encounter with the big city stands at the heart of this book and entails looking at the structures and practices of “traditional,” organized religion as well as at the new ideas about religious community and piety that emerged out of the modern urban environment. At the same time, this study seeks to move the discussion about religion in modern Europe beyond the dichotomies of modernization and secularization.33 Instead of straining to define the city as either sacred or secular, or trying to identify a single force—capitalism, democracy, Christianity—as the determinant force of an entire social system, I start from the premise that big cities, like modern societies more generally, were complex settings structured by a range of influences, including religion.34 Precisely because cities maintained both sacred and secular elements, modernization could promote sacralization and secularization alike. Because the secular dimension has dominated the literature to date, I concentrate here on the sacred.

32 Hans-Jürgen Teuteberg, “Moderne Verstädterung und kirchliches Leben in Berlin. Forschungsergebnisse und Forschungsprobleme,” in Elm and Loock, Seelsorge und Diakonie, 161–200. 33 This tendency to frame accounts of modernity in terms of pre-modern/modern alternatives is found in Giddens, Consequences, 100 –11. 34 This stance repudiates, in particular, the suggestion that because religion was only able to shape pieces of a social system (cf. Niklas Luhmann’s idea of social subsystems) and not modern society more broadly (as it purportedly did in pre-modern times), religion should not be viewed as modern in the same way that class, or even gender were modern forces. See here Luhmann, Funktion der Religion (Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp, 1977), and more recently, Carsten Kretschmann and Hennig’s Pahl’s critique of Blaschke’s thesis of a “second confessional age,” in “Ein ‘Zweites Konfessionelles Zeitalter’? Von Nutzen und Nachteil einer neuen Epochensignatur,” HZ 276 (2003): 369 – 92, esp. 381.

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Given our limited understanding of religious life and culture in Europe’s big cities, it is especially important that we expand our knowledge of what was happening at the local level. We need to comprehend the conditions in specific cities as well as in general types of cities before we can develop a richer and more persuasive picture of urban religion in modern Europe. Consequently, this volume takes the form of a case study, focusing on late nineteenth-century Strasbourg. The experience of Strasbourg between 1870 and 1914 is not viewed or pursued as typical or representative of European or, more specifically, German urbanization. No single case study can make that claim. However, Strasbourg’s specific situation provides an extraordinary opportunity for reassessing our notions about urban religion, and religion’s encounter with European modernity more generally. First, Strasbourg allows us to learn more about urbanization and its consequences for a city that was neither a “great city” like Berlin or Hamburg, nor an industrial boom town like Bochum or Essen. Like most of the forty-eight German big cities (Großstädte) in 1910, Strasbourg became a modern big city after 1871, largely due to its designation that year as the capital of German Alsace-Lorraine.35 On the eve of the First World War, Strasbourg was Germany’s twenty-sixth largest city in population, and eighth in area. While immigrants from other parts of Germany and Alsace swelled its population, Strasbourg remained an administrative, commercial, cultural, and military capital like it had been throughout the century, which made it comparable to places like Barmen, Halle, Mannheim, and Münster.36 Although a very different type of city than Munich or Hamburg, urban growth presented Strasbourg with similar types of challenges: creating additional housing, improving hygiene and sanitation, organizing the new urban environment, and securing the funds to pay for it. In fact, thanks to the

35 Germany had only eight big cities in 1871: Berlin, Hamburg, Breslau, Dresden, Munich, Cologne, Königsberg, and Leipzig. Reulecke, Urbanisierung, 203 – 04. On the period 1870 –1918 as the apex of modern German urbanization, see especially Tenfelde, “Urbanization and the Spread of Urban Culture.” 36 Karl Eichelmann, ed., Die Bevölkerung der Stadt Straßburg (auf Grund der Volkszählungsergebnisse mit besonderer Berücksichtigung des Jahres 1910) (Strasbourg: Friedrich Bull Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1913), i – vi; and more generally, Georges Livet and Francis Rapp, eds., Histoire de Strasbourg des origines à nos jours, 4 vols. (Strasbourg: Éditions des Dernières nouvelles d’Alsace, 1980), 4:3 –183 and 269 – 395.

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leadership of its talented mayors, Otto Back and Rudolf Schwander, Strasbourg emerged as one of the pioneers in German urban planning and social reform.37 Equally important was Strasbourg’s vibrant religious culture when urbanization commenced. Large numbers of Catholics, Protestants (Lutheran and Reformed), and Jews made their home in Strasbourg, and by 1870 interconfessional competition was established as a defining factor in local political, social, and cultural life. Furthermore, the city was an important ecclesiastical center for each of these faith communities. Strasbourg was the seat of the Catholic diocese of Alsace and its respected seminary, as well as the headquarters for the Lutheran Church of France and the Faculty of Protestant Theology. Regional Calvinist and Jewish affairs were also administered in Strasbourg through the actions of their respective consistories.38 By studying the affects of urbanization on these arrangements, we will not only augment our understanding of religion in Europe’s big cities, but we will help write a new chapter in the modern religious history of both Strasbourg and Alsace.39 Ideally a history of religious culture in German Strasbourg would examine each of the city’s faith communities and their interactions with one another. Coexistence—and conflict—played a key role in shaping the identities of the three groups. Interdenominational competition between Protestants and Catholics, in particular, was pivotal for the dynamism of Strasbourg’s religious culture both before and after 1870. For pragmatic and historiographical reasons, however, this study focuses on the experiences of Strasbourg’s Protestant community. At

37 Alexander Dominicus, Straßburgs deutsche Bürgermeister Back und Schwander 1878 –1918 (Frankfurt a.M.: Moritz Diesterweg, 1939); Christoph Cornelißen, Stefan Fisch and Annette Maas, Grenzstadt Straßburg: Stadtplanung, kommunale Wohnungspolitik und Öffentlichkeit 1870 –1940 (St. Ingbert: Röhrig Universitätsverlag, 1997), and, for Strasbourg as an urban “success story,” Palmowski, Urban Liberalism, 237–54 and 289; and Krabbe, Die deutsche Stadt, 100 – 07 and 127–28. 38 I will trace a more detailed picture of Strasbourg’s religious situation prior to 1870 in Chapter One. 39 Although historians of Alsace-Lorraine and Strasbourg have considered how religious and confessional differences shaped society and politics both before and after 1870, they have devoted little attention to the specifically urban dimension of the question. Albert Wahl’s pathbreaking study, Confession et comportement dans les campagnes d’Alsace et de Bade, 1871–1939, 2 vols. (Strasbourg: Éditions Coprur, 1980) ignores cities entirely, while Livet and Rapp’s magisterial Histoire de Strasbourg devotes a mere four paragraphs (4:355–56) to religion during the German period (and most of these concern the Catholic church).

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the practical level, one concern was keeping the project manageable. But there were also great disparities in the available primary sources. All three faith communities left considerable traces in the archives of the various territorial and municipal administrations. The periodical press—secular and religious—reported on a wide array of religious and ecclesiastical events. There exists as well a substantial memoir literature for the period. However, the sources that can shed light on the internal dynamics of Strasbourg’s Jewish and Catholic communities are extremely inadequate. Large amounts of the Jewish material perished during the Nazi occupation of 1940–44, while the different approaches to Catholic and Protestant church government in AlsaceLorraine meant that Catholic records at both the parish and episcopal levels were never very plentiful.40 Strasbourg’s Protestant communities however, left a rich documentary record that has largely survived the ravages of time. The more democratic approach to Protestant church government in Strasbourg produced a considerable paper trail that enables the historian to gain a rare look at debates within the Protestant community on a wide range of administrative and ministerial issues. Moreover, the fierce theological debates within the Protestant community found expression in rival hymnals and liturgical collections, polemical pamphlets, and party-specific religious newspapers and voluntary organizations. While such materials make it possible to explore the structures and practices of late nineteenthcentury Protestantism in Strasbourg with unprecedented depth, they also underscore the role that interconfessional coexistence and conflict played in shaping internal Protestant affairs. The choices that Strasbourg’s Protestants made regarding such matters as parish organization, religious education, and urban ministry between 1870–1914, for instance, repeatedly took into account the position and attitudes of the Catholic “other.” Thus, even though I focus on Protestants and Protestantism here, the need to place my analysis within the broader context of interdenominational relations has yielded a study that, in critical respects, is indeed a history of urban religious culture in Strasbourg and not 40 This said, access to the extant material remains problematic. ADBR has rich holdings but lack adequate catalogs. Until recently, most of the Protestant and Catholic archives were held privately and not easily consulted. Many Protestant materials (Lutheran and Calvinist) have made their way either to ADBR or the Archives municipales de Strasbourg (hereafter, AMS) and are more readily available, but the bulk of the Diocese of Strasbourg’s records for the Reichsland period remains closed to scholars.

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just of Protestantism. This contextualized approach has the further merit of reappraising our understanding of confessionalization, such that we see it not only in terms of its outcomes, that is, the specific social groups it produces, but also, and even more so, as a sociocultural process, namely, a way for generating both these social identities and the very religious practices they referenced.41 Concentrating on Strasbourg’s Protestants during the Reichsland period has important historiographical benefits. First, it addresses a significant lacuna in the literature on Strasbourg and Alsace-Lorraine. Although the era of German rule was important on a number of levels for the history of Alsatian Protestantism, it has received scant attention from historians and religious scholars. 42 In recent years, some important contributions to the history of Catholicism between 1870 and 1918 have appeared,43 but Otto Michaelis’s Grenzlandkirche remains the only monograph devoted to Reichsland Protestantism. It is a fine study, in no small part due to his personal connection to the material, but political circumstances after 1918 prevented the German Michaelis from consulting the official church and government archives in Strasbourg.44 The history of Protestantism in German Strasbourg, where roughly one-fifth of all the Reichsland’s Protestants lived and where both territorial Protestant churches were installed, exists only in fragments, most significantly Christian Albecker’s work on the Urban Mission, Bernard Vogler’s essay on the students attending the Faculty of Protestant Theology, and Paul Muller’s master’s thesis on the St. William Inspection.45 41 Helmut Walser Smith and Christopher Clark, “The Fate of Nathan,” in Smith, Protestants, Catholics and Jews, 3–29, esp. 14–16. For a lengthier critique of confessionalization as outcome (and not also process), see Steinhoff, “Ein konfessionelles Zeitalter? Nachdenken über Religion im langen 19. Jahrhundert,” GG 30 (2004): 549 –70. 42 Henri Strohl, Le Protestantisme en Alsace (Strasbourg: Éditions Oberlin, 1950) provides the best coverage, but even that is limited (only 30 of some 450 pages). See also Marc Lienhard, “Les Protestants,” in François-Georges Dreyfus, René Epp, Marc Lienhard, and Freddy Raphäel, Catholiques, Protestants, Juifs en Alsace (Colmar: Alsatia, 1992), 117– 90, esp. 139 – 49; and the passing references in Marc Lienhard, Foi et vie des Protestants d’Alsace (Strasbourg: Éditions Oberlin, 1981); and Gustave Koch and Marc Lienhard, Les Protestants d’Alsace: du vécu au visible (Strasbourg: Éditions Oberlin, 1985). 43 Most notably, Christian Baechler, Le Parti Catholique Alsacien 1890 –1939 (Paris: Éditions Ophyrs, 1982), and Claude Muller, Dieu est catholique et alsacien. La vitalité du diocèse de Strasbourg au XIX e siècle (1802 –1914), 2 vols. (Strasbourg: Société d’Histoire de l’Église d’Alsace, 1987). 44 Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche: Eine evangelische Kirchengeschichte Elsaß-Lothringens 1870 –1918 (Essen: Lichtweg, 1934). 45 Christian Albecker, L’Évangile dans la cité: histoire de la Mission Urbaine de Strasbourg

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Concentrating on Strasbourg’s Protestant community, moreover, provides a valuable opportunity to examine imperial Germany’s largest, but still insufficiently studied confessional group. The religious turn in modern German historiography, in fact, has primarily focused on Catholicism,46 although scholarly efforts to examine the roots of modern German anti-Semitism in the wake of the Holocaust have also fostered considerable research into nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Judaism.47 Recent years have witnessed the publication of several important titles concerning German Protestantism in Imperial Germany—Gangolf Hübinger’s valuable inquiry into cultural Protestantism; Frank-Michael Kuhlemann’s and Oliver Janz’s studies of the Protestant clergy; as well as Claudia Lepp’s, Harry Liebersohn’s, Armin-Müller Dreier’s and Helmut Walser Smith’s analyses of Protestant associational life48—but much de 1890 à 1939 (Strasbourg: Association des publications de la Faculté de Théologie protestante, 1992); Bernard Vogler, “Le recrutement des étudiants à la Faculté de théologie (1872–1918),” RHPR 68 (1988): 97–112; and Paul Muller, “La vie religieuse dans l’inspection ecclésiastique de St-Guillaume entre 1877 et 1900” (Maîtrise en théologie protestante, Université de Strasbourg II, 1980). Sadly, Robert Will, who ministered at Strasbourg-St. William (1899 –1922), never wrote a detailed article on the Reichsland era in his series on Strasbourg and Alsatian Protestantism that appeared in the Revue de Histoire et Philosophie Religieuses during the early 1940s. 46 Insightful discussions of the new work on German Catholicism appear in: Margaret Lavinia Anderson, “Piety and Politics: Recent Work on German Catholicism,” JMH 63 (1991): 681–716; idem, “The Limits of Secularization: On the Problem of the Catholic Revival in Nineteenth-Century Germany,” Historical Journal 38 (1995): 647–70; Oded Heilbronner, “From Ghetto to Ghetto: The Place of German Catholic Society in Recent Historiography,” JMH 72 (2000): 453–95; and Karl-Egon Lönne, “KatholizismusForschung,” GG 26 (2000): 137–44. Useful too are the remarks in Michael Gross, The War Against German Catholicism: Liberalism and the Anti-Catholic Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Germany (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004), 3–11. 47 In addition to the exemplary accounts presented in the final three volumes of Michael A. Meyer and Michael Brenner, eds., German-Jewish History in Modern Times, 4 vols. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996–97), see such individual studies as Marion A. Kaplan, The Making of the Jewish Middle Class: Women, Family, and Identity in Imperial Germany (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991); Simone Lässig, Jüdische Wege ins Bürgertum. Kulturelles Kapital und sozialer Aufstieg im 19. Jahrhundert (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2004); and van Rahden, Juden und andere Breslauer. 48 Gangolf Hübinger, Kulturprotestantismus und Politik (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1994); Frank-Michael Kuhlemann, Bürgerlichkeit und Religion: Zur Sozial- und Mentalitätsgeschichte der evangelischen Pfarrer in Baden 1860 –1914 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2001); Oliver Janz, Bürger besonderer Art: Evangelischer Pfarrer in Preussen 1850 –1914 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1994); Claudia Lepp, Protestantisch-liberaler Aufbruch in die Moderne: Der deutsche Protestantenverein in der Zeit der Reichsgründung und des Kulturkampfes (Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser, 1996); Harry Liebersohn, “Religion and Industrial Society: The Protestant Social Congress in Wilhelmine Society,” Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 76/6 (1986): 1– 63; Armin Müller-Dreier, Konfession in Politik, Gesellschaft und Kultur des Kaiserreichs. Der Evangelische Bund (1886 –1914) (Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser, 1998); Smith,

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work needs to be done, especially at the level of Protestant religious practice.49 Instead of applying analytical models derived from Catholic research (the “sociocultural milieu”) to Protestantism, which has created some serious weaknesses in Antonius Liedhegener’s and Dietmar von Reeken’s otherwise impressive studies, German Protestantism must be investigated on its own terms, with due consideration of its distinctive ideas on religious community, governance, and piety.50 Lastly, looking at the history of Protestantism from the perspective of Strasbourg raises important questions about the relationship between religion, region, and national identity in Imperial Germany. Scholars like Helmut Walser Smith and Hartmut Lehmann call attention to how German national identity acquired Protestant encoding between 1866 and 1871, and how this confessionalization of national belonging contributed to the designation of first Catholics and then socialists as “national outsiders.”51 In their own work on German national identity, historians such as Celia Applegate, Alon Confino, and Siegfried Weichlein emphasize how Germanness was rooted in local and regional experiences, even after the formation of the unitary nation-state in 1871.52 However, sufficient consideration of how much Applegate’s idea of a “nation of provincials” reflects the regional organization of German Protestantism itself is missing from these discussions. The ambiguities in the specifically Protestant dimension of German national identity became particularly evident—and problematic—following the Empire’s annexa-

German Nationalism. In terms of larger syntheses, the most successful are the relevant chapters in Gerhard Besier, Religion, Nation, Kultur: Die Geschichte der christlichen Kirchen in den gesellschaftlichen Umbrüchen des 19. Jahrhunderts (Neukirchener: Neukirchener, 1992); and Kurt Nowak, Geschichte des Christentums in Deutschland. Religion, Politik und Gesellschaft vom Ende der Aufklärung bis zur Mitte des 20. Jahrhunderts (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1995). 49 In this respect, David Blackbourn’s remark that modern German Protestantism awaits its historian remains valid. Blackbourn, “Progress and Piety: Liberals, Catholics, and the State in Bismarck’s Germany,” in idem, Populists and Patricians: Essays in Modern German History (London: Allen and Unwin, 1987), 143 – 67, here 160. 50 Liedhegener, Christentum und Urbanisierung; Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch. 51 Smith, German Nationalism; Lehmann, “God our Old Ally”; on the anti-Catholic dimensions of the Kulturkampf see especially now Gross, War Against Catholicism; for the Christian dimension of the anti-socialist politics of the late 1870s and 1880s, see Vernon Lidtke, “August Bebel and German Social Democracy’s Relation to the Christian Churches,” Journal of the History of Ideas 27 (1966): 245 – 64, esp. 255–57. 52 Celia Applegate, A Nation of Provincials: The German Idea of Heimat (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990); Alon Confino, The Nation as Local Metaphor: Württemberg, Imperial Germany, and National Memory, 1871–1918 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1997); and Siegfried Weichlein, Nation und Region. Integrationsprozesse im Bismarckreich (Düsseldorf: Droste, 2004).

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tion of Alsace-Lorraine. In order to make Alsatians into Germans, public officials in both Berlin and Strasbourg had to struggle to define “Germanness” for the purpose of shaping public policy. With respect to Protestantism, the German state initially sought to import the national “distillate” into the Reichsland: it required state-run theology exams of Protestant ministers. It called immigrant German (“old-German”) theology professors to the reorganized University of Strasbourg.53 Ultimately, such “top-down” measures had limits, like the government’s overall policy of germanization.54 Instead, the Reichsland’s inhabitants became Germans most effectively when they were allowed to participate in the “nation of provincials” as equal partners, a situation that was most fully achieved in the evolution of the Lutheran and Reformed Churches into true territorial churches (Landeskirchen). Plan of the Argument This book is organized into three large sections. The first set of four chapters examines the structures of religious culture and community in Strasbourg, and their evolution in the course of urbanization and the shift to German rule. Chapter 1 sets the stage for the investigation by looking, first, at Strasbourg’s development as a city and center of Alsatian Protestantism over the first two-thirds of the nineteenth century. It then explores the transition to German rule in 1870–71, during which time the critical decisions concerning the development of the local Protestant churches as territorial churches were made. Alsace-Lorraine was to exist as an independent imperial territory (Reichsland ), and the French ecclesiastical statutes would be maintained in the region as the local church law, which confirmed the Lutheran and Reformed Churches’ status as independent, regional institutions. Chapter 2 focuses on Strasbourg’s entry into the ranks of the German big cities, which was accomplished already in the 1880s. Although the 53 On the creation of the “German” University of Strasbourg, see generally John E. Craig, Scholarship and Nation Building: The Universities of Strasbourg and Alsatian Society, 1870 –1939 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984). Unfortunately, we still do not have a satisfactory history of the Faculty of Protestant Theology for the Reichsland period, although Michaelis discusses some of the faculty’s most prominent members in Grenzlandkirche, 173 – 80. 54 Hans-Ulrich Wehler, “Das ‘Reichsland’ Elsaß-Lothringen von 1870 bis 1918,” in Krisenherde des Kaiserreichs 1871–1918: Studien zur deutschen Sozial- und Verfassugsgeschichte, 2nd ed. (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1979), 23 – 69.

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city’s urban transformation was triggered largely by secular forces—the wave of immigration resulting from Strasbourg’s new position as a territorial capital, the need to rebuild and expand physically following the bombardment of 1870 and the newcomers’ arrival—the chapter reveals that urbanization was not merely a secular process. It also encouraged a considerable degree of sacralization as new churches were constructed, streets were named after historical religious figures, and new mobility patterns endowed many neighborhoods with a palpably confessional character. Chapter 3 investigates the Protestant parish milieu: the parishes and their clerical and lay leaders. It reveals how the competitive interconfessional climate placed Strasbourg’s Lutheran and Reformed parishes in a strong position to deal with the influx of new residents, both in terms of churches and personnel, and how they managed it over time, albeit with some difficulties. But the milieu itself changed in important ways between 1870 and 1914. It became more diverse, with the implantation of the German military church system and, later, free churches and sects. The clergy were professionalized. Its candidates had to pass first one, and then two state-administered exams. Systems of clerical placement, at least in the Lutheran church, were standardized. At the turn of the century, a fully modern salary and pension system was also introduced, which was paid for, in part, by a new regime of church taxes. Chapter 4 takes up the question of church-state relations, which is made especially important by the shift to German rule and the concentration of both political and Protestant ecclesiastical authority in Strasbourg. Whereas secularization theory emphasizes ecclesiastical stasis and secular state interests, this investigation highlights change and the state’s considerable involvement in church affairs. Both the Lutheran and the Reformed churches pursued reforms—the creation of a new Lutheran inspection, the convocation of a territorial Reformed synod—in order to adjust to their post-1870 circumstances and to modernize their administrative practices. But, they had to contend with the new German administration, which was composed primarily of Protestants who sought to use their powers in the Protestant churches’ internal affairs to promote their own ideas of proper (German) Protestant church government—and enforce new standards of political reliability. The book’s second section considers three areas of religious cultural practice that served to inculcate notions of confessional belonging and piety among the faithful while also calling attention to the existence of faith communities in the constantly evolving urban setting. Chapter 5

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concentrates on worship and, in that context, notions of ritual space and time. Although urbanization challenged traditional ideas about worship as religious practice, most notably by attenuating the churches’ claims on Sunday mornings and afternoons, it persisted as a key agent of religious acculturation in the city. Parishes responded to the altered social and cultural climate by moving services to new hours of the day and week, and by experimenting with new liturgical formats. The churches updated their hymnals and they organized special one-time feast days to commemorate the actions of locally important Protestant figures such as Martin Bucer and John Calvin. Many Lutherans and Calvinists did not attend services as frequently as their ministers would have liked, but their contacts with the culturally rich liturgical environment remained intact. Not only was attendance on feast days regularly strong, but throughout the Reichsland the vast majority of the city’s Protestants continued to receive religious rites of passage and engage in worship. In Chapter 6 the attention shifts to religious education in school and parish, a cultural activity of tremendous importance to the faith communities. These programs prepared youth not just for a particular rite of passage (Protestant confirmation, Catholic first communion) but their future as members of these socio-religious groups. The modernization of primary and secondary instruction in Strasbourg after 1870, such as the introduction of mandatory schooling, the reorganization of the school day, and the making of new school districts, created real difficulties for the churches. It became harder for the ministers to oversee the schools’ programs of instruction, and schoolchildren could not always attend parochial catechism lessons as they once had. The educational reforms also resulted in religious education reaching more of the city’s youth, since every boy and girl had to attend not just school, but also the mandatory religion classes. It did not develop into a “secular” institution, as the recent literature on the European culture wars would indicate.55 Instead, schools became critical, complementary sites for disseminating religious knowledge in the city.56 In contrast to their

55 On the conflicts over schooling in nineteenth-century Europe, see Clark and Wolfram, Culture Wars; Marjorie Lamberti, State, Society, & the Elementary School in Imperial Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989); and Mona Ozouf, L’École, l’Église et la République, 1871–1914 (Paris: Éditions Cana, 1982). 56 Jeffrey Cox has developed the term “diffusive Christianity” to talk about this kind of non-church based religious knowledge; Cox, English Churches, 90 –128.

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Catholic peers, who sought to dominate the school system, Strasbourg’s Protestant clergy aimed to work with school officials and their religious education teachers in order to improve the quality and content of the actual instruction. Chapter 7 addresses the evolution of pastoral care and ministry in urban Strasbourg. In this context, too, the changes associated with urbanization challenged the city’s faith communities. The Lutheran personal congregation system prevented an efficient use of available financial and personnel resources. It was also foreign to most newcomers and consequently delayed their establishment of formal ties with the city’s official faith communities, if they did so at all. In light of these difficulties, Strasbourg’s Protestant leaders proceeded with reforms and innovations. To make it easier to remain in contact with the city’s Protestants, the Lutheran clergy proposed a system of geographicallybased parishes. Parish councils formed service committees to handle the material needs of their parishioners, permitting pastors to concentrate more on spiritual matters during their house visits. For the provision of medical and certain types of social assistance, parishes began hiring women from the local deaconess house, making these women de facto the first group of female parish officials. In addition, Lutherans and Calvinists exploited new, urban forms of sociability, like the voluntary association and the press, to reach out to the city’s Protestants. Indeed, Strasbourg’s larger and more diverse population made possible a greater number of religious associations and newspapers, through which it was also possible to cater to the specific religious requirements of groups within the larger community. The city’s Lutherans and Protestants created channels that allowed urban religious culture to spread more effectively into the countryside. They also elaborated alternative notions of religious community, which were anchored in, but no longer dependent on the traditional parish. The final chapter functions as the book’s third section. It is devoted to the issue of Protestant church reform and the modernization of ecclesiastical structures to make them more effective and more responsive to the needs of the urban populations. The local, geographicallydefined parish was formally established as the base of the entire church structure, and given greater autonomy. Church decision-making was reorganized in accord with liberal legal (rechtstaatlich) principles. The church governments gained a greater degree of independence from the state, especially with respect to managing their internal affairs. Even women were to gain the right to vote at the parish level, reflecting

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their active involvement in local religious life. In short, Strasbourg’s Protestant Churches sought to take advantage of modernity, not to pursue “antimodern” agendas, as Wilfried Loth once characterized the goal of Catholic modernization efforts, but à la Inspector Knittel, to realize better Protestant ecclesiastical principles.57 Hesitant to support reforms that might serve as precedents either for altering Catholic church-state relations in the Reichsland or political reform elsewhere in the Empire, the Reichsland’s government ultimately scaled back many of the Churches’ proposals. But it did proceed to draw up legislation to grant many of their wishes in bills that the territorial Assembly would have approved, had war not broken out in 1914 first. There is still much we need to learn about religion’s encounter with modernity in the urban environment, in Imperial Germany as in late nineteenth-century Europe more generally. The history of Strasbourg presented here will not alone fill this gap, but it makes a valuable contribution. It calls attention to developments in a type of big city that heretofore have not figured significantly in the historiography. It makes official religious institutions and practices key figures in the analysis, rather than topics to be dismissed or explained away. Above all, in arguing that the time has come to move beyond the old chestnut of the “secular” big city, it hopes to provoke further investigation of urban religion and, thereby, engage further debate on the consequences of European modernity.

57 Loth, “Einleitung,” in Deutscher Katholizismus im Umbruch zur Moderne, ed. idem (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1991), 9 –19, here 11.

CHAPTER ONE

FROM GRANDE VILLE TO HAUPTSTADT On the morning of 28 September 1870, after a devastating siege of fifty days, the French troops guarding Strasbourg capitulated to the opposing German forces. The heavy bombardment damaged the town’s fabled fortifications and many neighborhoods so badly that further resistance was pointless. In terms of military strategy, this victory was not significant. The German army had already established its mastery of eastern France after beating Napoleon III at Sedan earlier in the month and the real focus of the Franco-Prussian war was shifting towards Paris.1 Symbolically, however, Strasbourg’s capture was critical. It fulfilled the dream of nineteenth-century German nationalists, including the historian Heinrich von Treitschke who argued that a new Germany would be incomplete as long as Strasbourg, the wondrously fair city and pride of the old German empire, remained in French hands.2 To underscore this shift in geopolitical fortunes, the German leaders in Strasbourg celebrated their victory in a particularly evocative fashion.

1 The French Republic was proclaimed on 3 September, one day after Napoleon III surrendered at Sedan; because of the siege, however, Strasbourg’s citizens only heard this news on 11 September. Roger Price, The French Second Empire: An Anatomy of Political Power (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 452 – 62; Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:178–79; and on the war itself, Geoffrey Wawro, The Franco-Prussian War: The German Conquest of France in 1870 –1871 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), especially 225 – 60. 2 Over the course of the nineteenth century, the eighteenth-century folksong “O Straßburg, Du wunderschöne Stadt” became quite popular across Germany like the “Deutschlandlied” and the “Wacht am Rhein” as influential promoters of German cultural nationalism. On the history of “O Straßburg,” see Ludwig Erk and Frank M. Böhme, ed., Deutscher Liederhort. Auswahl der vorzüglicheren deutschen Volkslieder, nach Wort und Weise aus der Vorzeit und Gegenwart, 3 vols. (Leipzig: Georg Olms, 1893), 3:259 – 60. Regarding the folksong’s contribution to German nationalist sentiment, see George L. Mosse, The Nationalization of the Masses: Political Symbolism and Mass Movements in Germany from the Napoleonic Wars through the Third Reich (New York: Howard Fertig, 1975), 138–40; and Carl Dahlhaus, Nineteenth-Century Music (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), 110 –11. Treitschke’s famous demand of Strasbourg (and Alsace) as the fruits of Germany’s victory over France appeared in “Was fordern wir von Frankreich,” Preussische Jahrbücher 26 (1870): 367– 409, republished as “What We Demand From France,” in Germany, France, Russia, and Islam (New York and London: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1915), 96 –79.

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They held a special worship service for the troops on 30 September, the very day on which the free German city of Strasbourg surrendered to Louis XIV’s French troops back in 1681. By itself, this act serves as a useful reminder of the ways in which religion and ideas of national identity were linked in nineteenth-century German Europe. Hartmut Lehmann has emphasized that narratives of Germanness during this high season of nation building drew heavily on the notion that God was with the Germans, that they benefited from His special aid and protection, which made it all the more essential that momentous victories were marked with religious celebrations of thanksgiving.3 The specific choice of venue for this service was equally telling. For rather than holding this liturgy at the Cathedral, that icon of Strasbourg’s medieval German past, the Germans gathered at the Lutheran parish of St. Thomas. It was this Protestant setting that served as a legacy of Strasbourg’s Reformation past and an emblem of its multiconfessional present, where field chaplain Emil Frommel offered thanks and rejoiced that Strasbourg’s future lies with the “Protestant German Empire of the German Nation.”4 Strasbourg’s return to Germany certainly marked the beginning of a new era in the city’s history. After 1871, the major French city ( grande ville) and departmental seat became the capital (Hauptstadt) of the German imperial territory (Reichsland ) of Alsace-Lorraine. This change in status along with the reconstruction work set in motion forces that turned Strasbourg into a big city, a Großstadt. Critical as these developments were, so too were the continuities between the French and German periods. The foundations for Strasbourg’s prominence as an administrative, commercial, transportation and intellectual center were all established well before 1870. So too were the basic elements of its religious culture. The city counted large numbers of Catholics, Protestants and Jews among its residents. It was also a major ecclesiastical center: the seat of a large Catholic diocese, both a Calvinist and a

Lehmann, “ ‘God Our Old Ally’.” Emil Frommel, O Straßburg, du wunderschöne Stadt! Alte und neue, freudvolle und leidvolle, fremd und eigene Erinnerungen eines Feldpredigers vor Straßburg im Jahre 1870 (Stuttgart: J. F. Steinkopf, 1911). This reworking of the old Holy Roman Empire’s formal name came from another military chaplain, Adolf Stoecker; Kurt Nowak, Geschichte des Christentums, 158. On the specifically Protestant dimension of German national sentiment, see above all Smith, German Nationalism, esp. 17– 50; and, more recently, Gross, War Against Catholicism. 3 4

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Jewish consistory, and the superior organs of church government for the French Lutheran church. Finally, while the peace treaty between Germany and France severed the bonds between the various French and Alsatian (and Lorrainer) church institutions, the challenges of the transition period impressed upon the Germans the desirability of retaining French ecclesiastical law in their new territory. Consequently, as Alsace-Lorraine entered the newly established German Empire in 1871, it found that it already enjoyed one of the benefits of membership in this “nation of provincials”: its own regional church law.5 Strasbourg, Frontier City By 1870, the citizens of Strasbourg could reflect on more than five hundred years as an important urban center. Until 1681, the Republic of Strasbourg enjoyed a position as one of the leading free cities of the Holy Roman Empire. Like the late medieval and early modern cities of Augsburg and Nuremberg, Strasbourg owed much of its initial fame and glory to a propitious location on the crossroads of major European travel routes. Commerce and artisanal production thrived, swelling the city’s coffers and its influence over other towns and villages in the upper Rhine valley.6 Strasbourg’s golden age coincided with the turbulent years of the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, a time of religious crisis, reform, and eventually war.7 Under the leadership of city fathers like Jacob Sturm and theologians like Martin Bucer, Strasbourg emerged as an independent center of the Protestant Reformation and further developed its reputation as a cultural and intellectual capital. At the same time that the promotion of humanism, tolerance, and religious reform fueled spectacular growth in the area of publishing and book production, the city opened a new school in 1538—the Gymnasium—to give the burghers’ sons a proper humanistic and theological training. Three decades later, the upper forms of this institution were split off 5 According to the Imperial Constitution of 1871, ecclesiastical policy was the prerogative of the individual German states. Consequently, this bit of Alsatian particularism was not particular, but rather a sign of the Reichsland’s membership in what Celia Applegate has called the “nation of provincials.” Nipperdey, Deutsche Geschichte 1866 –1918, vol. 2, Machtstaat vor der Demokratie (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1992), 85 – 86; Appelgate, Nation of Provincials, 11–15. 6 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 2:99 –177. 7 Ibid., 2:177–354.

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to form the municipal Academy, which became the University of Strasbourg in 1621.8 The sixteenth- and seventeenth-century wars of religion presented a constant threat to the city’s religious arrangements and its independence. In 1555, for instance, the Peace of Augsburg forced a (temporary) restoration of Catholicism to the city (a situation called the Interim). Orthodox Lutherans took advantage of the city’s diplomatic weaknesses—and the treaty’s failure to recognize anything other than Lutheranism and Catholicism—to expel rival forms of Protestantism from the city and declared Strasbourg a Lutheran Republic in 1598.9 Strasbourg survived the Thirty Years War (1618–48) largely intact, but the Peace of Westphalia installed a new danger at the city’s door: France. Having acquired most of Upper Alsace from the Habsburgs, Louis XIV wished to consolidate his holdings so that the Rhine formed France’s eastern frontier, and this meant stripping the Alsatian free cities, Strasbourg above all, of their autonomy. One by one, Louis’ armies did precisely that, and on 30 September 1681 Strasbourg fell into Bourbon French hands.10 Incorporation into France had a number of notable consequences for Strasbourg. For starters, the former free city became the center of French administration in Alsace, the capital of the Intendancy of Alsace. Thanks to its strategically valuable position on the Rhine, Strasbourg also emerged as a major French military outpost, complete with an extensive set of fortifications designed by Louis XIV’s military engineer, the Marquis de Vauban. In religious terms, Strasbourg’s fall to France resulted in the return of Catholicism. Lutheranism continued on in Strasbourg, protected by the capitulation agreement and the treaty of Westphalia, but until the middle part of the eighteenth-century, the French state made life very difficult for the city’s Lutheran residents. 8 The literature on late fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Strasbourg is enormous. For a synthesis and bibliographic overview, the best starting place is Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 2:365 – 541 (“La Réforme”). On the rule of the city magistrates, see Thomas A. Brady, Ruling Class, Regime and Reformation in Strasbourg (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1978), and Lorna Jane Abray, The People’s Reformation: Magistrates, Clergy, and Commons in Strasbourg 1500 –1598 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1985). On books and publishing, see above all Miriam Chrisman, Lay Culture, Learned Culture: Books and Social Change in Strasbourg, 1480 –1599 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982). 9 In particular, the tense religious-political situation after 1555 enabled the Lutherans to close down the Reformed congregation, where John Calvin himself had ministered between 1538 – 40. Abray, People’s Reformation, 104 – 62. 10 Rodolphe Reuss, Histoire de Strasbourg depuis ses origines jusqu’à nos jours (Paris: Librairie Fischbacher, 1922), 241– 51; Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 3:3 –108.

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They had to relinquish the Cathedral to the Bishop of Strasbourg, and share the Old and Young St. Peter churches with the Catholics (a practice referred to as the simultaneum). Catholics were free to proselytize throughout the city, whereas the public exercise of Lutheranism was strictly controlled. Nevertheless, institutions like the University and the Gymnasium remained in Lutheran hands. Lutheran elites discovered, as well, that the French state was a good ally in their efforts to keep Reformed Protestantism out of Strasbourg.11 Although Strasbourg’s commercial position declined somewhat over the course of the eighteenth century, it was still regarded as one of the great inland ports in Europe. Even more significantly, it became a privileged point for human and intellectual exchange between France and German Europe. As a French provincial capital, Strasbourg was exposed to a wide range of influences emanating from “the interior.” Recognizing the political, commercial, and social benefits to be gained, local elites began learning the French language. Court officials imported the latest styles and dances from Paris. Parisian-styled hôtels also sprang up in parts of the city, such as the Palais épiscopal de Rohan. Literary societies and salons became part of Strasbourg’s cultural scene in this period, when men like Jean-Daniel Salzmann gathered to discuss the latest writings of philosophes like Voltaire or Diderot.12 German culture also flourished in eighteenth-century Strasbourg. The Protestant University enjoyed considerable renown, especially in the areas of law, medicine, and letters, drawing students from across Germany to its doors, including a young poet named Goethe. Fluent in both their native German and French, Strasbourg’s intellectuals played a key role as translators in the eighteenth-century republic of letters. They absorbed information and ideas from German sources, spoke and wrote about them in French, and then repeated the process working from French back into German. Strasbourg’s theaters, too, served as a point of cultural contact, hosting both troupes from Paris and itinerant Germans musicians like Mozart.13 11 The best single study of eighteenth-century Strasbourg remains Franklin R. Ford, Strasbourg in Transition, 1648 –1789 (New York: W. W. Norton, 1958), but see also Rapp and Livet, Histoire de Strasbourg, vol. 3. On the exclusion of Reformed Protestants from Strasbourg, see Rodolphe Reuss, Notes pour servir à l’histoire de l’Église française de Strasbourg, 1538 –1794 (Strasbourg: Treuttel et Würtz, 1880). 12 Ford, Strasbourg, 169 –206; Bernard Vogler, Histoire culturelle de l’Alsace (Strasbourg: La nuée bleue, 1993), 145 – 57. 13 Ford, Strasbourg, 166 – 69 and 207– 34; Vogler, Histoire culturelle, 136 – 42 and 160 – 64.

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During the age of the French Revolution and Napoleon, Strasbourg underwent a transformation that marked its emergence as a modern, French city. The events of the early Revolutionary period destroyed most of the institutions and socioeconomic practices that had defined the city for centuries. The National Assembly’s attack on privilege and the creation of a unitary state based on the rule of common law ended the reign of the intendants and city magistrates. With the extension of religious tolerance in France, Reformed Protestants and Jews could both live and practice their religion freely in the city. However, assets from the Catholic church were seized as “national property” in 1789,14 and during the waves of de-Christianization that accompanied the Reign of Terror (1793–94) all public exercise of religion was proscribed. The outbreak of war in 1792, too, left its mark on the city. The University was closed in 1793 on suspicion that it was a center of pro-German sentiment and public documents that had once been published in French and German were now released only in French. The blockade of commercial traffic on the Rhine, moreover, all but ruined this critical sector of the municipal economy.15 Nevertheless, the institutions of the new regime confirmed, even enhanced Strasbourg’s basic character as an administrative, commercial, transportation, cultural, and ecclesiastical center. The city was named as the seat of the Department of Lower Alsace (Bas-Rhin), one of eighty-three such units in Revolutionary France. The nomination of prefects to the departmental seats during Napoleon’s reign heightened the concentration of administrative services in French cities like Strasbourg. The prefects were the central government’s point men in the departments. They ensured the implementation and enforcement of state policy within their jurisdictions, and served as the sole point

14 Alsace’s Protestant deputies to the National Assembly, Christophe-Guillaume Koch above all, managed to exempt most of the region’s Protestant holdings from this nationalization. Robert Will, “Les Églises protestantes de Strasbourg pendant la Révolution française,” RHPR 18 (1939): 262–87. On the religious situation in Revolutionary France, the best introduction is now Nigel Aston, Religion and Revolution in France, 1780 –1804 (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press of America, 2000). 15 Ford, Strasbourg, 235 – 57; Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 3:565 – 66; and Bernard Vogler and Michel Hau, Histoire économique de l’Alsace (Strasbourg: La nuée bleue, 1997), 113–21. On the reorganization of France during the first phase of the Revolution, see especially Michael P. Fitzsimmons, The Remaking of France: The National Assembly and the Constitution of 1791 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), and, with respect to the cities, Ted Margadant, Urban Rivalries in the French Revolution (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 21– 83 and 145 – 219.

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of communication between central and local instances of government. Because the prefect was there, branches of other state agencies, such as the office of direct and indirect taxes and the bureau for bridges and roads, also set up shop in Strasbourg. Napoleon’s foreign policy successes permitted a recovery of Strasbourg’s commercial fortunes, and after 1805 it benefited handsomely from the Continental System. Peace in France and improved tax revenues also enabled city and departmental officials to begin rebuilding the road system that linked Alsatian towns and villages to Strasbourg, as well as Strasbourg to Paris. The city’s standing as an educational hub was also reaffirmed under Napoleon. Not only was one of the state’s secondary schools—lycées—created there (and the Protestant Gymnasium recognized as a lycée), but Strasbourg was named as the seat for one of the regional divisions (Académie) of the new state educational monopoly (the Université). In 1808, the university returned like a phoenix from the ashes, as Strasbourg became the only city apart from Paris with a full complement of the new Facultés of superior instruction—law, letters, mathematical and physical sciences, medicine, pharmacy—as well as one of Protestant theology.16 The creation of the Faculty of Protestant theology attests, lastly, to the First Consul and Emperor’s pathbreaking ecclesiastical reforms. Wishing to promote peace within France by ending the animosities stemming from the Revolutionary government’s disastrous religious policy, Napoleon restored the public exercise of organized religion. Through three sets of legislation—the Concordat of 1801, the Organic Articles of 1802, and the “Regulations” of 1806 and 1808—Napoleon extended state recognition to four faith communities: Catholics, Calvinists, Lutherans, Jews. Significantly, while the Concordat acknowledged that Catholicism was “the religion of the majority of the French,” Catholics did not receive preferential treatment. Rather, the members of four groups—and the “churches” themselves—were treated as equal under the law, ending the practice by which Calvinists, Jews and Lutherans were but “second-class” Frenchmen and women. This equality entailed that the four faith communities were also subjected to a similar regime of state oversight and control. The French state appointed their leaders, and confirmed the nominations of lower clergy and rabbis. It charged the clergy to look after public morals, but carefully regulated whether

16 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 3:508–602; Margadant, Urban Rivalries, 413–28; Vogler and Hau, Histoire économique, 131–38.

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and how church assemblies could meet. Furthermore, no major issue of church policy, especially in the area of discipline and doctrine, could take effect without state approval.17 This ecclesiastical reorganization also made Strasbourg an ecclesiastical capital second only to Paris.18 The Catholic diocese for all of Alsace (Bas- and Haut-Rhin) was located there. Additionally, Strasbourg was the seat of a Reformed and a Jewish consistory, that is, regional instances of the two communities’ decentralized ecclesiastical structures. And in keeping with French Lutheranism’s geographical concentration in the East, Strasbourg became home not just to a Faculty of Protestant Theology, but also the superior organs of Lutheran church government for France: the Directory and the General Consistory.19 After 1815, Strasbourg continued its development as a major French city. As with many urban areas on both sides of the Rhine, growth was slow in Strasbourg between 1815 and 1848, due to the conservative political atmosphere, repeated agricultural crises, and restrictions on trade and mobility. Nevertheless, between 1820 and 1846 the city did see its population increase from some 50,000 to 64,000 people, enough to retain its position among France’s ten largest cities.20 Most of this growth was the result of renewed immigration to the city, since throughout the French era the rate of natural increase in Strasbourg was strongly negative.21 Why did people come to Strasbourg? In part, 17 Cf. Jean-Étienne-Marie-Portalis, Discours, rapports et travaux inédits sur le Concordat de 1801, ed. Frédéric Portalis (Paris: Joubert, 1845), 58–84; for the Jewish legislation, see Phyllis Cohen Albert, The Modernization of French Jewry: Consistory and Community in the Nineteenth Century (Hanover, NH: Brandeis University Press, 1977), 345 –349. 18 Cf. Boudon, Paris: capitale religieuse. However, Boudon’s fine study neglects to discuss the capital’s significance for French Judaism and Protestantism. 19 On the general scope of Napoleon’s religious politics, especially vis-à-vis the Catholics, see Aston, Religion and Revolution, 316 – 48, and for Alsace, Francis Rapp, Le Diocèse de Strasbourg (Paris: Beauchesne, 1982). For the Protestant situation, the key studies are Marcel Scheidhauer, Les Églises luthériennes en France 1800 –1815: Alsace-MontbéliardParis (Strasbourg: Éditions Oberlin, 1975); and Daniel Robert, Les Églises Reformées en France (1800 –1830) (Paris: Librairie Protestante, 1961). Albert, Modernization, remains the standard work on the organization of French Jewry. A lengthier discussion of Protestantism in nineteenth-century Strasbourg follows in the next section. 20 Agulhon, La ville de l’âge industriel, 43–59; Cohen, Urban Government, 1–19; and André Jardin and André-Jean Tudesq, Restoration and Reaction, 1815 – 48 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 310 –12. Significantly, with 71,000 inhabitants in 1851, Strasbourg was also larger than all but seven German cities; Reulecke, Urbanisierung, 14–35 and 203. 21 The best overview of Strasbourg’s history during the Bourbon Restoration is now Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:5 – 88, but see also the important remarks in Paul Leuilliot, L’Alsace au début du XIX e siècle (1815 –1830), 3 vols. (Paris: S.E.V.P.E.N, 1960).

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it is because transportation improvements made it easier to do so. By 1830, regular road traffic between Strasbourg and points west (Paris, Lyon, Metz) and east (Germany via the Rhine bridge to Kehl) had been restored. In 1825, steam-powered navigation arrived on the Rhine; river-based transportation was further enhanced with the completion of canals linking the Rhine to the Rhône (1834), Ill (1841) and Marne (1853) rivers. After 1840 came the railways. The line linking Strasbourg to Basel via Mulhouse opened in 1841 and the tracks connecting Strasbourg to Paris via Metz were completed a decade later in 1852.22 People also came to Strasbourg for both the short and long term, because of the gradual upturn in business conditions after 1830. Strasbourg’s commercial sector picked up markedly during the July Monarchy, as did such light industry sectors as brewing, tanning, and milling. The major transportation projects, coupled with the urban renewal projects of Mayor Georges-Frédéric Schutzenberger (1837– 1848), such as the quays along the Ill river and Ill canal, gas lighting, and new primary schools, all stimulated Strasbourg’s emergence as a regional banking and credit capital, capped off by the Bank of France’s decision to open a branch there in 1842. Strasbourg’s reputation as a relatively liberal city also made it an attractive place for refugees from Central Europe, including such notables as the romantic nationalist Joseph von Görres and the economist Friedrich List.23 After the tumultuous Revolutionary years of 1848–49, Strasbourg experienced an even greater period of development. Mayors like Charles-Louis Coulaux (1852–64) and Théodore Humann (1864–70) devoted themselves to the task of modernizing the urban setting. They built, straightened, and repaired streets. They erected sidewalks, introduced stricter building codes, and imposed new regulations for heating and waste collection. The city also continued its building program, which by 1870 included six primary schools, edifices for the school of medicine and the military’s school of health, a municipal slaughterhouse, and a Catholic church (namely, extensions to the Catholic part of Old St. Peter). Commerce also flourished in Strasbourg as it had not since the days of Napoleon. The number of banks in Strasbourg quadrupled between 1848 and 1870. Import and export houses benefited from the

22 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:57– 62; Vogler and Hau, Histoire économique, 131– 34. 23 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:62 – 66 and 95 – 96; Vogler, Histoire politique de l’Alsace (Strasbourg: La nuée bleue, 1995), 95 – 96.

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free trade agreements of 1860 and the continued expansion of the railroad network. In 1856 alone, the three lines connecting Strasbourg with Saverne, Sélestat and Wissembourg transported some 650,000 travelers and 157,000 tons of merchandise.24 However, because of the fortifications, serious industrial development remained foreign to Strasbourg, a fact that helped explain its modest rate of demographic growth. Whereas the onset of industrialization pushed French peers like Toulouse and Lille to expand by 35 and 105 percent, respectively, and German counterparts like Frankfurt am Main and Königsberg to increase by 40 and 53 percent, Strasbourg’s population increased by only a mere twelve percent between 1851 and 1861, namely from 75,500 to 84,100 total inhabitants (including military).25 Intellectually and culturally, Second Empire Strasbourg was overshadowed only by Paris. Its university Faculties were among the most renowned in France; its professors included such luminaries as Fustel de Coulanges and Louis Pasteur. Its professors of Medicine and Protestant Theology enjoyed renown even beyond France’s borders. Strasbourg was the place where the elite of Alsace were schooled, whether at the state run lycée, the Protestant Gymnasium, or the Catholic collège épiscopal (also known as the petit séminaire). In addition, the city boasted one of France’s most extended systems of primary education, with a normal school for males, a normal school for Protestant women, and eleven primary schools intra muros (within the city walls).26 Cultural life also flourished on the Ill, despite censorship laws and restrictions on associational life. Strasbourg’s intellectuals, civil servants, and churches helped sustain a bustling printing and publishing business. The city also cultivated an active music scene with an opera, philharmonic society, and, after 1855, a municipal conservatory. Above all, Strasbourg maintained its role as a bridge between French and German cultural worlds. It was a place where one could see a Parisian company perform at the opera one night, and participate in a conference about the

24 Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:13 and 121– 29; see also André Sayous, “L’Évolution de Strasbourg entre les deux guerres (1871–1914),” Annales d’histoire économique et sociale 6 (1934): 1– 9 and 122 – 32, here 4 –7. 25 John M. Merriman, “Introduction: Images of the Nineteenth-Century French City,” in French Cities in the Nineteenth Century, ed. idem (New York: Holmes & Meier, 1981), 11– 41; Reulecke, Urbanisierung, 203. 26 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:154 – 64; on the educational system see also François Igersheim, Politique et Administration dans le Bas-Rhin (1848 –1870) (Strasbourg: Presses Universitaires de Strasbourg, 1993), 463 – 64.

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latest German medical discoveries the next. State officials may have aggressively promoted the French language in Alsace after 1850, but German remained a language of intellectual, religious and popular culture in Strasbourg, facilitating the diffusion of ideas—especially in theology—from one side of the Rhine to the other.27 Finally, nineteenth-century Strasbourg was a place where labels like “Lutheran,” “Catholic” and “Jew” mattered profoundly. They were not “moldy relics of ancient quarrels,” but markers of social realities that the very conditions of everyday life actively reinforced. Indeed, whereas much of German Europe enjoyed a brief respite from interconfessional conflict in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the religious policies of the Revolution kept it alive in Strasbourg.28 The data in Table 1.1 reveal a particular facet of the nature of religious pluralism in modern Strasbourg. Namely, that by 1807, each of the major recognized faith communities—Catholics, Protestants (Lutherans and Calvinists), and Jews—had established a considerable presence in the city. All four groups experienced noticeable growth between 1789 and 1866, but the trends are consistent with the eighteenth century, when Catholic gains were most substantial in absolute terms and as a percentage of the entire population. There was, however, no clear socioeconomic or geographic dimension to religious coexistence in Strasbourg. By the 1850s, Catholics, Protestants, and Jews were well represented in all ranks of municipal society, from the increasingly French-speaking bourgeoisie and civil service, to the lower middle-class, and menu peuple.29 They also lived together in the various parts of the city. Thanks in large part to the constraints imposed by the fortifications, there were no Jewish neighborhoods or distinctly Protestant

27 Georges Foessel, “La Vie quotidienne à Strasbourg à la veille de la guerre de 1870,” in L’Alsace en 1870 –1871, ed. Fernand L’Huillier (Paris: Ophyrs, 1971), 11– 42; and Vogler, Histoire culturelle, 234 –300. 28 Margaret Lavinia Anderson rightly stresses the “new” elements in the nineteenthcentury story of interconfessional coexistence and conflict. Anderson, “Afterword: Living Apart and Together in Germany,” in Smith, Protestants, Catholics, and Jews, 319 – 32, esp. 319 –22. The starting places for the study of interconfessional relations in modern Germany are now the essay collections by Smith (as above) and Blaschke, Konfessionen im Konflikt. 29 Given that Strasbourg’s Calvinist population remained small throughout the nineteenth century and that the socio-theological differences between Lutherans and Calvinists paled in comparison to the differences dividing Protestants from both Catholics and Jews, for the discussion that follows it makes most sense to treat the two Protestant communities as a single group.

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Strasbourg’s civilian population by confession, 1789 –1866

Year

Cath.

%

Luth.

1789 1807 1820 1851a 1861b 1866b

25,700 27,213 27,421 44,292 40,141 43,750

52.27 49.97 48.83 58.61 56.14 57.73

22,570 24,741 25,824 28,112 27,623 27,793

%

Ref.

45.90 830 45.43 887 45.98 916 37.20 653 38.63 900 36.67 1,000

% 1.69 1.63 1.63 0.86 1.26 1.32

Jewish %

Total

68 1,476 2,000 2,387 2,820 3,126

49,168 54,454 56,161 75,565 71,499 75,784

0.14 2.71 3.56 3.16 3.94 4.12

SOURCE: Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, vols. 3 and 4; Statistique de la France, 1861; VBSS 1870–1888/89, 21. a Confessional data for 1851 for entire population, including some 7,403 military personnel. b For 1861 and 1866, the French government did not distinguish between Lutheran and Reformed Protestants. The figures here present an extrapolation based on reported data and figures from Strasbourg’s Reformed parish’s records (ADBR 173 AL).

quartiers in Strasbourg, just as there were no specifically aristocratic or working-class districts. Municipal politics, too, reflected the confessional situation. If the mayor were Catholic (which was normally the case), then the city council selected a Protestant to be the first adjunct mayor (adjoint). Frequently, it also named a Jewish notable to fill one of the other three adjoint positions. Candidate slates for city council elections were also drawn up to give each confessional group its due.30 Strasbourg’s Catholics, Protestants, and Jews may have resided together as neighbors, but they did not mix much outside of their respective milieux.31 During the French Second Empire, the rate of marriage between Catholics and Protestants remained low, and instances

30 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg 4:22–35, 66 –70, 108 –116, and 144 – 47; Will, “Les Églises protestantes de Strasbourg sous le Second Empire: II,” RHPR 29 (1949): 204 – 40, here 239 – 40. Leuilliot has suggested that this balancing of confessional interests represented a continuation of the post-1681 tradition of the “alternative,” by which Protestant municipal officials were replaced by Catholics and vice versa. Leuilliot, L’Alsace au début, 1:26. On the social composition and residential patterns of Strasbourg’s Jews, see Victor Treschan, “The Struggle for Integration: The Strasbourg Jewish Community, 1818–1850,” (Ph.D. Diss., University of Wisconsin, 1978), 16 –19 and 112 –16. 31 I use the word “milieu” here in its general sense, rather than in the analytical manner advocated by M. Rainer Lepsius and advocates of the “milieu” approach to nineteenth-century German religious history. Cf. Lepsius, “Parteisystem und Sozialstruktur,” and Blaschke and Kuhlemann, Religion im Kaiserreich.

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of marriage between Christians and Jews were all but nonexistent.32 Schooling in Strasbourg also had a strongly confessional flavor. Each of the city’s Lutheran and Catholic parishes maintained its own primary school as did, after much debate, the Jewish community.33 The state-run normal school and the lycée were confessionally mixed establishments, but the Protestant elite still preferred to send their boys to the Protestant Gymnasium for secondary-level studies, while Catholic youth had recourse to the collège épiscopal.34 The new “university” of Strasbourg was equally open to all faiths, but its close association with the city and its Protestant elite endured. Not only did the city’s Lutheran foundations help pay the salaries of the Protestant Theology professors, but the majority of the faculty and a large number of students in the other faculties were themselves Protestant.35 Interconfessional competition also promoted remarkably high levels of literacy in Strasbourg. As part of its traditional encouragement of education, the Lutheran church required regular attendance at school prior to being confirmed at fourteen, and this motivated Catholics to have their youth attend school assiduously before receiving first communion. For its part, the Jewish community saw education as important for promoting social integration, thus, consistory authorities also encouraged parents to send their children to school.36 Schooling was hardly the only area in which confessional particularism left its mark. As one vieux Strasbourgeois recalled, “Protestants and Catholics were like two separate clans. . . . Their habits and even the type of education were different. Protestant social circles were simpler and more bourgeois. . . . Catholic social circles more elegant and more French, at least in that they were more open to the functionaries who had come from the other side of the Vosges and more frequented Unfortunately, there are no reliable figures on “mixed marriages” in Strasbourg for the period prior to 1870. However, based on Protestant reactions to the data for the early Reichsland period, it would appear that mixed marriage rates during the Second Empire were low. AS 42 (1887): 56. 33 Treschan, “Struggle for Integration,” 75 – 85 and 98 – 99. The Jewish community was slower to establish its own primary school out of concern that it would be regarded as a sign of Jewish particularism, that is, a refusal to integrate into the gentile world. 34 Vogler, Histoire culturelle, 220 –21. 35 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:154 – 58. There was a second Protestant seminary at Montauban for French Calvinists, but it did not have the status as a Faculty. 36 Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:162 – 64. In 1870, the general rate of illiteracy in Alsace was two percent, the lowest in France. 32

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by them.”37 Catholics and Protestants preferred different newspapers (respectively L’Alsacien and Le Courrier du Bas-Rhin) and by 1870 each community was publishing its own religious weeklies: the Catholic Volksfreund (1857), the Protestant (pietist) Sonntagsblatt (1863), and the liberal Protestant Progrès religieux (1867). Official publications from the two churches were even handled by different presses, Le Roux for the Diocese of Strasbourg and Heitz for the Lutheran Church.38 Above all, confessional affiliation in French Strasbourg remained a potent marker of social identity because relations among Jews, Catholics, and Protestants were never entirely free of conflict. Until 1848, Strasbourg’s Jews faced a multitude of challenges. From 1808 to 1818, the city council repeatedly barred Jews from working as traders, merchants and shopkeepers by denying them the special license required by the décret infâme of 1808. Similarly, the Catholic prefect of Bas-Rhin and the Catholic-dominated departmental council opposed the creation of a Jewish primary school in Strasbourg after 1815, just as they backed the state run normal school’s refusal to admit Jewish students as boarders.39 Catholic clergy typically leveled attacks against the Jews with the traditional stereotype of Jews as usurers and they promoted conversion as the surest form of Jewish “regeneration.” During the July Monarchy, the Jewish consistory increasingly spoke out against such activities, but anti-Jewish prejudices in the city and countryside remained strong, as evidenced by the rural anti-Semitic riots of 1848. After 1848, JewishGentile relations in Strasbourg improved markedly. Between 1848 and 1870 there were no notable incidents that questioned Jews’ status as citizens, whether of Strasbourg or France.40 Catholics were the largest confessional group in Strasbourg throughout the nineteenth century. They rejoiced when Louis XVIII named Catholicism as the religion of France in 1814, but were dismayed that the king did not also restore their privileged status. In Strasbourg, Catholic leaders remained upset that Protestant church assets had not been confiscated during the French Revolution. They also took it as a 37 Madame la baronne ***, La société de Strasbourg (Colmar: Veuve Camille Decker, 1888), 136. (The BNUS catalog attributes this piece to Karl Frieherr von Kloeckler von Veldegg and Münchenstein, President of the Landesgericht in Colmar and a native Alsatian.) 38 Vogler, Histoire culturelle, 231– 52. 39 Treschan, “Struggle for Integration,” 19 –21, 73 –74, and 125. 40 Treschan, “Struggle for Integration, 125 – 30, 173 –77; Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:144 – 47; and on Catholic-Jewish relations in particular, Muller, Dieu, 731– 57.

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personal affront when state authorities allowed the Lutherans to celebrate the tercentenaries of the Reformation in 1817 and the Augsburg Confession in 1830 and upheld the Organic Articles’ restrictions on Catholic religious processions in Strasbourg. In the 1830s, Bishop Raess also protested loudly against the city’s intent to include a bas-relief of Luther on the planned Gutenberg memorial. Thus, when the statue was unveiled in 1842, not only had Erasmus replaced Luther, but on another panel an image of the Catholic Bossuet took the place of Montesquieu. Such attacks, as well as the steady stream of Catholic vitriol in the clergy’s sermons and bishops’ pastoral letters, were met by a Protestant counterthrust. The Evangelical Society and papers like the Protestantisches Kirchen- und Schulblatt defended themselves vigorously against the Catholic rhetoric, while individual pastors penned pamphlets to mobilize the faithful against what appeared to be the return of the Counter-Reformation.41 The Catholic church’s polemics during the 1820s and 1830s were cause enough for Protestant consternation, but after 1840 the city’s Catholic forces also challenged key Protestant institutions in Strasbourg. In 1843, the departmental council (Conseil général ) demanded that the St. Thomas Foundation, which administered the assets of the former municipal Lutheran church government (Kirchenkonvent), be subjected to the same legal oversight as the Cathedral Chapter. Although the city council blocked this effort in 1846, seven years later the Catholic mayor, Coulaux, had the provisional, Catholic-dominated council call for the municipality to take over the Foundation entirely.42 This represented a serious threat to Protestantism in Strasbourg. The Foundation’s revenues helped maintain the Protestant Seminary and Gymnasium. It provided scholarships for theology students and supported the city library. Luckily for the Protestants, the prefectoral council refused to authorize the suit, and after the city council elections later that year, Coulaux could no longer obtain a majority for his scheme.43 Ten years later tensions flared up when the city sought to end the simultaneum at Young St. Peter by giving the historic church entirely to the rapidly

41 Robert Will, “L’Église protestante de Strasbourg sous la Restauration,” RHPR 22 (1942): 240 –76, esp. 251– 59; idem, “Les Églises protestantes de Strasbourg sous la Monarchie de Juillet,” RHPR 24 (1944): 1– 60, esp. 18 –23. 42 Will, “Restauration,” 25. 43 Robert Will, “Les Églises protestantes de Strasbourg sous le second Empire: I,” RHPR 27 (1947): 64–90, here 82–85; Igersheim, Politique et administration, 264 – 68.

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growing Catholic parish and building a new structure for the Lutheran congregation. Lutheran officials supported the city’s proposal, but the parish dismissed it, regarding it as an attack on the parish’s Lutheran heritage. Led by its president, Friedrich Horning, the parish council obstructed all action on the proposition, forcing the city council to table the entire plan in 1867.44 Events in 1870 further escalated Protestant-Catholic animosity. Protestants ridiculed the First Vatican Council’s actions by branding papal infallibility an “insensible idea” that betrayed the Catholic Church’s authoritarian aims and highlighted just how detached it was from the modern world.45 Alsatian Catholics energetically defended the Council’s decisions.46 When France declared war on the North German Confederation in July, they went on the offensive, questioning Protestants’ patriotism. In a campaign that neatly mirrored Protestant war rhetoric in many parts of Germany, Alsatian Catholic priests portrayed the struggle as a religious war pitting Catholic France against Protestant Germany.47 As Emil Frommel later noted in one of his first reports to Military Governor Friedrich von Bismarck-Bohlen, “In no other French department . . . has the war against Prussia been preached and proclaimed as a Crusade against Protestants as in Alsace. From the outset, Protestants have been placed under extreme suspicion and accused of being in Prussia’s pay.”48 Marie-Joseph-Auguste Pron, prefect of Lower Alsace, was equally convinced of Protestant complicity. On 9 August, he complained to Empress Eugénie in Paris: “The situation in Alsace 44 Will, “Second Empire I,” 85 – 87; see also Wilhelm Horning, Friedrich Theodor Horning. Pfarrer an der Jungsanktpeterkirche. Lebensbild eines Strassburger evangelisch-lutherischen Bekenners im 19. Jahrhundert (Strasbourg: Vomhoff, 1885); and [Seraphin Schott], Actes et démarches se rapportant à la question de l’église Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune depuis l’année 1865 jusqu’en 1886 (Strasbourg: G. Fischbach, 1886), 3. 45 Cf. Progrès religieux, issues for Jan–Aug 1870, passim; Johann Friedrich Bruch, opening address to the 1870 Pastoral Conference, “Bericht über die Verhandlungen von 14. und 15. Juni 1870,” ASPC 6 (1870): 123. 46 Cf. Joseph Brauner, ed., “Briefe von Joseph Guerber an den jungen Carl Marbach, des späteren Weihbischof von Strassburg aus den Jahren 1859 bis 1871,” AEK 8 (1933): 371– 448. 47 See especially here Nipperdey, Religion im Umbruch, 92– 95; Ernst Bammel, Die Reichsgründung und der deutsche Protestantismus (Erlangen: Universtitätsbund Erlangen-Nürnberg e.V., 1973); and Günter Brakelmann, “Der Krieg 1870/71 und die Reichsgründung im Urteil des Protestantismus,” in Kirche zwischen Krieg und Frieden. Studien zur Geschichte des deutschen Protestantismus, ed. Wolfgang Huber and Johannes Schwerdtfeger (Stuttgart: Klett, 1976), 293–320. 48 Emil Frommel to Bismarck Bohlen, 13 September 1870, German Foreign Ministry Files and Microfilms (hereafter GFMFM ), 18 MAE Feld-Akten, vol. 2.

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grows worse every hour. The Protestants are aiding the Prussians. The defense of Strasbourg is impossible with only a few hundred men.”49 Yet, it was ultimately Pron and the French of the “interior” who abandoned the city in its hour of need, fleeing soon after hearing the news that the Second French Empire had collapsed.50 Strasbourg’s native sons, Protestant and Catholic, carried on the fight, relenting only when the fortress’ commander, General Uhrich, himself concluded that the city could hold out no longer. Protestantism in French Strasbourg Although German nationalists regarded the survival of Protestantism in Strasbourg and other Alsatian cities as signs that the “German spirit” had not yet died out in this “German land,” the fact that most Alsatian Lutherans and Calvinists were still speaking German as late as 1870 obscured a deeper truth about Alsatian Protestantism. Due to Napoleon Bonaparte’s reorganization of Protestantism in 1802, the Alsatian Protestant churches developed in ways distinct from those prevailing east of the Rhine. Consequently, it will be helpful first to take stock of the evolution of Protestantism in the wake of the Napoleonic legislation, before assessing the consequences of war and occupation for Strasbourg and its religious communities. When he promulgated the Organic Articles in 1802, the First Consul did much more than to restore the free exercise of the Protestant faith. He created two new Protestant churches for France, whose structures and institutions shaped the development of religious life within the Lutheran and Reformed communities for the rest of the century.51 As part of the Napoleonic notion of ecclesiastical parity through equal

Rodolphe Reuss, Le siège de Strasbourg en 1870. Conférence . . . et Chronique strasbourgeoise Juillet–Août 1870. Textes inédits publiés par Jean Rott (Strasbourg: Librairie Istra, 1971), 15. As the journalist and liberal politician Auguste Schneegans asserted, though, Pron had always privileged looking after his reputation in Paris over attending to the department’s needs; August Schneegans, August Schneegans, 1835 –1898. Memorien. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Elsasses in der Übergangzeit, ed. Hermann Schneegans (Berlin: Gebrüder Paetel, 1904), 41– 45. 50 Alsatians frequently refer to French citizens living to the west of the Vosges as “from the interior.” 51 The Napoleonic legislation that recognized French Jewry in 1808 similarly prompted a complete reorganization of the Jewish community; Albert, Modernization of French Jewry, esp. 45 – 55. 49

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submission to state authority, the basic tenor of Protestant church-state relations paralleled those prevailing in the Catholic church. As agents of the government, only French citizens who were trained in seminaries recognized by the French state could minister in a French parish, whether Protestant or Catholic. Appointments of all religious ministers had to be confirmed by the state and these ministers were required to pray for France and its head of state. The state also had to approve all changes in doctrine, such as the recognition of a particular confession of faith as official church belief, and church discipline (e.g., rules governing the ability to take communion or receive a church wedding). Indeed, virtually every major church government decision—from the appointment of church officials and seminary professors to the convocation of ecclesiastical bodies and administration of church assets—required state authorization.52 With respect to the actual organization of the Lutheran and Reformed churches, the Organic Articles innovated in three main ways. First, unlike most early modern church constitutions (règlements or Kirchenordnungen), the law contained no formal religious provisions. It made no explicit doctrinal endorsements, established no standards of religious behavior, and promoted no specific liturgical practices. In part, these omissions reflected the Legislator’s intent to define only the state’s legitimate interest in the churches (ius circa sacra), rather than make religious prescriptions for the churches (ius in sacra).53 But the absence of such provisions also reflected the government’s assumption that fixed traditions of belief, practice and discipline already existed.54 Not only was this

52 “Articles Organiques des Cultes Protestants, Titre Premier: Dispositions générales pour toutes les communions protestantes.” While this particular manifestation of state authority was uniquely French, Napoleon’s strengthening of state power over the established churches had its parallels in Joseph II’s reforms of the Austrian Catholic church and in the reorganization of the German state churches (Landeskirchen) after 1800. Cf. William David Bowman, Priest and Parish in Vienna, 1780 –1880 (Boston: Humanities Press, 1999); and Franz Schnabel, Deutsche Geschichte im neunzehnten Jahrhundert, vol. 4, Die religiösen Kräfte (Munich: DTV, 1987), 320 – 58. 53 Both Napoleon and Jean-Étienne-Marie Portalis, who was primarily responsible for drafting the actual legislation and seeing it through the Conseil d’État, wanted to avoid any appearance that a (Catholic) head of state could dictate matters of Protestant belief and practice. Paul Lucius, Bonaparte und die protestantischen Kirchen Frankreichs (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1903), 13 –23. 54 Article 22, for instance, provided for the consistories to meet “on the customary days”; the actions of the superior organs of Lutheran church government, too, were to be guided by the “customs” of the church (Article 44).

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not the case, but under the Organic Articles’ provisions the Protestant churches could clarify the situation only with the state’s support, which was never given. Consequently, while the Lutheran Church was officially called the “Church of the Augsburg Confession,” the Augustana’s formal status as church dogma remained vague, a circumstance that provoked considerable controversy once the confessional revival set in.55 The second, and most criticized novelty presented by the Organic Articles was the disappearance of traditional parishes. Jean-ÉtienneMarie Portalis actually intended the parish to be the basic unit of the Protestant church. When the Organic Articles came before the Conseil d’État, however, its Catholic members insisted that the same standard for determining the number of official Catholic parishes be applied to the Protestant churches.56 Since most of the Reformed and Lutheran communities in France were smaller than this (6,000 souls per parish), the Conseil provided for the combination of parishes to create consistorial churches (“consistories”), each staffed by a limited number of paid ministers of equal rank.57 In Strasbourg this meant that only one parish, the Lutheran New Church, was constituted as a consistorial church. The other traditional Lutheran parishes were paired into three consistories: St. Thomas with St. Nicholas, Old St. Peter with St. Aurelia, and Young St. Peter with St. William. For its part, the Reformed consistory of Strasbourg included the city’s congregation as well as several other Reformed communities in the northwest section of the Bas-Rhin department.58 Still, as a minor concession, Portalis allowed the old parish councils to function as “overseers” of the local 55 Cf. Lucius, Bonaparte, 25 – 31; and Ernst Lehr, Dictionnaire d’administration ecclésiastique à l’usage des deux Églises protestantes de France (Paris: Berger-Levrault, 1869), 88 – 89. 56 Catholics were permitted only one parish per canton, which had an average population of 6,000. Befitting the more hierarchical approach to Catholic church government, the parish was led by a single priest, the curé, although in larger (urban) parishes he was assisted by additional ordained clergy (the vicaires and desservants). 57 Lucius, Bonaparte, 36 – 38. Because the consistorial churches could not embrace populations from different departments, this amendment proved especially problematic to the restoration of Calvinist church life in many parts of France; André Encrevé, Protestants français au milieu du XIX e siècle. Les réformés de 1848 à 1870 (Geneva: Labor et Fides, 1986), 73–78. 58 The consistory of Young St. Peter-St. William also included communities outside the city walls, but still within Strasbourg’s immediate vicinity (i.e., Ruprechtsau, Schiltigheim, and Bischheim). Scheidhauer, Églises luthériennes, 147–55. On the limits of the Reformed consistory of Strasbourg, see Marie-Joseph Bopp, Die evangelischen Gemeinden und Hohen Schulen in Elsaß und Lothringen von der Reformation bis zur Gegenwart (Neustadt a. d. Aisch: Degener & Co., 1963), 344 – 47.

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congregations (“petits consistoires”), even if these bodies had no legal standing.59 Lastly, the Organic Articles departed from the churches’ historical institutional arrangements. In place of the hierarchic structure of Reformed Protestantism, the 1802 law created a highly decentralized church. Each consistory existed as an autonomous administrative unit, overseen only by the Ministry for Religious Affairs in Paris. The Reformed churches “of the interior” frequently complained about the absence of superior church councils (synods) and petitioned in vain for their reinstatement.60 In Alsace and Lorraine, consistorial independence preserved local traditions in doctrine, liturgy, and religious life. The Reformed communities in eastern France, thus, treasured the “incompleteness” of the new church organization.61 Composed of the ministers serving within the consistorial district and a number of elders selected from among its wealthiest members, the Reformed consistory’s primary responsibility was administrative. It maintained church discipline, and administered church property and assets. It appointed pastors and approved books for religious instruction (subject to state confirmation). Moreover, as the local Reformed community’s legal representative, the consistory served as the intermediary between the “parishes” and the French state.62 By contrast, whereas French Lutheranism had been characterized by a multitude of independent local churches, the Organic Articles established a single, hierarchical French Lutheran church with its seat in Strasbourg.63 At the base lay the consistorial church, administered Scheidhauer, Églises luthériennes, 115 –17. The Organic Articles contained provisions for regional synods (Section 3), but the French government refused to allow their convocation; Encrevé, Protestants français, 67– 82. 61 Initially, there were three reformed consistories in Alsace and Lorraine: Bischwiller (Bischweiler), Mulhouse and Strasbourg. Two more consistories were established before 1848: Ste-Marie-aux-Mines (Markirch, 1822) and Metz (1830); Bopp, Die evangelischen Gemeinden, 334 – 34. In 1850, however, the consistorial seat for the Lorrainer parishes was transferred to Nancy; Encrevé, Protestants français, 304. 62 The only account of the development of the French Reformed Church that pays significant attention to the situation in Alsace is the first (and only completed) volume of J. C. L. Gieseler [Adam Maeder], Die protestantische Kirche Frankreichs von 1787 bis 1846 (Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, n.d.); but see also Maeder, Notice historique sur la paroisse réformée de Strasbourg (Strasbourg: Berger-Levrault, 1853) and, more generally, Robert, Les Églises réformées, passim. 63 The Organic Articles (Article 40) also created General Consistories for the German Lutherans in Mainz and Cologne, but all French consistories were under the General Consistory of Strasbourg. As part of the 1815 peace settlements, the General 59 60

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by its pastors and elders. The consistories were organized into seven inspections, largely geographic districts established for the purpose of selecting lay delegates (one each) to the General Consistory in Strasbourg, and for naming three men (the religious and lay inspectors) to watch over the clergy and maintain public order within the inspection. At the top of the pyramid stood the General Consistory, the church’s policy-setting body. It was composed of the Church’s lay president, two religious inspectors (all three appointed by the French head of state), and the lay delegates from each inspection. In between the body’s sessions, the church’s affairs were overseen by a Directory, comprised of the Lutheran president, the senior religious inspector, two of the General Consistory’s lay members, and a lay “commissioner” appointed by the government.64 While strong on paper, the Lutheran hierarchy was actually rather feeble for most of the first half of the century. To keep the Lutheran church from becoming too powerful, the French state preferred to convene the inspectoral assemblies and the General Consistory only irregularly, which prevented their development into true deliberative bodies. It also diffused the strength of the Lutheran community in Strasbourg by dividing the Strasbourg consistories into two different inspections. New Church and the Young St. Peter-St. William consistories formed the nexus of one inspection (New Church), while St. Thomas-St. Nicholas and Old St. Peter-St. Aurelia provided the core of another (St. Thomas).65 Although this arrangement suited the state’s purposes, it presented certain disadvantages to the Lutherans in Strasbourg, for the city consistories had no formal means to develop common church policies or negotiate collectively with municipal authorities on matters such as cemetery rights.

Consistories in Mainz and Cologne were disbanded; Brigitte Duda, Die Organisation der evangelischen Kirchen des linken Rheinufers nach den Organischen Artikeln von 1802 (Düsseldorf: Verlag der Evangelischen Kirche im Rheinland, 1971), 94 – 96 and 99 –100. 64 For most of the French period, the state named a lawyer from Strasbourg (usually a member of the law faculty) to serve as this “governmental commissioner.” On the formation of the General Consistory and Directory, see Scheidhauer, Églises luthériennes, 172 – 82 and 256 – 59; and Leuilliot, L’Alsace au début, 157–79. 65 Strohl, Protestantisme, 317–18. Initially, there were seven Lutheran inspections: Bouxwiller, Colmar, Montbéliard, La Petite Pierre (combined with Wissembourg in 1818), Strasbourg-New Church, Strasbourg-St. Thomas, and Wissembourg. The small Lutheran population in Paris was attached to the New Church inspection. Scheidhauer, Églises luthériennes, 156 – 63.

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LORRAINE (Meurthe and Moselle)

Metz

Kurzel (Courcelles-Chaussy) Kleeburg Metz

r en Altweile enhof Died iler we Assweiler Rau Helleringen Saarburg

Steinseltz

ach Oberseebach

Hunsp

Bischweiler Bischweiler

Lixheim Kossweiler

Nancy

Strasbourg

(After 1871, Metz replaced Nancy as the consistorial seat for the Reformed communities in German Lorraine.)

Strasbourg

Hohwald

St. Dié (Prior to 1870, St. Dié belonged to the Markirch Consistory)

LOWER ALSACE (Bas-Rhin)

Markirch Markirch

Gebweiler Sennheim

LEGEND Boundary of future Reichsland district (Bezirk) Consistory boundary

Thann

Illzach

UPPER ALSACE (Haut-Rhin)

Mulhouse Mulhouse

Consistorial seat (chef-lieu) Official parish (as of 1870)

Figure 1.1 The Reformed Church in Alsace and Lorraine (c. 1870) (data from Bulletin des lois, 1852 and Bopp, Evangelischen Gemeinden).

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LORRAINE

Weissenburg

Saargemünd (est. 1876) Lützelstein (La Petite Pierre)

Saarunion

(all Lutheran communities in Lorraine belonged to this inspection)

Finstingen

de

Nie

en

ering

Diem

nn rbro Weissenburg

Oberbronn

Wörth Sulz u. Wald n e Hatt

Lützelstein Ingwei ler Drulingen Pfaffenhoffen Buchsweiler

Buchsweiler

r

eile chw

Bis

eim Dettweiler dratzh Brumath Schwin New Church Vendenheim im Wasselnheim Strasbourg nhe Itte New Church:

Dorlisheim

LOWER ALSACE (Bas-Rhin)

Geispolsheim St. Thomas Rothau Barr

Gerstheim

New Church, Young St. Peter, St. William St. Thomas:

St. Thomas, St. Nicholas, St. Aurelia, Old St. Peter

Sundhausen

Markirch Reichenweier Colmar Andolsheim Münster Colmar

UPPER ALSACE (Haut-Rhin) LEGEND Inspection boundary District boundary (former dépt.) Seat of inspection Consistorial seats (chef-lieux)

Figure 1.2 The Lutheran Church in Alsace and Lorraine (c. 1870) (data from Bulletin des lois, 1852 and Bopp, Evangelischen Gemeinden).

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Despite repeated calls for institutional change from within both Protestant communities, no modifications to the Organic Articles occurred until mid-century, when, as one of his final acts as Prince-President, LouisNapoleon Bonaparte issued the Decree-Law of 26 March 1852.66 This text altered the letter of the Napoleonic legacy in Protestant church law, but not its spirit.67 Its most celebrated feature was the formal recognition of the parish, which precipitated a series of changes in consistory boundaries within both Churches (see Figures 1.1 and 1.2). The Reformed community that worshipped on Strasbourg’s rue Bouclier now became an official parish, as did the seven Lutheran “petits consistoires,” which gave Strasbourg a total of eight Lutheran parishes: New Church, Young St. Peter, St. William, St. Thomas, St. Nicholas (German-language), St. Nicholas (French-language), Old St. Peter, and St. Aurelia.68 At each parish, the Decree-Law instituted parish councils, composed of the parish’s pastors and a group of four to seven elders elected according to the “parochial suffrage,” that is, by adult males who were at least thirty years of age and had registered themselves in the parish.69 Nevertheless, in good Bonapartist fashion, this democratic gesture was of limited value.70 Parishes enjoyed no real autonomy. Their resolutions still required consistorial approval and, in the Lutheran church, that of the Directory as well. Indeed, technically speaking, 66 On the churches’ reform efforts during the July Monarchy and the Second Republic, see Strohl, Protestantisme, 322–32; Will, “Monarchie de Juillet”; idem, “L’Eglise protestante de Strasbourg sous la Séconde République,” RHPR 26 (1946): 166 – 69; Encrevé, Protestants français, 169 – 231; and Alfred Krüger, Die geschichtliche Entwicklung der Verfassung der Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession von Elsaß-Lothringen von 1789 –1852 (Berlin: Juristische Verlagsbuchhandlung Dr. jur. Frensdorf, 1913), 85 –117. 67 See Recueil officiel des actes du Consistoire supérieur et du Diectoire de l’Église chrétienne de la Confession d’Augsbourg en France (hereafter RO) 9 (1851–52): 179 – 83, and, for, the implementing ordinances, RO 10 (1852): 18 –31 and 59 – 66. 68 The French-language congregation at St. Nicholas had enjoyed the status of “petit consistoire” since 1845; Karl Theodor Gerold, Geschichte der Kirche St. Nikolaus im Straßburg. Ein Beitrag zur Kirchengeschichte Straßburgs, quellenmäßig gearbeitet (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1904), 89 – 90. A consequence of the Decree-Law’s implementation was that four Strasbourg consistories (New Church, St. Thomas, St. Aurelia and Old St. Peter) functioned simultaneously as parish councils, since there was only one parish in their respective “districts.” The other three Strasbourg consistories (Young St. Peter, St. William, and St. Nicholas) had jurisdiction over two or more parishes. 69 With the ordinances of 10 September and 12 November 1852, the Ministry delineated the parish council’s and consistory’s attributions, while also establishing election procedures to the two bodies; RO 10 (1852): 18–31 and 59 – 66. Where the parish and consistory coincided, the parish council-consistory had fourteen members. 70 See Price, Second French Empire, 41–54.

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the consistory and not the parish still served as the foundation of the churches’ ecclesiastical structures.71 Apart from the recognition of the local parish, the Decree-Law made few substantive changes to the Reformed Church’s organization. Consistories continued to appoint the pastors for the parishes within their jurisdiction, although a parish could now officially present candidates for its vacant positions. The legislation also created a central council for the entire Reformed church, which had its seat in Paris. This “Conseil central” issued advisory opinions on Reformed church issues to the French state. It also coordinated the evaluation of candidates for chairs in Reformed theology at Strasbourg and the Calvinist Seminary at Montauban. But it had no direct power over the consistories, which retained the autonomy granted them by the Organic Articles. The Decree-Law had greater consequences for Lutheran Church governance. For one, the church became more hierarchical. The Lutheran consistories lost most of their autonomy and their appointment powers. The Decree-Law replaced the General Consistory with the Superior Consistory, which was a larger, more powerful body that now had to meet annually.72 It watched over the church’s constitution and discipline, and devised regulations to order the church’s internal affairs. It approved all books and liturgical materials intended for use in the parishes or in religious education. It supervised the financial administration of the consistories and parishes and rendered judgments on disputes arising within the church. Yet, here too, Louis-Napoleon kept the Church’s wings clipped. The Superior Consistory sessions had to meet in the presence of the prefect of Bas-Rhin (or his representative); similarly, the body could only pass resolutions on matters that appeared on the state-approved agenda. Not only was state sanction required before any church resolution to take effect, but the state alone could issue the ordinances and regulations necessary to implement the

71 This was evident, above all, in that every part of Protestant France was allotted to a specific consistory (Lutheran or Reformed), and not a specific parish. 72 The Lutheran president continued to sit in (and chair) the Superior Consistory, but each inspection now sent two lay delegates along with its religious inspector to the Superior Consistory sessions. The Decree-Law also gave the Protestant Seminary in Strasbourg a seat on the Superior Consistory. Thus, after the ordinance of 12 November 1852 reestablished the Inspection of La Petite Pierre and created an Inspection of Paris, the Superior Consistory had a total twenty-seven members (president, governmental commissioner, seminary delegate, plus three delegates from eight inspections).

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1852 legislation. Lastly, the Decree-Law transformed the Directory into the Lutheran Church’s executive and administrative authority. It named parish clergy and appointed vicars, and recommended men to serve as religious inspectors, who were now to be chosen by the state in view of their enhanced administrative duties.73 The Directory oversaw the Protestant Gymnasium and the Seminary, appointing faculty at both institutions; it could also weigh in on candidates for vacancies at Strasbourg’s Faculty of Protestant Theology. Public reaction to the Decree-Law varied widely. The Reformed Consistory of Strasbourg regarded it favorably since it actually changed little.74 Alsatian Lutherans were much less enthusiastic. They appreciated neither the heightened degree of centralization nor the increased level of state authority in internal church matters. But their primary grievance was with the Directory’s new appointment prerogatives.75 Under the new system, neither the concerned parish nor the consistory had any voice in selecting the parish’s leaders, the men whose training uniquely qualified them to be caregivers, teachers, and organizers of religious life for the community. Even though the Directory was located in Strasbourg, the city’s Lutheran community was equally concerned about this development. The twenty-three positions at the eight inner-city parishes were among the best paid and prestigious in the Church. Residence in Strasbourg also offered cultural and educational opportunities to pastors and their families without equal in the region. Consequently, once someone received a Lutheran position in the city, he usually remained there until his death.76 Above all, the changes to the pastoral appointment process aroused strong passions because by 1850 the Lutheran church was divided into three distinct theological camps or factions: liberalism, pietism, and confessional orthodoxy.77 Although it might be tempting to dismiss

The religious inspectors’ expanded administrative functions were enumerated in the ordinance of 10 November 1852; RO 10 (1852): 59 – 66. 74 The Reformed community in the rest of France was decidedly negative in its assessment of the Decree-Law; Encrevé, Protestants français, 816 –39. 75 Will, “Second Empire I,” 78 – 82. 76 With its relatively small congregation, Strasbourg was not a particularly attractive posting for Reformed ministers (Mulhouse was much more prestigious). Nevertheless, there too, longevity in office proved to be the norm. Between 1802 and 1870 the German-language parish had only one pastor, Adam Maeder (1816 –72), and the French-language congregation only two, Matthias Richard (1820 –1862) and Christian Karl Paira (1862–72). 77 The Methodist and confessional revivals from the first third of the nineteenth73

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these differences as intellectual squabbles that only troubled churchmen, they had important practical ramifications for clergy and laity alike. A pastor’s theological orientation strongly colored his ministry and how individuals experienced or were encouraged to think about their faith. It shaped how curates organized their liturgies, preached, and interacted with their flock. In Strasbourg, moreover, the prevailing system of personal congregations allowed Lutherans to become the parishioners of any pastor in the city, so that parish registration expressed personal religious preferences. Indeed, while each church had multiple pastors appointed to it—e.g., four at New Church, three at St. Thomas—and these ministers took turns conducting services and preaching, each pastor maintained his own, discrete congregation. All in all, this system worked quite well in French Strasbourg because it created a “spiritual marketplace” where almost every Lutheran could find his or her niche regardless of economic status or linguistic orientation. Herein lay a major reason for the continued vitality of religious culture in the city. The faithful heeded the calling of the church bells for Sunday morning and holy day services. They were also baptized, confirmed, married and buried in the church. Nevertheless, as intraconfessional polemics heated up in the 1850s and 1860s, relations between pastors in several of Strasbourg’s churches became strained, which made the absence of a true parish community all the more apparent.78 At mid-century, theological liberalism held a commanding position in the French Lutheran Church, both in its institutions and among its clergy. In this regard, Alsatian Lutheranism differed markedly from the German Protestant churches, where conservative and confessional Lutheran positions prevailed.79 Liberalism’s dominance within French century provoked similar rancor within the French Reformed Church, except in Alsace where the confessional Calvinist revival left few traces. See, Emile G. Léonard, Histoire générale du protestantisme, 3 vols. (Paris: PUF, 1964), 3:217–248 and 371–86. 78 Will, “Second Empire II,” 239 – 40; Marc Lienhard, Foi et vie des protestants d’Alsace, 82– 86; and the minutes (Protokollbücher) of the city’s parish council and consistory sessions (a list of those consulted appears in the bibliography). On the idea of a “spiritual marketplace” and its consequences for religious practice, see R. Laurence Moore, Selling God: American Religion in the Marketplace of Culture (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994). 79 Only in neighboring Baden and in some of the smaller Landeskirchen did liberal Protestantism remain influential. See Schnabel, Deutsche Geschichte, vol. 4, part two, passim; Nipperdey, Deutsche Geschichte 1800 –1866. Bürgerwelt und starker Staat (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1983), 433 – 40; Kuhlemann, Bürgerlichkeit, 67– 88; and Karl H. Schwebel, “Der Bremer kirchliche Liberalismus im 19. Jahrhundert,” Jahrbuch der Gesellschaft für niedersächsische Kirchengeschichte 76 (1978) 41–75.

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Lutheranism stemmed from its status as the successor to the rationalist tradition, which had been the guiding spirit within the restored church during its founding decades.80 As the label suggests, rationalists prioritized reason and liberty over dogma and authority. While recognizing Holy Scripture as the basis of the Christian religion, they dismissed the validity of formal confessions of faith. Likewise, they rejected the notion of the miraculous and instead presented Christianity more as a matter of ethics and morality than faith and salvation. Under the leadership of men like the pastor-professors Lorenz Blessig (New Church) and Isaac Haffner (St. Nicholas), rationalist ideas strongly influenced the development of religious life in Strasbourg after 1800. Rather than developing a new ecclesiastical ordinance for the city’s parishes, Blessig and Haffner insisted that each pastor be free to minister and preach in accordance with his faith, personal convictions, and sense of his parishioners’ religious needs. The rationalist outlook promoted simple religious services that centered on the sermon and downplayed the importance of rites and sacraments. Communion, for instance, was offered only infrequently (typically on Good Friday, Easter, Pentecost and Christmas), and funerals were little more than commemorative exercises.81 Haffner and Blessig’s prominent roles in the rebuilding of the Lutheran Church likewise ensured that rationalist leanings were ensconced within the Church’s institutional structures. They were leading figures in the constitution of the Protestant Seminary and the Faculty of Protestant Theology, influencing the intellectual and religious development of generations of French pastors and theologians.82 They also occupied major positions in the new church government, which enabled them to promote like-minded men to vacancies in the city’s churches. Both were simultaneously presidents of their consistories, religious inspectors for their inspections and, in that role, members of the General Consistory and Directory.

80 Rationalism’s persistence in Alsace resulted, in part, from the lack of any significant penetration by Friedrich Schleiermacher’s theology; Lienhard, Foi et vie, 79. Furthermore, the French state had no interest in supporting one faction within the Protestant church over another, as German states like Prussia did, since the politics of order in France were best served by maintaining strong ties with Catholicism and keeping peace within the Protestant ranks. 81 Will, “L’Église protestante de Strasbourg pendant le Consulat et l’Empire,” RHPR 21 (1941): 138–76, esp. 157– 61, 165 – 69; Strohl, Protestantisme, 353–63. 82 Philippe Jung, “Les étudiants de la Faculté de théologie de Strasbourg (1819 – 1872),” BSHPF 136/4 (1990): 39 – 54.

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After Blessig’s and Haffner’s deaths (in 1816 and 1831 respectively), their students and protégés continued to carry the rationalist torch. Men like Frédéric-Guillaume Edel and Johann Boeckel moved into the influential religious inspectorships of New Church and St. Thomas. This pair was also responsible for founding the Strasbourg (later Alsatian) Pastoral Conference in 1834 that quickly emerged into a key Protestant institution. Initially, the Conference brought together the region’s Lutheran and Calvinist ministers in order to discuss issues of general interest to the churches and their ministers. Since the General Consistory met only irregularly during the 1830s and 1840s, the Conference initiated projects such as developing a new hymnal, creating liturgical guidelines for Lutheran services (the proposed Agende of 1852), and adopting a uniform date for commemorating the Reformation. The reforms of 1852 diminished the need for the Conference to function as a para-ecclesiastical institution, but it remained influential as an advisory board and representation of clerical interests.83 By 1850, rationalism was metamorphosizing into liberalism, a shift personified in such Strasbourg personalities as Johann Baum, Johann Friedrich Bruch, and Eduard Reuss.84 The Lutheran president, Théodore Braun (1850 –71), was also noted for his liberal proclivities. Liberals held true to their rationalist heritage by defending the principle of Protestant liberty, above all the right to examine carefully and discuss critically all truths, even religious ones (liberté d’examen). They remained suspicious of ecclesiastical authority and combated the many efforts to reintroduce liturgical and confessional uniformity after 1840. Nonetheless, in response to the pietist and orthodox revivals, liberals moved way from rationalism’s extremist positions. They reaffirmed the authority of the Bible, the Gospels, and Christ. They took a stronger stand on what constituted Christian (Protestant) faith by recognizing the doctrinal validity of the Confession of Augsburg even though they refused to honor it as church law. Liberals also gave greater consideration to the sentimental dimension of faith, as evidenced by their greater attention to liturgy and ritual. Lastly, Alsatian liberalism was noted for its 83 “Generalbericht über das 50jährige Bestehen der els[ässische] Pfarr-Konferenz 1834 –1883 von E[mil] Nied,” ASPC 8 (1883): 244ff.; Will, “Monarchie de Juillet,” 54 –55; Strohl, Protestantisme, 380 – 81. 84 Still, rationalism was far from a dead doctrine. After 1850, the Directory appointed two confirmed and outspoken rationalists to serve in Strasbourg: Louis Leblois at the New Church and Timothée Colani at French St. Nicholas; Strohl Protestantisme, 388–89 and 403 – 06.

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concern to keep religion contemporary by continuing to engage with contemporary intellectual and cultural questions, and making efforts to disseminate their theological views in language accessible to the “average” Protestant man or woman, as in the folksy religious tracts written by Karl Friedrich Riff (Strasbourg-Ruprechtsau).85 Of the two alternatives to the rationalist-liberal tradition, the larger one in Alsace was pietism, a movement closely associated with the ministry of Franz Haerter, pastor at Strasbourg’s New Church from 1829 to 1874. Although he promoted rationalist teachings at the time of his appointment, on Trinity Sunday in 1831 Haerter urged a stunned congregation to repent and consecrate their lives to Christ. This announcement highlights two key characteristics of nineteenthcentury Alsatian pietism: the advancement of individual conversion as part of its inwardly directed notion of piety, and the emphasis on the redemptive power of Christ. Haerter, however, drew on the older Spenerian tradition, in regarding the Bible as a divinely inspired text and an authoritative guide for Christian living. Like his contemporary, Johann Hinrich Wichern, Haerter also emphasized the need to pursue one’s own sanctification actively, especially by engaging in public works of charity.86 The well-spoken and dynamic Haerter quickly built up a significant following in both Alsatian Protestant churches, establishing Strasbourg as a hotbed of pietist activity. In 1834 the pietists founded the Evangelical Society (Société Évangélique) on the rue de l’Ail, where Haerter and his son, Gustav, often led special religious services. Initially, the Society focused on the promotion of missionary work, but by the 1860s it was doing much more. It maintained a reading room and a lending library. It published and disseminated religious literature. It also provided space for the meetings of allied organizations like the newly-founded YMCA.87 In 1842, Haerter celebrated another major accomplishment with the opening of the Deaconess House (Maison des Diaconesses). This was a sort of Protestant convent, whose members dedicated their lives in service 85 Strohl, Protestantisme, 378–83, Lienhard, Foi et vie, 78–79; Will, “Second Empire II,” 216 –19; Riff, Der Weihnachtsabend (Strasbourg, 1874). In Germany, this liberal desire to stay in touch with contemporary culture is generally called cultural Protestantism or “Kulturprotestantismus.” The German movement, however, lacked the populist tendencies present in Alsatian liberalism. Hübinger, Kulturprotestantismus. 86 On Wichern, see Schnabel, Deutsche Geschichte, 4:429 – 45. 87 Will, “Restauration,” 260 – 62; René Voeltzel, Service du Seigneur. La vie et les oeuvres du pasteur François Haerter (Strasbourg: Éditions Oberlin, 1983); Strohl, Protestantisme, 369 –71.

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to the sick and poor. Forty-four women were serving as deaconesses in Alsace by 1850, either at the mother house in Strasbourg or in hospitals and parishes in other parts of Alsace, and by 1867 that number stood at one hundred fourteen.88 Pietism’s success in Strasbourg was apparent not only in its ability to sustain institutions like the Evangelical Society and the Deaconess House, but also in the number of the pastors who attached themselves to it. By 1870 all of the inner city parishes had had at least one pietist or pietist-leaning pastor, and in the prestigious New Church, two of the four pastors were avowed pietists (Haerter and Kopp).89 Yet, relations between the pietists and the rational-liberal majority were frequently tense. The style and substance of pietism challenged rationalist and, later, liberal ideas on ministry and theology. Conversely, rationalists and liberals disparaged the pietists’ emphasis on “good works,” as well as the tendency to create organizations that were not based on official church structures. Nevertheless, by the 1860s, differences of theology and personality notwithstanding, pietist and liberal pastors had learned to sustain good working relationships with each other in the individual parishes, the Pastoral Conference, and the Superior Consistory. This liberal-pietist modus vivendi stood in sharp contrast to the strife occasioned by the outbreak of confessional Lutheranism in the 1840s.90 Here, too, the movement’s leading personality was a Strasbourg curate at Young St. Peter, Friedrich Horning (1846 –1882). Like Haerter, Horning came from a rationalist theological background. But inspired by the Calvinist revival he encountered in Geneva during the 1830s, he began to study the works of Luther and the German neo-Lutherans (e.g., Johann Konrad Löhe of Erlangen).91 He also discovered the old Strasbourg ordinances and hymnals and found a richness and spiritual depth in them that he felt lacking in the contemporary church.

Strohl, Protestantisme, 374–76. The creation of the deaconess center was doubly revolutionary. Not only did it create a specific public role for women within Alsatian Protestantism, but Haerter left the day-to-day administration of the maison in the hands of the “mother superior.” Voeltzel, Service, 176 –77. 89 The list included Kreiss at Young St. Peter, Redslob at St. William, Bühlmann at St. Thomas, and Bögner at Old St. Peter. 90 Those adhering to confessional Lutheranism have variously been called “confessional Lutherans,” “neo-Lutherans,” or “orthodox Lutherans.” The terms are interchangeable, although I have generally preferred to use the “orthodox” label. 91 On the orthodox Lutheran “revival” in Germany, see Nowak, Geschichte des Christentums, 99 –101; and Gerhard Besier, ed., Neulutherische Kirchenpolitik im Zeitalter Bismarcks (Gütersloh: Gutersloher Verlagshaus Gerd Mohn, 1982). 88

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Shortly after his appointment to Young St. Peter, Horning decided to restore Luther to the Lutheran church of France, just as Johann Marbach and Johann Pappus had installed Lutheran orthodoxy in late sixteenth-century Strasbourg. Horning moved to reinstate the Augsburg Confession (Augustana) as part of the official teaching and make adherence to its doctrines a requirement for church officials and theology professors. He also promoted a “high church” form of Lutheranism, which proclaimed that the parish was not only a place of worship, but also the proper center of religious life and action. It also entailed emphasizing sacramental life, catechetical instruction, and the sermon as means for the faithful to learn to become Lutherans and to cherish their Lutheran church.92 Exclusivity was another characteristic of Horning’s confessional Lutheranism. He and his chief followers—his son Wilhelm, and suburban pastors like Johann Magnus and Georg Heinrich Rittelmeyer— rejected not just compromise, but any form of cooperation with those of other theological persuasions. When the Pastoral Conference’s songbook commission refused to revise the hymnal as Horning wished, he left it and launched a scathing polemic on the commission’s activities. Similarly, after Haerter refused to restrict the Evangelical Society’s membership to Lutherans, Horning and his supporters walked out and founded a separate Evangelical-Lutheran Society a few years later. Throughout the 1850s and 1860s, the confessional Lutherans attacked the Directory for not upholding the Augustana, for allowing non-orthodox teaching in the Seminary and Theological Faculty, and for refusing to appoint confessional Lutheran clergy to open positions. Horning and his friends freely criticized their colleagues and their theological views, both in print and from the chancel. Where they shared a church with other pastors, they refused to worship together or feel bound by parish council decisions not to their liking.93 In rural areas, the Horningites even encouraged orthodox Lutherans to separate from the official parish, rather than hear sermons and receive sacraments from “unionist” or “liberal” pastors.94 92 Strohl, Protestantisme, 393–95; Will, “Second Empire II,” 211–16; Lienhard, “Le réveil luthérien en Alsace au XIXe siècle,” Positions luthériennes 40 (1992): 74 – 83. 93 Cf. SPJ PBKR, passim, 1852–71. 94 Will, “Second Empire II,” 212–16; Wilhelm Horning, Die lutherische Reaktion in ihren ersten Anfängen und in ihrer vollen Entwicklung bekämpft durch den Unionspietismus (Strasbourg: privately printed, 1925); idem, Vernichtungsversuche der luth. Kirche durch rationalistische Professoren (Strasbourg: privately printed, 1909); and Charles-Théodore Gérold, La Faculté de

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Given the level of intraconfessional tensions even before the promulgation of the Decree-Law, the Directory took pains to use its appointment powers carefully after 1852. It examined the religious situation in a vacant parish thoroughly before making a choice, striving to nominate an individual whose theological leanings would satisfy the parish’s particular needs and whose personality would promote harmony in the community. In the case of Strasbourg, the Directory endeavored to maintain the theological status quo: it replaced conservative pastors with conservative pastors, and liberals with liberals. Nevertheless, the Directory was wary of naming confessional Lutherans to vacant “conservative” posts, for it wished to avoid replicating Young St. Peter’s stormy intraparochial situation. Consequently, although a considerable number of parishioners at St. Aurelia wanted the Directory to name an orthodox pastor to their open position in 1867, the Directory demurred.95 Occupation, the Churches and Public Opinion in Strasbourg In 1870, the Superior Consistory was scheduled to enact major reforms to the Lutheran pastoral appointment process. This session, however, never took place and became a casualty of the Franco-Prussian war. Indeed, the string of quick German victories in August and September 1870 made it questionable whether the Superior Consistory would ever meet again. The more that the Germans underscored their intentions to annex Alsace and part of Lorraine, the more uncertain became the fate of Strasbourg and its Protestant churches in the future German order. The capture of Strasbourg at the end of September 1870 was, in fact, the culmination of the German administration’s initial planning for what came to be known as Alsace-Lorraine. In mid-August, King Wilhelm I of Prussia established a pair of “General Governments” to

théologie et le Séminaire protestant de Strasbourg (1803 –1872). Une page de l‘histoire de l‘Alsace (Strasbourg: Istra, 1923). 95 The Directory’s efforts to prevent difficulties weren’t entirely successful. When the Directory named Karl Meyer (instead of the orthodox Lutherans’ favorite, Gustav Herrmann of Ingweiler) in September, the conservative parishioners left St. Aurelia for Young St. Peter. Personnel dossier Karl Meyer, ADBR 172 AL 75; Will, “Second Empire I,” 81 (Will, however, erroneously lists 1868 as the year of the vacancy).

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oversee military and civilian affairs in occupied Lorraine and Alsace. General Friedrich von Bismarck-Bohlen, a cousin of Prussian Minister President Otto von Bismarck, received command of the Alsatian General Government that was enlarged on 21 August with five districts (arrondissements) from the General Government of Lorraine, thereby linking the destiny of “German-Lorraine” with that of Alsace.96 Wilhelm named Friedrich von Kühlwetter, then Prussian Regierungs-Präsident (provincial governor) in Düsseldorf (Rhine Province), to lead the civil service within the General Government of Alsace as Civilian Commissioner and the Bavarian Count Friedrich von Luxburg (Bismarck’s son-in-law) to serve as the first German prefect for Lower Alsace.97 These two appointments were especially significant and illuminated Bismarck’s ideas about the territory’s fate. Not only were both men talented, reliable senior civil servants, but each had had considerable success governing regions with confessional profiles similar to that of Alsace (i.e., areas with predominately Catholic populations)98 Bismarck himself made clear his intention to hold onto Alsace and part of Lorraine in conversations with Kühlwetter shortly after the Civil Commissioner arrived at the High Command in Pont-à-Mousson (Lorraine). On 22 August Bismarck confided to Kühlwetter: Part of the conquered territory will fall to Germany, at the very least Alsace. . . . That portion of the conquered territory which Germany will eventually retain must be seen and treated as the common property of all Germans [deutsches Gemeingut]. This will then cement the newly allied German powers, whose harmony would otherwise probably come to an 96 Excerpt from the Sitzungsprotokolle des preußischen Staatsministeriums, 17 Aug 1870, BAL RKA 1452, Bl. 46. The General Government of Alsace received Saarburg and Chateau-Salins from the Meurthe department and Saargemünd, Metz and Thionville from Moselle; François Igersheim, “L’Occupation allemande en Alsace et en Lorraine: Le commissariat civil du gouvernement general d’Alsace et de Lorraine d’août 1870 à février 1871: un aperçu,” in L’Huillier, L’Alsace en 1870 –71, 249 –367, here 253. See also Paul Wentzcke, “Die Anfänge des Reichslandes Elsaß-Lothringen,” Rheinische Vierteljahrsblätter 7 (1937) 273–83, here 276 –78; and Wehler, “Das ‘Reichsland’ Elsaß-Lothringen,” 26 –27. 97 Sitzungsprotokolle des preußischen Staatsministeriums, 13 August 1870, GstA, Rep 90a, B III 2b, Nr. 6, Bd. 83, Bl. 132; Excerpt from the Sitzungsprotokolle des preußischen Staatsministeriums, 15 Aug 1870, BAL RKA 1452, Bl. 45. 98 Kühlwetter remarked on Luxburg’s personal ties to Bismarck in, “Aus Tagebuch und Briefen,” 25 Sep 1870, Nachlass Kühlwetter, BAL 90 Ku 1, Doss. 22, Bl. 4. As Regierungs-Präsident in Aachen (1848 – 66) and then in Düsseldorf (1866 –70), Kühlwetter had already gained a reputation for firm dealings with Catholics. Igersheim, “L’occupation allemande,” 262; Gross, War Against Catholicism, 64 –70.

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end once more after the war is over. . . . The new German land should therefore be handled with special care; severely as necessary, but otherwise kindly from all sides.99

Thus, well before the defeat of France and for reasons that had little to do with the annexationist demands currently circulating in the German public sphere, Bismarck had decided to annex Alsace for a new, united Germany.100 On 30 August, Bismarck-Bohlen and Kühlwetter set up the General Government’s provisional headquarters in the provincial town of Haguenau. From the outset, several obstacles stood in the way of reestablishing the “normal” mechanisms of government and maintaining public order.101 First, the region’s cities—Strasbourg, Colmar, Metz, and Mulhouse—were still in French hands, so Germany did not yet control the area’s key administrative, transportation, and communications centers. Second, with France and Germany still at war, the existing cadre of civil servants refused to cooperate with the General Government, since it would have been viewed as treason.102 Hence, while gathering information about the general state of affairs in Alsace and Lorraine, Kühlwetter engaged upper-level German civil servants to help him lead its administration and was forced to plan for a more thoroughgoing “Germanization” of the civil service.103 This strategy became official policy on 8 September when Paris formed a provisional republican government and Bismarck ordered the Prussian Staatsministerium to “put into place a more lasting organization for [Alsace-Lorraine], roughly along the lines of a Prussian District-Government (Regierung).”104 Third, public opinion in Alsace was decidedly anti-German. In a letter dated 28 August, Kühlwetter observed that “feelings towards the Germans

Kühlwetter, “Aus Tagebuch und Briefen,” Bl. 6. The question of Bismarck’s role in the decision to annex Alsace-Lorraine was the subject of considerable debate in the 1960s and 1970s that Thomas Nipperdey has capably summarized in Deutsche Geschichte 1866 –1918, 2:70 –75. 101 The Instructions for the Civil Commissioner appear in GFMFM 18 MAE, “FeldAkten,” Bd. 1, 2. The account par excellence of the Civil Commission’s establishment and functioning in Alsace is Igersheim, “L’occupation allemande.” 102 Kühlwetter, “Aus Tagebuch und Briefen,” 7 Sep 1870, 19. In fact, the French government at Tours explicitly forbade French civil servants from serving in the occupational administration. Igersheim, “L’occupation allemande,” 304. 103 Igersheim, “L’occupation allemande,” 273–76. 104 Copy of Telegram from Bismarck to Delbrück, 8 Sep 1870, BAL RKA 1137, 121. 99

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in the countryside are very hostile.”105 Three days later, he noted to Bismarck-Bohlen, “The language of the masses is German, but their sentiments are French.”106 Alsatian antipathy toward the Germans expressed, in particular, anxieties about the consequences of a German victory for the region’s faith communities. Throughout July and August, for instance, Catholics spread rumors that “if Prussia were to win [the war], then they would have to become Protestant.” But Protestants and Jews also feared annexation. Confessional Lutherans abhorred the thought of being part of a united church, while Jews worried that they would lose their status as full-fledged members of the nation-state.107 To defuse these worries, Kühlwetter shrewdly announced on 13 September that the General Government would maintain the ecclesiastical status quo. Thus, until the final decisions regarding the status of Alsace were reached, the Concordat, Organic Articles, Decree-Law of 1852, as well as the statutes for the Jewish consistories remained in effect. Parishes, ministers, and the various organs of church government also continued their operations with the exception that the functions of the French ministry for religious affairs were assumed by the Civil Commissioner’s office.108 The importance of religion to public opinion required the General Government of Alsace to act carefully in the realm of church policy. Not only did Prussian authorities compose detailed memoranda to apprise Bismarck-Bohlen and Kühlwetter of the ecclesiastical situation there,109 but Bismarck-Bohlen asked that a chaplain be appointed who could both inspire the troops and advise the General Government on local religious and church issues. When making this request, Bismarck-Bohlen already had someone in mind: Emil Frommel, a talented preacher who Kühlwetter to unknown, 28 August 1870, “Aus Tagebuch und Briefen,” 11. Igersheim, “L’occupation allemande,” 289 – 91. 107 Report of Emil Frommel to Bismarck-Bohlen, 13 Sep 1870, GFMFM 19 MAE, “Feld-Akten,” No. 2. On the general religious situation in Germany circa 1870 see Nowak, Geschichte des Christentums, 130 – 46. Regarding Alsatian Jewish attitudes towards annexation, see Vicki Caron, Between France and Germany: The Jews of Alsace-Lorraine 1871–1918 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), 27–31. 108 Ordinance of 13 Sep 1870 (draft), ADBR 1049 W 1; Igersheim, “L’occupation allemande,” 292. Kühlwetter was actually following the recommendations that Heinrich von Mühler, Prussian Minister for Religious Affairs (Kultusminister), had given to Delbrück on 23 August. “Vorschläge zu einer Instruction für die Preussische [!] Civil-Administration in Frankreich in Betreff der geistlichen, Schul- und Medizinal-Angelegenheiten,” BAL RKA, 1136, Bl. 343. 109 These reports appear in the Prussian Kultusministerium files, GStA Rep 76, Sekt 1, No. 87; Mühler sent Bismarck-Bohlen copies of them on 25 August 1870. 105 106

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“knew French so well that he can preach in the language.”110 More importantly, Frommel was well connected in Alsace. He was born in nearby Karlsruhe and had spent considerable time as a child among his mother’s family in Strasbourg. Frommel’s cousin, Max Reichard, moreover, was the son-in-law and vicar to the influential New Church pietist, Franz Haerter.111 Bismarck-Bohlen’s certitude regarding Frommel proved well founded. As he noted in his journal on 6 October: “Mr. Frommel has given me good information about the mood in Alsace, since he has numerous relatives there and many acquaintances among the [ Protestant] clergy.”112 It was Frommel who apprised Bismarck-Bohlen of Strasbourg’s situation and how it made a very bad impression on public opinion in Alsace. The shelling of Strasbourg at the end of August, Frommel reported on 13 September, “Had reduced the city’s most important Lutheran Church [ New Church] and the Protestant Gymnasium . . . to ashes, and therewith the extraordinary treasures of the city library.” He continued, “Strasbourg is the heart of Alsace, in which the pulse of its spiritual life beats most strongly. There is hardly a congregation (Gemeinde) that does not have some direct connection with the city, which is why the subject of Strasbourg arouses such pain, even bitterness in the hearts of many.”113 Indeed, by the end of September 1870, the “wondrously fair” city lay in shambles. Neighborhoods facing the line of attack (the area around the Porte de Pierre and the Kageneck) were completely ruined. The prefecture, city theater, and court of justice went up in flames, along with the New Church and the famed city library. Residences throughout the city suffered extensive damage, and some three hundred private buildings had been fully destroyed. Streets throughout the city were buried in rubble, and many of the bridges across the rivers and canals had been rendered unusable.114

110 Bismarck-Bohlen to Mühler, 19 August 1870, GStA Rep 76, Sekt. 1, No. 87, B 1148. 111 Furthermore, Frommel’s brother, Max, was a close friend of Friedrich and Wilhelm Horning. Frommel, O Straßburg, 46 – 47, 86; Wilhelm Horning, Köstliche Mühe und Arbeit in Amt, Gemeinde und Kirche zu Straßburg. Für seine Kinder und Freunde (Strasbourg: privately published, 1913), 1:16 – 23. 112 “Memoirs” of Bismarck-Bohlen, VPLA-GR, Rep 38d, Karlsburg, Nr. 1603, 30. 113 Report Frommel to Bismarck-Bohlen, 13 Sep 1870, GFMFM 19 MAE, “FeldAkten,” Nr. 2, 3, which was forwarded to Bismarck the next day. 114 Klaus Nohlen, Baupolitik im Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen 1871–1918 (Berlin: Mann, 1982), 27–29.

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On 8 October, the General Government formally moved to Strasbourg and Bismarck-Bohlen proclaimed to great fanfare that “Strasbourg was and would remain a German city.”115 Although this statement accurately represented German intentions, it brought little comfort to a population traumatized by the siege. Just before reaching Strasbourg, Kühlwetter described the situation there as “depressing, both with respect to the amount of destruction and the prevailing mood.”116 Louis Bloch, then a child of six, recalled that after the capitulation the population continued to resist the Germans. There were bloody incidents on the streets, but also calmer responses. One day, he noted, “three well-known women of good family [protested the banning of the French tricolor] by parading down the street, one dressed in blue, the second in white, and the third in red.” Others showed their resistance by wearing black ties, signs of mourning, and by refusing all contact with the Germans.117 On 2 November, Frommel opined that “while the bombardment may have been a strategic necessity, for the purposes of winning over and keeping Strasbourg, it was a political mistake.” Not only had it encouraged the anti-German sentiments of the city’s Catholics, Frommel continued, but by destroying such jewels as the New Church and the city library (on St. Bartholomew’s Day, no less), the bombardment alienated many Protestants who might otherwise have been sympathetic to the German cause.118 While the Germans capitalized on their possession of Strasbourg to create a more effective administration for Alsace, they made a priority of cleaning up the ruins and promoting a return to normality. Kühlwetter’s office supported the city council’s efforts to begin the new school year in the primary schools, which finally occurred on 4 November, despite extensive damage to numerous school buildings.119 Aided by two professors from the Protestant seminary, Johann Friedrich Bruch also managed to reopen the Faculty of Protestant theology by the end of November, although the other university faculties remained closed

Igersheim, “L’Occupation allemande,” 295 – 98. Kühlwetter, “Aus Tagebuch und Briefen,” 5 October 1870, 33. 117 Louis Bloch was the son of a teacher at Strasbourg’s Jewish school, the greatnephew of the city’s grand rabbi, Arnaud Aron, and the uncle of the famed French historian, Marc Bloch. Louis Bloch, “Souvenirs de Louis Bloch,” http://www.marcbloch. fr/veritas01souvenirs.html. 118 “The Religious Situation in Alsace-Lorraine,” report Frommel to BismarckBohlen, 2 Nov 1870, ADBR W 1049 (2). 119 Igersheim, “L’Occupation allemande,” 330. 115 116

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because their professors feared compromising their French citizenship by holding classes.120 Church officials struggled to restore local religious life. Because of the danger during the bombardments, regular religious services had ceased in the city as of 23 August. Their restoration in October depended largely on the condition of the churches that all sustained various degrees of structural damage. The buildings in city’s “south canton,” which included St. Nicholas, St. Thomas, and the Jewish synagogue were essentially spared. The Cathedral, St. William, and Young St. Peter were all badly hit, but still functional. St. Aurelia, however, required extensive repair before it could be used and the New Church was, again, completely destroyed. Nevertheless, on 23 October, the Protestant Sonntagsblatt reported that every Protestant parish except St. Aurelia and New Church would hold a normal set of services the following Sunday.121 Resolving the plight of the orphaned New Church congregations took more time. St. Thomas offered the use of its church, but backed down after the military decided to hold services for the Protestant troops there (services for Catholic soldiers were held at the Cathedral and St. Stephan). When negotiations with the parish council of nearby Young St. Peter also failed, the New Church consistory turned to Old St. Peter and finally reached an agreement that permitted it to begin worshipping there on 18 December.122 If the General Government encouraged local church governments to continue on with their work, Bismarck-Bohlen and Kühlwetter were extremely reticent to discharge the state’s prerogatives in ecclesiastical matters. Not only did this make it difficult for church authorities in Strasbourg to carry on, but it made people wonder if changes might be forthcoming. For instance, while Bismarck-Bohlen confirmed the Directory’s right to function with only four members, the Superior Consistory session announced for October was cancelled.123 The parish 120 Johann Friedrich Bruch. Seine Wirksamkeit in Schule und Kirche 1821–1872. Aus seinem handschriftlichen Nachlasse, ed. Karl Theodor Gerold. (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1890), 78–83. See also, Craig, Scholarship, 32–34. 121 Until repairs were completed in March 1871, St. Aurelia could only hold afternoon services in its church hall (Kirchstube). “Nachrichten,” SB 7/36 (23 Oct 1870) 417; PR 3/39 (25 Nov 1870) 316; SB 8/9 (26 Feb 1871) 109 –10. 122 On the efforts of the New Church to find a new home see especially TN PBK 6:248, 271–72 and 280 – 82, AMS TN 101; Gustave Kopp, “Faits du Temple Neuf,” TN 1; SPV PBK, vol. 1, 22 and 28 Nov 1870. 123 The governmental commissioner, Frédéric-Charles Rau, had left for Paris just before the siege commenced. Bruch, Wirksamkeit, 80 – 81, 87.

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and consistory elections that would normally have been held in January were also called off, because Kühlwetter would not issue the order to authorize them as required by law.124 The government’s inaction became critical regarding pastoral nominations. In the Lutheran church, for instance, there were already six vacancies by the end of October 1870, including one at Strasbourg’s Young St. Peter parish. The Directory attempted to proceed as was customary by announcing the vacant positions and allowing six weeks for individuals to present themselves as candidates. Yet, problems arose with the position at Young St. Peter. On 19 December, the last day to present one’s candidacy, the parish council took the extraordinary step of asking the Directory not to fill the vacancy, arguing that the war had prevented some qualified (i.e., confessional Lutheran) candidates from applying. President Braun dismissed the request, and on 10 January 1871 the Directory named the pietist Emil Nied to the vacancy.125 Then everything became tricky. Legally speaking, Nied’s appointment still required state confirmation, but under the circumstances it was unclear how that would come about. Braun raised the issue with Prefect Luxburg, who intimated that the Directory might proceed without the requisite approval. Accordingly, the Directory announced Nied’s installation for 29 January.126 Refusing to accept this turn of events, Friedrich Horning and his allies took their case to Emil Frommel and Kühlwetter. Confronted by the Civil Commissioner, Braun eventually relented, and suspended further action on all the nominations. At the same time, he asked Kühlwetter to tell the Directory how to proceed, since the filling of pastoral vacancies represented an essential part of restoring normal parish functions in Alsace.127 On the orders of Bismarck-Bohlen, however, Kühlwetter

124 The Directory and the Reformed Consistory of Strasbourg both wanted to proceed with elections. There were vacancies on many of the parish boards, raising the possibility that they would lack a quorum to make decisions on such pressing issues as church repairs. See SB 7/42 (4 Dec 1870): 464; KS-PBK, 8 Nov 1870, ADBR 173 AL 9. 125 RO 26 (1870 –71): 240. At Young St. Peter, the person in question was Gustav Adolf Kreiss, a well-respected pastor of pietist leanings, who died on 13 September. SPJ PBKR, 1:165. On the controversies surrounding Nied’s appointment, see also the personnel file for Emil Nied, ADBR 172 AL 79. 126 Braun to Kühlwetter, 20 January 1871, 136 AL 12/38. 127 Carl Vomhoff to Kühlwetter, 17 January 1871, ADBR 136 AL 12/38; Frommel to Kühlwetter, 18 Jan 1871, ADBR 136 AL 12/36; Personnel file Emil Nied, ADBR 172 AL 79; Braun to Kühlwetter, 20 Jan 1871, ADBR 136 AL 12/38; Bruch, Wirksamkeit, 87–88.

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never issued this clarification. When the preliminary peace between France and Germany was signed on 26 February, Braun asked once more for action on the nominations. Again Kühlwetter replied, following Bismarck-Bohlen’s instructions, that nothing could be done, which prompted the Directory president, who was freed from his oath to the French state, to resign on 14 March.128 Bishop Raess also sought to test the German administration’s readiness to wield the French state’s powers. Even before the Directory moved forward with Nied’s nomination, the bishop decided to publish the decrees of the recently completed Vatican Council without first seeking the requisite state approval. Prefect Luxburg wanted to take action against Raess, but Kühlwetter disagreed, recommending instead that they ignore the transgression. He observed that Raess might have thought that the placet regium was no longer necessary, since no German state required it. More to the point, he argued, the delicate state of Catholic public opinion recommended prudence.129 Bismarck-Bohlen and Bismarck opted to follow Kühlwetter’s counsel. Bismarck even used the incident to remind the General Governor about how to handle religious affairs in Alsace: Our occupation and Government do not need to concern themselves with tasks other than the achievement of our war aims. . . . The moment to take up questions of ecclesiastical law will arise only when it is clear whether and to what degree French ecclesiastical law will remain in effect [after Alsace’s political future is settled]. For now we should restrict ourselves to making it known, without mentioning this specific case, that German religious laws are much more favorable to the Catholic church and its freedom than French ones.130

Bismarck’s remarks provide a key to understanding why the German administration handled the Catholic and Lutheran churches’ respective actions so differently. Illegal though Raess’s actions were, they were hardly revolutionary. Hence, it was advisable to be forbearing, and avoid enflaming Catholic opinion further. By contrast, the Directory’s initiatives not only violated French law, but threatened the underlying principles of church-state relations, which could not be tolerated. Nevertheless, by the spring of 1871 a major reversal of positions came

128 Braun to Kühlwetter, ADBR 43 D 45. The preliminary peace was not ratified until 2 March 1871; Wehler, “Das ‘Reichsland’ Elsaß-Lothringen,” 30. 129 Kühlwetter to Bismarck-Bohlen, 13 Jan 1871, PA-AA R7589, I 621. 130 Bismarck to Bismarck-Bohlen, 24 Jan 1871, ADBR 136 AL 9/29.

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about. Inflamed Catholic resistance to German authority in AlsaceLorraine, coupled with the onset of Bismarck’s own problems with German political Catholicism (the Kulturkampf or “culture wars”), convinced the Chancellor and Bismarck-Bohlen that it would be better to retain the Concordat and Organic Articles rather than introduce the more lenient “German religious laws” into Alsace-Lorraine.131 Conversely, the General Governor believed that properly conceived ecclesiastical reforms would help win over Alsatian Protestants to the German cause. Herein lies the reason for his insistence that Kühlwetter not act on the Lutheran appointments. Plans for change were already underway and until they were confirmed, Bismarck-Bohlen wanted to avoid anything that might be viewed as precedent-setting. In fact, the General Governor’s project touched off a storm of controversy. It cost Bismarck-Bohlen his job, prompted Bismarck to rethink how the new Reichsland would be governed, and put the damper on meaningful ecclesiastical reforms in the Protestant Churches for years to come. The Fabri Affair and the Birth of the Reichsland The notion that Germany should reorganize Alsatian Protestantism, as part of the process of restoring “German ways” in the region, had been aired well before the preliminary peace was concluded. Treitschke hinted at such a program in “What We Demand From France” and noted that “When the Evangelical Church can again move about in undisturbed liberty . . . the reawakening of the free German spirit” in Alsace-Lorraine would be well underway.132 Similarly, in an article praising the German victory at Strasbourg, the [neo-orthodox] Evangelische-Lutherische Kirchenzeitung (Leipzig) stressed the need to “support the traditional carriers of Germanness in Alsace—the true [i.e.,

131 That summer, Raess also tried to appoint priests without state confirmation, since with a non-Catholic as head of state, he held the Concordat to be void. Bismarck never accepted this interpretation, although with the outbreak of the Kulturkampf in 1871 the Concordat’s status wasn’t formally clarified until the early 1880s. Ernst Thiele, “Die deutsche Regierung und das Konkordat im Elsaß nach 1870,” AEK 2 (1927): 349 – 66. On the German “culture wars” see, Sperber, Popular Catholicism, 207–22; Heinz Hürten, Kurze Geschichte des deutschen Katholizismus 1800 –1960 (Mainz: Matthias-Grünewald, 1986), 136 – 48; and Rudolf Lill, “Die deutschen Katholiken und Bismarcks Reichsgründung,” in Reichsgründung 1870/71: Tatsachen, Kontroversen, Interpretationen, ed. Theodor Schieder and Ernst Deuerlein (Stuttgart: Seewald Verlag, 1970), 345 – 65. 132 Treitschke, “What We Demand From France,” in Germany, France, 149 – 50.

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orthodox] Lutherans.”133 Emil Frommel also encouraged shoring up the conservative Protestant position in Alsace and he convinced the pious Bismarck-Bohlen to intervene in Protestant church affairs for the good of Germany and Alsace. Writing to the General Governor on 2 November, Frommel argued: The best of [Strasbourg’s] Protestant element has been weakened by the [Protestant theological] faculty, through French preaching, and through the radicalism [i.e. rational-liberal theology] that reigns in both. Here . . . we must undertake a thorough cleansing. . . . Emigration will help bring this about as well as the immigration of Germans. . . . But energy, especially against ultramontanism and [ Protestant] radicalism . . . will still be essential.134

At the beginning of December, Frommel sent a long memorandum to Bismarck-Bohlen that outlined a general course of action. He recommended that the Alsatian churches retain their separate existence and current organization despite their peculiarities. That is, they should become independent state churches (Landeskirchen), rather than be subsumed under the authority of the Prussian Superior Church Council (Oberkirchenrat). Second, Frommel urged the General Governor to take advantage of the transition period to replace the “Francophile and irreligious men” in the church government with “pious men who would be loyal to the new regime.” Finally, the chaplain counseled Bismarck-Bohlen to call his good friend Friedrich Fabri, an Inspector with the Rhenish Missionary Society in Barmen, to serve as the General Government’s advisor for religious affairs.135 Fabri would be charged to vet appropriate individuals for the positions on the Lutheran Directory and the Protestant Faculty. Furthermore, he could be trusted to propose appropriate modifications to the churches’ organizational structures. In complete agreement with this counsel, Bismarck-Bohlen called Fabri to Alsace on 9 January 1871.136 “O Straßburg,” AELKZ 42 (21 Oct 1870): 769 –75. Frommel to Bismarck-Bohlen, 2 Nov 1870, ADBR 1049 W 1. Bismarck-Bohlen was well known for his conservative religious views and piety, attending religious services regularly during his tenure in Strasbourg. Kappstein also points out that Frommel gave confirmation instruction to the General Governor’s two children. “Memoirs of Bismarck-Bohlen,” passim; Kappstein, Emil Frommel. Seelsorger und Menschenfreund (Giessen and Basel: Brunnen, 1955), 105. 135 From 1865 to 1870, Frommel served as a pastor in Barmen where he and Fabri became close friends. Kappstein, Emil Frommel, 68 and 106. 136 Report Frommel to Bismarck-Bohlen, 6 Dec 1870, ADBR 1049 W 1. As Kühlwetter reported in his diary on 4 December, Bismarck-Bohlen had actually decided to 133 134

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News of Fabri’s appointment spread quickly from Berlin to Strasbourg and it was not particularly well received. Fabri was well-known for his conservative Protestant theological positions and for his unsuccessful efforts to reorganize the Prussian state church, which made many wonder about his actual agenda in Strasbourg.137 The liberal deputy Rudolf Virchow (who later coined the term “Kulturkampf ”) denounced Fabri’s appointment from the floor of the Prussian House of Deputies and (wrongly) accused Kultusminister Mühler of sending “this most radical member of the catholicizing tendency within German Protestantism” to Alsace.138 In Alsace, too, Lutherans were not certain what to make of Fabri’s arrival. In Johann Friedrich Bruch’s opinion, “The very fact that Fabri was called to Strasbourg indicated that the General Governor was seriously considering making significant reforms to our church’s constitution.”139 Contrary to what he later declared, Fabri had begun to think about the ecclesiastical situation in Alsace-Lorraine well before BismarckBohlen called him to Strasbourg.140 Shortly after the city’s capitulation, the Missions Inspector advised Mühler to restructure Alsatian Protestantism: When I am not mistaken . . . a properly timed and correct reorganization [of Protestant church affairs] will win [us] the thanks of Alsatian Protestants. . . . It should be possible to erect a truly confederate form of church government in Strasbourg without great difficulty that would also fit the

call Fabri to Alsace even before receiving Frommel’s report. Kühlwetter, “Aus Tagebuch und Briefen,” 50. On Fabri’s appointment, see Personal note of Bismarck-Bohlen, VPLA-GR, Rep 38d Karlsburg, Nr. 1595, 11; Fabri to Bismarck-Bohlen, 12 Jan 1871, VPLA-GR, Rep 38d Karlsburg, Nr. 1595, 11. 137 On Fabri’s involvement in Prussian church politics, see above all Gerhard Besier, Preussische Kirchenpolitik in der Bismarckära. Die Diskussion in Staat und Evangelischer Kirche um eine Neuordnung der kirchlichen Verhältnisse Preußens zwischen 1866 und 1872 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1980), esp. 68–81; and idem, “Das kirchenpolitische Denken Friedrich Fabris auf dem Hintergrund der staatskirchlichen Geschehnisse im 19. Jahrhundert,” Zeitschrift für bayerische Kirchengeschichte 46 (1977): 173–238. 138 As reported in the conservative Norddeutschen Protestantenblatt (Bremen), 4/3 (21 Jan 1871). 139 Bruch, Wirksamkeit, 88–89. 140 Fabri, “Einiges über Kirche und Schule in Elsaß-Lothringen,” in Staat und Kirche. Betrachtungen zur Lage Deutschlands in der Gegenwart (Gotha: Friedrich Andreas Perhes, 1872), 139 – 58. Because of poor cataloguing and the dispersal of the relevant archival materials, scholars long believed that Fabri’s reports were lost and, thus, have accepted Fabri’s account of his activities in Alsace; cf. Besier, Preussische Kirchenpolitik, 505. In fact, these reports, as well as many other documents related to Fabri’s mission, are still extant.

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local circumstances well. To leave things as they are, however, is not only impossible, but would make it that much harder to overcome the difficulties ensuing from the strong particularist sentiments there.141

Fabri had not developed any concrete proposals before arriving in Strasbourg on 19 January 1871.142 But his undertaking had, at least in part, received Bismarck’s backing. Writing to Bismarck-Bohlen on 17 January, the Prussian Minister President observed that Alsace-Lorraine’s separation from France would require modifications to the Lutheran church’s organization, and he invited the General Governor to make proposals to that end. At the same time, Bismarck seconded Frommel’s recommendation for personnel changes and he asked the General Governor to take the necessary first steps.143 For over a month, Fabri met with clergy in both the Lutheran and the Reformed churches, taking care to consult with men from each of the main theological “parties.”144 Then, in late February, he prepared his recommendations for Bismarck-Bohlen.145 He proposed leaving the Reformed Church mostly unchanged, apart from creating a new advisory council to represent the consistories and their interests to the government and vice versa (i.e., a Reichsland equivalent to the French conseil central ). Fabri hinted that this council, composed of the five consistory presidents, might be allowed to deliberate with the Lutheran Directory when it was advisable for the two churches to pursue similar policies. But he insisted that the two administrative bodies remain separate, for he opposed introducing the Union into Alsace.146

Fabri to Mühler, 3 Oct 1870, GStA, Rep. 76 I, Sekt 1, Abt 1, Nr 87, Bl. 1169. Fabri’s first long conversation with Bismarck-Bohlen occurred on the evening of 21 January, “Memoirs of Bismarck-Bohlen,” 46. 143 Bismarck to Bismarck-Bohlen, Versailles, 17 Jan 1871. This letter came in response to Bismarck-Bohlen’s of 10 January, to which a copy of Frommel’s report of 6 December had been attached. ADBR 1049 W 1. 144 Adam Maeder, the German-language pastor at Strasbourg’s Reformed Church, twice visited Fabri in February. See “Monsieur le docteur Fabri et sa mission relative aux Églises protestantes d’Alsace et de Lorraine,” ADBR 2G 482 F 41. Bruch, too, reports of interacting with Fabri during this period in Wirksamkeit, 88–89. 145 The first set of reports were dated 21 Feb 1871, ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1. Fabri modified his remarks on the Lutheran church slightly in an additional report, “Die Behandlung der protestantischen Kirchen-Angelegenheiten beim Vollzug der Incorporation des Elsaß,” 4 Mar 1871. ADBR 1049 W 1. 146 Fabri, “Vorschläge in Beziehung auf die reformierte Kirche, innerhalb des General-Gouvernements Elsaß,” ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1. 141 142

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Regarding the Lutheran church, Fabri felt it necessary to draw up an entirely new constitution to give the church greater autonomy from the state at every level. Fabri wanted to develop an entirely new approach to Protestant church government in Alsace-Lorraine that could serve as a model for church reform in other parts of Germany. In the interim, the parishes, consistories, and inspections as well as the laws and regulations governing them would remain as they were. The Directory and Superior Consistory, however, were to be replaced by a provisional German-style “Consistorium,” composed of an old-German pastor as superintendent-bishop, three additional clergymen, and two laymen. Fabri justified this radical change with his own, rather original reading of the diplomatic situation. Because they were organs of the French state, the Superior Consistory and the Directory ceased to exist once Alsace-Lorraine was separated from France. Following the same logic, Fabri also considered the mandates of the Lutheran president and the religious inspectors to have expired.147 At the beginning of March, Bismarck-Bohlen signed on to Fabri’s plans. He forwarded Bismarck copies of Fabri’s memoranda, wrote Mühler on 9 March to recommend Fabri’s appointment as the Lutheran church’s new superintendent, and dispatched Fabri to Berlin at the end of March to secure approval for the reforms.148 Yet, not everyone agreed with the General Governor’s ecclesiastical ambitions.149 Kühlwetter completely rejected the legal premise of Fabri’s schemes and contended that the preliminary peace affected neither the Directory’s nor the Superior Consistory’s legal existence.150 Thus, after Braun resigned as president, 147 In particular, Fabri wanted to prevent the state from interfering with purely religious matters within the church; see especially, Fabri “Behandlung der protestantischen Kirchen-Angelegenheiten.” Fabri commented on the broader significance of these reforms in “Einiges über Staat und Kirche,” 140 – 41 and 144 – 48. The phrase “old German” (altdeutsch) was commonly used throughout the Reichsland period to refer to someone from one of the German states that were included in the 1871 German Empire. 148 Fabri to Bismarck-Bohlen, 4 Mar 1871, VPLA-GR, Rep 38d Karlsburg, Nr. 1595, 25 –26. Bismarck-Bohlen to Mühler, 9 Mar 1871, GStA Rep. 76, I, Sekt I, Abt 1, Nr. 86. 149 On the tensions between Bismarck-Bohlen and Kühlwetter, see Igersheim, “L’occupation allemande,” 365 – 66. Kühlwetter had significantly better ties to Bismarck. Not only was Kühlwetter consulted about how to set up Alsace-Lorraine’s postoccupation administration (Bismarck-Bohlen was not), but Kühlwetter was promoted to Oberpräsident for Westphalia in May. See Kühlwetter’s correspondence with Delbrück, Hassey (in Strasbourg), and the Reichskanzleramt between April and August, BAL, Nachlass Kühlwetter, 90 Ku 1, Dossier 7, passim. 150 Kühlwetter to Bismarck-Bohlen (undated draft, but between 21 Feb and 4 Mar 1871), ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1.

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he confirmed the authority of the remaining Directory’s members (the “Directorial Commission,” viz. Bruch, J. L. Eduard Kratz, and Edouard Goguel). Furthermore, in response to rumors about Fabri’s plans, Kühlwetter assured the Directorial Commission on 1 April that the German administration would not consider reorganizing the Lutheran church without first consulting the Churches’ legal representatives.151 Indeed, rumors about Fabri’s decisions and proposals were running rampant, because both he and Bismarck-Bohlen had been very tight lipped. It was known, however, that Fabri had been in Berlin to discuss the future of the churches. On 15 April, the liberal Progrès religieux reported that Fabri had presented reform proposals in Berlin “that would soon be imposed on the Alsatians.” The pietist-leaning Sonntagsblatt also acknowledged that discussions about the future of the Lutheran church had taken place, but it “could not provide any details on their content.” Fabri himself returned to Strasbourg on 19 April, but left soon afterward because he believed that his task in Alsace had been accomplished.152 And while everyone waited, the confessional Lutherans dropped a bombshell. On 21 April, the Allgemeine Evangelische-Lutherische Kirchenzeitung printed a petition that the orthodox camp had submitted directly to Bismarck, asking him to reform the church according to neo-Lutheran principles.153 In its content, the petition differed little from the appeals the orthodox party had repeatedly sent to Paris in the 1850s and 1860s.154 But its appearance at this juncture exposed a fundamental weakness in Fabri’s own proposals. While he aimed to import a notion of ecclesiastical government that was decidedly more clerical than the prevailing

151 Kühlwetter to Bruch (draft), 20 Mar 1871, ADBR 43 D 45; Kühlwetter to the Directorial Commission (draft), 25 Mar 1871, ibid.; Kühlwetter to the Directorial Commission, 1 Apr 1871, 172 AL 309. 152 Fabri to Bismarck-Bohlen, 7 Apr and 11 Apr 1871, VPLA-GR, Rep 38d Karlsburg, Nr. 1595, 38 – 40, 42– 43; “Memoirs” of Bismarck-Bohlen, 52. Fabri, “Zweiten Bericht über die Behandlung der protestantischen Kirchenagelegenheiten in ElsaßLothringen,” 29 Apr 1871, ADBR 1049 W 1. 153 The petition appeared in the AELKZ, 21 April 1871. On the AELKZ’s role in the debates over the fate of the Alsatian churches, see also Jochen-Christoph Kaiser, “Das Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen aus lutherischer Perspektive: Die Allgemeine EvangelischLutherische Kirchenzeitung (AELKZ ),” in Le problème de l’Alsace-Lorraine vu par les périodiques (1871–1914), ed. Michael Grunewald (Bern: Peter Lang, 1998), 293–313. 154 Unbeknownst to liberal leaders, the pietists had also asked Bismarck to “preserve the authority of the Augsburg Confession and Gospel” within the Lutheran church. Petition to Bismarck, 2 May 1871, ADBR 1049 W 1. Among the signatories were Haerter (New Church), Scheffer (Young St. Peter), Bögner (Old St. Peter, also SB editor), Max Reichard, and the local businessman, Alfred Herrenschmidt.

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Alsatian model from 1802, Fabri also sought to reinforce the conservative position within the Lutheran church in a way that was unacceptable to the liberal and moderate majority. By responding to the confessional Lutheran challenge, the liberals implicitly contested Fabri’s basic positions. Already in May, the Progrès religieux began denouncing the neoorthodox proposal in its columns. Inspector Bruch, too, published a series of pamphlets defending the existing ecclesiastical structures and their protection of liberty. In June, the Pastoral Conference resolved to ask Bismarck to uphold the “church’s traditional freedoms and liberties” and refrain from changing the church statutes without “consulting the freely elected representatives of the church.”155 Meanwhile, the Directorial Commission asked Bismarck to help resolve the worsening problem of pastoral vacancies. It pointed out that there were now fifteen parishes without ministers, which caused growing discontent among Alsatian Protestants.156 On June 19, Bismarck stepped into the fray. Having received assurances from Kühlwetter that the Pastoral Conference represented the opinions of the majority of Alsace’s pastors, Bismarck wrote Bruch (in his capacity as the Conference’s president), “At the moment it is not my intention to propose changes in the still legally existing constitution of the Protestant churches in Alsace-Lorraine. . . . When such changes should be found advisable, they will not be suggested before hearing from the churches’ legal representatives.”157 The Chancellor then instructed Bismarck-Bohlen to make the necessary recommendations to reconstitute the Lutheran church’s governing bodies and emphasized that he saw no reason to alter the church’s constitution at the present time. A few weeks later, on 4 July, the General Governor also received a note from the head of the Imperial Chancery (Reichskanzleramt) in which Rudolf von Delbrück requested the files on the pending pastoral appointments so that they could be submitted to the emperor for confirmation.158

PR 4 (1871): issues for May, June, and July, passim; Bruch, Fliegende Blätter zur Beurteilung der Verfassung der evangelischen Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession in Elsaß und deutsch Lothringen, nos. 1–3 (Strasbourg: Treuttel und Würtz, 1871); ASPC 6 (1871): 195ff. Sixtyeight conference members signed this petition, which was then endorsed by numerous parish councils and consistories, including Strasbourg’s New Church, Old St. Peter, St. Aurelia, St. Nicholas, and St. Thomas. ADBR 1049 W 1. 156 Directorial commission to Bismarck, 13 June 1871, ADBR 1049 W 1. 157 Bismarck to Kühlwetter, 15 June 1871; Kühlwetter to Bismarck, 19 June 1871, ADBR 1049 W 1. Bismarck’s letter to Bruch was published in ASPC 6 (1871–72): 264. 158 Bismarck to Bismarck-Bohlen, 27 June 1871, ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1; Bismarck 155

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Since Bismarck asked for names of individuals to lead the Lutheran church, Bismarck-Bohlen decided to interpret the situation positively. On 12 July, he informed Delbrück that until the pending organizational issues were resolved, he felt it unwise to act on the outstanding appointments. The General Governor also recalled Fabri to Strasbourg.159 This time Fabri proceeded more cautiously and stuck to the Decree-Law’s provisions regarding the Directory’s composition, but he still recommended that the government appoint all five members (in violation of the law). Again, Fabri got caught in the minefield of intraconfessional politics. He agreed to reappoint Bruch and Kratz to the new Directory, but not the third member of the Directorial Commission, Goguel, who had “no religious interests and was, crucially, anti-German.”160 His proposals for two of the other positions—Léon de Bussière and August Küss—were men whose extremist views made them unpopular even in conservative Lutheran circles.161 Liberals in Strasbourg were aghast at this news and interpreted it as Bismarck-Bohlen’s intention to turn the Lutheran church over to the orthodox minority. Once more, the Progrès religieux called laity and clergy to action, which culminated in the foundation of a “liberal defense committee”: the Evangelical-Protestant Union for Alsace-Lorraine (Union Évangelique-Protestante).162 In the midst of this turmoil, the acting mayor of Strasbourg, Jules Klein, decided to write Bismarck directly. Klein informed the Chancellor that despite the best intentions of some of its civil servants, the German administration in Alsace-Lorraine was failing miserably in its duties. In particular, he noted:

to Bismarck-Bohlen, 1 July 1871, ADBR 1049 W 1; RKA to Bismarck-Bohlen, 4 July 1871, ADBR 41 AL 2. 159 Bismarck-Bohlen to RKA, 12 July 1871, ADBR 136 AL 12/38. 160 Fabri also wanted to exclude Kratz, but didn’t feel that he could get away with it. Bussière was Fabri’s first choice for Directory president, but Fabri singled out the industrialist, Albert von Dietrich, as an alternative. Fabri never mentioned his choice for the fifth person on the Directory, but it was likely to be himself since he intended to stay on in Strasbourg as the government’s official councilor (Rat) for Protestant church affairs. ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1; Fabri, “Einiges,” 149 –53. 161 Bruch to Bismarck-Bohlen, 13 July 1871, VPLA-GR, Rep. 38d Karlsburg 1594, 21; and Johann Wilhelm Baum (St. Thomas) to Bismarck-Bohlen, 19 July 1871, GStA Rep 89, No. 23216, 14. 162 PR 4 (1871): 15 and 29 July. On the formation of the Evangelical-Protestant Union, see also the memoirs of the French-language pastor at St. Nicholas, Albert Schillinger; Albert Schillinger. Souvenirs pour ses amis, ed. Rodolphe Reuss (Strasbourg: Librairie Fischbacher, 1883), 241– 47.

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chapter one The close relationship that the General Governor has developed with the ultra-Lutheran party, his rejection of members of the Lutheran church’s government, the calling of Dr. Fabri and the rumors—not totally unfounded—that have circulated about the General Government’s intentions in [the ecclesiastical] domain have deeply wounded Strasbourg’s large and influential Protestant population, making impossible any rapprochement between them and the German authorities. No action would be better received or would calm the population more than the total removal of the General Governor from a position of influence on religious matters and [the churches’] future organization.163

In short, far from winning support, Bismarck-Bohlen’s Protestant policies were damaging the German administration’s credibility. Precisely for this reason, Bismarck intervened again. The day after receiving Klein’s note, Bismarck penned a long letter to Delbrück, which conveyed the Chancellor’s resolve to maintain the status quo ante in the Reichsland’s Protestant churches. He tabled Fabri’s proposals, including his suggestion to appoint a special commissioner for Reichsland church affairs. He also confirmed Goguel’s place on the Directory, and requested that the General Governor prepare to convene the Superior Consistory.164 Bismarck-Bohlen initially tried to reverse these decisions that transferred his prerogatives in church (and school) matters back to the prefects.165 And upon learning that the Superior President (Oberpräsident) of Hesse-Nassau, Eduard von Möller, had been named to lead the new German administration in Alsace-Lorraine, Bismarck-Bohlen tendered his resignation, a request that Emperor Wilhelm I accorded on 26 August.166

163 Klein to Bismarck, 24 July 1871, GFMFM, I.A.A.b 96, Bd. 1, UC I-67, frame 5. Closely related to the church problems were the General Government’s efforts to confessionalize the school administration in Alsace-Lorraine, cf. Igersheim, “La politique scolaire allemande en Alsace-Lorraine (1870 –1871): De la confessionalization à la loi Falloux,” Recherches gérmaniques (1975): 243–87. 164 Bismarck to RKA, 29 July 1871, ADBR 105 AL 2061; RKA to Bismarck-Bohlen, 1 Aug 1871, ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1; Bismarck to Bismarck-Bohlen, 13 Aug 1871, VPLA-GR, Rep 38d Karlsburg, Nr. 1584, 57– 59; RKA to Bismarck-Bohlen, 13 August 1871, ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1. 165 Bismarck-Bohlen to Bismarck, 7 Aug 1871, VPLA-GR, Rep 38d Karlsburg, Nr. 1584, 52–56. Fabri also urged the General Governor to hold his ground here, even if it meant taking his case to the emperor (Wilhelm I). Fabri to Bismarck-Bohlen, 8 Aug 1871, VPLA-GR, Rep. 38d Karlsburg, Nr. 1594, 35 – 38; Igersheim, “La politique scolaire,” 281– 82. 166 ADBR 47 AL 152; On Möller’s appointment and Bismarck-Bohlen’s intent to resign, see especially GFMFM, I.A.A.b. 96 adh, UC-I 66, frames 639ff. Abiding by the Emperor’s request, Bismarck-Bohlen remained in Strasbourg until Möller arrived on 5 September. Bismarck-Bohlen to RKA, 4 Sep 1871, ADBR 87 AL 1062.

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The unraveling of the Fabri affair did more than force BismarckBohlen’s ouster. It had important repercussions for the shape of the German administration in Alsace-Lorraine and its subsequent approaches to ecclesiastical policy. For most of the summer of 1871, Bismarck left the question of Alsace-Lorraine’s political and constitutional future unresolved. The Imperial Law of 9 June 1871 formally established the former French territories as the Reichsland Alsace-Lorraine (see Figure 1.3).167 But the territory was not a Land, a sovereign state with its own government, legislature and seats on the Bundesrat (Federal Council), but rather a special political unit (Reichsland) directly dependent on the Empire. The German Emperor (Wilhelm I) was the Reichsland’s immediate sovereign and the Imperial Chancellor’s office (Reichskanzleramt) would exercise executive power in his name. Until 1 January 1873, legislative authority for Alsace-Lorraine was also vested in the emperor (as advised by the Federal Council or Bundesrat), when the Imperial Constitution was scheduled to take effect in Alsace-Lorraine and the Reichsland’s laws would be granted by Reichstag and Bundesrat.168 Thus, whereas religious affairs were the prerogative of the federal states in the rest of the empire, imperial authorities handled these matters in the Reichsland.169 In response to the messy situation in Strasbourg, Bismarck’s first step was to dissolve the General Government and replace it with a Superior Presidency (Oberpräsidium), who would have many of the responsibilities of the former General Governor and Civil Commissioner. Second, the ongoing problems of religion and public opinion led Bismarck to select someone with a good track record handling local ecclesiastical matters: Eduard von Möller, who successfully oversaw Electoral Hesse’s integration into Prussia after 1866.170 Third, and perhaps most importantly,

167 France formally ceded Alsace and portions of Lorraine to the German Empire by virtue of Article One of the Treaty of Frankfurt, signed on 10 May 1871. The text of the treaty appears in Das Elsass von 1870 –1932, ed. Joseph Rossé and Marcel Stürmel, 4 vols. (Colmar: Alsatia, 1938), 4:251–57. 168 Möller later convinced Bismarck to delay the constitution’s introduction by a year, so that it took effect in Alsace-Lorraine only on 1 Jan 1874. Georg Wolfram, Oberpräsident von Möller und die Elsaß-Lothringische Verfassungsfrage (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1925), 31. 169 This aspect of Alsace-Lorraine’s peculiar status has not received the attention it deserves in the otherwise voluminous literature on this subject. See especially, Wehler’s classic account, “Das ‘Reichsland’ Elsaß-Lothringen.” 170 Dan P. Silverman, Reluctant Union: Alsace-Lorraine and Imperial Germany, 1871–1918 (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1972), 37–38.

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Altkirch

Selz

Sulz u. W ald

rbron

Lützelstein

Finstingen

LORRAINE

Lauterburg

Weissenburg

Saarunion

(e.m.)

Hayingen Gr. Moyeuvre

Landser

gen

Hünin

Hirsingen Pfirt

The Reichsland Alsace-Lorraine.

LOWER ALSACE

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Bismarck-Bohlen’s actions convinced Bismarck to limit the Strasbourg administration’s autonomy. To handle Alsace-Lorraine’s affairs, he created a special division within the Reichskanzleramt on 14 August, which was led by Karl Herzog. Bismarck told Delbrück that the Superior President would have the function of “executing imperial laws and the Reichskanzleramt’s ordinances.”171 In short, while Möller ran the local administration, ultimate decision-making power for the territory remained in Berlin. The law “Concerning the Administration of Alsace-Lorraine” of 30 December 1871 formalized the basic governmental structures for Alsace-Lorraine. It established Strasbourg as Alsace-Lorraine’s official capital. As Superior President, Möller oversaw the territorial administration and was responsible for executing the laws and ordinances coming from Berlin. In this task he was assisted by his own cadre of civil servants, who collectively formed the Superior Presidency.172 In place of the French departments and prefects, the law established three districts (Bezirke: Lower Alsace, Upper Alsace, Lorraine), each led by a president (Bezirkspräsident). This shift in appellation was significant, because while the district president fulfilled many of the same functions as the French prefect, like overseeing the lower instances of territorial government (counties [Kreise], cantons, municipalities), he nevertheless had limited power of initiative.173 Even if the Reichsland did not enjoy the status of a federal state, its peculiar incorporation into the Empire necessitated that it share an important characteristic with the German states, namely, its own corpus of local (French) law. Holding firm to the transition period policy, Bismarck maintained the validity of French laws in Alsace-Lorraine unless political circumstances required their replacement. Thus, to the chagrin of many Alsatians, the French penal and civil codes, child labor laws, and statutes governing newspapers and associational life were not 171 Telegraph Bismarck to Delbrück, No. 33, 28 Aug 1871, GFMFM, I.A.A.b 96 adh, UC I-66; see also Rudolf Morsey, Die oberste Reichsverwaltung unter Bismarck, 1867–1890 (Münster: Aschendorffsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1957), 170 –71. 172 For this study, the most important of these men were Heinrich Richter (brought from Düsseldorf by Kühlwetter) and Friedrich Althoff, who were primarily responsible for legal and church affairs. In 1872, Möller hired away the Bavarian jurist Eugen Dursy from the Reichskanzleramt, to succeed Althoff in these areas. ADBR 87 3284; Marie Althoff, Aus Friedrich Althoffs Straßburger Zeit. Erinnerungen für seine Freunde ( Jena: Diedrichs, 1914), 11–14, 17–30; Möller to RKA 8 June 1872, ADBR 87 AL 3769, and ADBR 87 AL 1741. 173 Law of 30 Dec 1871, Gesetzblatt für Elsaß-Lothringen Nr. 43 (1872): 49 – 56.

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replaced with by their more liberal German counterparts.174 Until 6 June 1895, French regulations concerning municipal government also remained in effect. Accordingly, elections to Strasbourg’s thirty-six member city council were held during the summer of 1871. Not surprisingly, Strasbourgers manifested their discontent with the political situation by voting a majority of avowedly anti-German councilors into office, which made it difficult to find councilors who would accept positions as mayor and adjunct mayor. Jules Klein refused outright to serve as mayor and only on 9 September did former mayor Ernst Lauth agree to be elected, even though he felt himself too old and too pro-French.175 The tense religious climate in Alsace-Lorraine compelled the German authorities to preserve French church law in Alsace-Lorraine except for the most essential modifications. As Bismarck and Möller soon discovered in their subsequent contests with the local Catholic hierarchy, the French legislation provided the state with considerable authority to keep the churches in line. As Prefect Ernst von Ernsthausen recalled, “Thanks to French law and the Concordat of 1800 the relations between church and state are organized in an entirely satisfactory manner from the state’s perspective . . . consequently the former organization of the Catholic church was not altered.”176 On the Protestant side, too, settling public opinion and restoring the churches to their normal duties took precedence over reform that the churches themselves desired. After mid-August 1871, the German administration in Strasbourg energetically worked to end the exceptional situation in the Alsatian Protestant churches. In one of his first assignments as Prefect for Lower Alsace, Ernsthausen attended to the pending Lutheran pastoral appointments and gathered information on the eleven pastors for review by the Reichskanzleramt and Emperor, who duly confirmed them on 13 November.177 After consulting with Möller, Ernsthausen informed

Hermann Hiery, Reichstagswahlen im Reichsland: Ein Beitrag zur Landesgeschichte von Elsaß-Lothringen und zur Wahlgeschichte des Deutschen Reiches 1871–1918 (Düsseldorf: Droste, 1986), 72–75. 175 Jean Daniel Imlin was the “premier adjoint,” while Edouard Goguel (and Directory member) took responsibility for school affairs; both were Lutherans. The Catholics were Adolphe Weyer, who led the buildings division, and Louis Hueber, who oversaw the administration of public works. Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg: 4:208–10; and Carl Buechel, Verwaltungsbericht der Stadt Straßburg i.E. (hereafter, VBSS) für die Zeit von 1870 bis 1888/89 (Strasbourg: Elsässische Druckerei, 1895), 41. 176 On the problems between the German authorities and the Catholic Church in Alsace-Lorraine, Silverman, Reluctant Union, 91–110, remains valuable. 177 ADBR 11 D 5; RO 26 (1871): 309. 174

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the Directorial Commission that it could not proceed with any new nominations until the Directory had been reconstituted.178 To pave the way for the Directory’s reconstitution, Ernsthausen also negotiated with the Directorial Commission to convene the Superior Consistory that fall. Normally, the Superior Consistory would only choose two of its members to sit in the Directory, but to quell the passions raised by the Fabri Affair, Delbrück decided to invite the body to propose candidates for the offices of president and governmental commissioner (something that the French government had never done).179 At its extraordinary session of 19 October, the Superior Consistory confirmed Goguel’s position as one of its delegates to the Directory. It then recommended its other delegate, Eduard Kratz (Strasbourg), as the new president, and the notary Schillein (a conservative from Buchsweiler) as the governmental commissioner.180 Reporting to Möller on 20 October, Ernsthausen encouraged supporting Kratz’s nomination. He personally felt that Kratz was not sufficiently pious for such an important position, but since the administration had made an overture to the church, Ernsthausen believed it would create a bad impression to reject the church’s recommendation. Schillein, however, was unwilling to accept appointment. Rather than ask the Superior Consistory for another name, which would delay the Directory’s formation further, Ernsthausen suggested that the government name someone without the church’s participation. The good will gesture had been made.181 On 12 December 1871, Möller endorsed Kratz’s appointment as president and proposed the old-German civil servant, Heinrich Richter, “a man who enjoyed the trust of Alsatians of all theological tendencies,” as the new governmental commissioner.182 After Wilhelm I officially named these two men to their new positions

Ernsthausen to Möller, 18 Sep 1871, ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1. Delbrück to Ernsthausen, 21 Aug 1871, ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1. 180 ADBR 43 D 45 and ADBR 147 AL, packet 7; RO 27 (1871): 8, 14 –15, 35. Since Goguel had represented the Montbéliard inspection, which was no longer part of the church, his position as delegate to the Directory was technically vacant. The New Church inspection made Goguel eligible to remain in office by electing him as its deputy on 12 October; PR 4 (14 Oct 1871). 181 Ernsthausen to Möller, 20 Oct 1871; ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1. 182 Möller to RKA (Herzog), 6 December 1871; Möller to RKA 31 December 1871, ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1. In this last letter, Möller assured Herzog that Richter’s appointment would not only be accepted by conservative Lutherans but would also be greeted as a positive influence on the church’s future development. 178 179

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on 24 January 1872, the path was finally clear for the Directory to resume its normal functions.183 The Protestant Churches’ customary activities were progressively restored in 1872. That January, both the Lutheran and the Reformed churches held elections to renew the membership of their parish councils and consistories.184 In February, the reestablished Directory made appointments to the five pastoral vacancies that Möller had allowed in December (including two at Strasbourg’s St. William parish and one at St. Aurelia). Like the previous fall, Ernsthausen and Möller reviewed the appointments and sent the files to Berlin, where the Reichskanzleramt formally requested the ministers’ confirmation from the emperor. In June, the Superior Consistory also met in a regular session.185 It named Christian-Frédéric Petri (Weissenburg) as a delegate to the Directory. It also proposed amendments to the process for naming pastors and religious inspectors, something that Möller agreed to allow only because it had been on the agenda for the cancelled 1870 session. In this regard, the Superior Consistory endorsed the consensus opinion from the Directory’s investigations of 1869 and early 1870, namely, for pastoral appointments, a review commission (Erhebungskommission) would be established to gather opinions on the candidates from members of the concerned parish, parish council, and consistory, before issuing its own recommendations on the nomination. Yet, as before, the Directory made the actual appointment. The Superior Consistory also proposed democratizing the process of naming religious inspectors. Henceforth, when a position became vacant, the inspectoral assembly would designate, without deliberation, three candidates for the position. The Directory could endorse one of these candidates over another but the final selection rested with the government. On 15 November 1872, Möller gave his approval to these two sets of reforms, a decision that reflected as much the fact that they represented a piece of business left over from the French regime as that both enjoyed the support of Lutherans across the theological spectrum.186 183 Although it was with only four members, since Kratz’s appointment as president created a new vacancy. RO 26 (1871–72): 315. 184 Lutheran elections were held on Sunday, 21 January; those in the Reformed Consistory of Strasbourg on 21 and 22 January. PR 4/47 (25 Nov 1871): 377; RKPBKR, 2 January 1872, ADBR 173 AL 61. 185 ADBR 147 AL, packet 7/1; RO 27 (1871 –72): 43 and 52. 186 The proceedings of the June session were published in AS 28 (1872): 220ff., the

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In their effort to revive “German ways” in the Reichsland, the new administration promoted policies that also altered how the churches conducted their affairs, even if they were not matters of church law. Most notably, on 31 March 1872, Möller made German the territory’s official language (effective 1 July), an order that also applied to the institutions of the recognized religious communities.187 Since knowledge of German was already widespread within the churches (it was the primary liturgical language), the edict posed few problems in principle. The Lutheran church’s official journal started appearing as the Amtliche Sammlung (in place of the French language Recueil officiel ), and all correspondence between the government and organs of church government (Directory, Reformed Consistory of Strasbourg, parish councils) duly took place in German. Nevertheless, several of Strasbourg’s parishes protested this change with the claim that several parish council members were insufficiently conversant in German. Parishes like the Reformed Church and St. William continued to keep their minutes in French and translated excerpts into German only as circumstances required.188 The decision to replace the French university Faculties with a Germanstyle University of Strasbourg also had important consequences for the Reichsland’s Protestant churches. As Inspector-Professor Bruch observed, the “refounding” of the University of Strasbourg made it possible to conduct theological training for future ministers solely at the university, as was customary in the other German Landeskirchen. Thus, on 20 March 1872 the Protestant Seminary closed its doors as an educational institution. The passing of this institution also entailed a reduction in the churches’ influence over clerical training. Whereas the Organic Articles gave the Churches the power to name seminar professors and a voice in appointments to the theological faculties, German university customs effectively denied church officials any meaningful role in faculty hiring. It was an internal matter, supervised by the state.189 decree of 15 November in AS 26 (1872): 107. On public reactions to the new appointment process, see PR 5/25 (22 June 1872): 193 – 94; AELZK 28 (12 July 1872): 514–16; and SB 9/25 (23 June 1872): 295 – 96. 187 Decree published in AS 27 (1872–73): 50. 188 The French language parish at St. Nicholas also refused to adopt the new language policy. On the linguistic politics of the early Reichsland period and local reaction to the same, see Rossé, Das Elsaß von 1870 –1932, 3:53 – 59. 189 Bruch, Wirksamkeit, 83; Craig, Scholarship, 70 –73; Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 61– 64. Initially, the Lutheran church was still asked its opinion on the men the University curator intended to appoint, but the Reformed church was cut out of the process all

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More critically, the Seminary’s closing necessitated a reform in the academic preparation for ministry itself. Prior to 1872, ministers could not be ordained without the baccalaureus de théologie from a state seminary. German universities did not offer this degree, which meant that a new course of study had to be prepared. Bruch, and to a lesser degree Eduard Reuss, had in fact long advocated such a reform, through which they hoped to increase the academic rigor of ministerial preparation.190 Once it became clear that the Seminary would cease operations (as head of the theological faculty, Bruch was well informed about the university reforms), the two professors encouraged the Directory to begin drafting new regulations so that everything would be in place when university instruction began in the fall of 1872. This was the third (and final) substantive issue that the Superior Consistory discussed and resolved during its June 1872 session. Henceforth, students would have to study for eight semesters (at least six at a German-language university) and then pass a state-administered comprehensive exam (Candidaten-Prüfung) to be admitted as a candidate for ministry. Möller approved the new regulations for Lutheran theology students on 30 October 1872 and released a slightly amended version for Calvinist students that adjusted for differences in the Reformed Church’s organizational structure the following January.191 Apart from the changes to the Lutheran appointment procedures and the training for Protestant ministers, Möller steadfastly opposed any other modifications to the existing ecclesiastical system. It worked and he did not wish to have controversial reforms threaten the public order once more. Thus, when the Reformed consistories agitated to convoke a territorial synod in 1872, which would give them a central coordinating institution and facilitate their interactions with the government, Möller refused to consider their proposals. “The constitution of

together. ADBR 173 AL 40. On nineteenth-century German university practices, Charles E. McClelland, State, Society and University in Germany, 1700 –1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980) is solid. 190 Adam Maeder, the German-language pastor at Strasbourg’s Reformed parish, also strongly supported this facet of “Germanization.” In a letter written shortly before his death, Maeder told Möller, “The new regulation will be a treasured gift and of great use to us.” Maeder to Möller, 8 Nov 1872, ADBR 136 AL 12/39. 191 We will discuss these reforms at greater length in Chapter 3. On the Lutheran text, see AS 28 (1872): 100 – 06 and 134 –147; regarding the negations between the Superior Presidency and the various Reformed Consistories, see Reformed Consistory of Strasbourg to Möller, 10 Aug 1872, Möller to RKA, 5 Sep 1872, and RKA to Möller, 21 Sep 1872, ADBR 136 AL 12/39.

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the Reformed Church,” he wrote to Leonhard Burckhardt of Gebweiler (Upper Alsace), “is clearly organized and not so urgently in need of reforms that would make the [proposed] changes advisable [at the present time].”192 More to the point, the reforms that the Calvinists wanted required altering the existing laws, something Möller was entirely unwilling to countenance. The Superior President likewise turned down requests to create a Jewish Central Consistory for Alsace-Lorraine as a successor to the Central Consistory of Paris. Again, it was unnecessary under the present circumstances.193 The government’s unwillingness to support church reform was matched by a similar disinclination within the Protestant community. Although clergy and laity from the main theological camps had wish lists about improving the church’s organization, the Fabri affair made them distrustful of the German administration. Indeed, since French law did not give the churches a formal role in amending the church “constitutions,” they feared that the new authorities would impose their own ideas of the Lutheran and Reformed churches and compromise their traditions and liberty. Better to leave the Pandora’s box closed, they felt. Hence, neither the Pastoral Conference nor the Superior Consistory backed the Evangelical-Protestant Union’s efforts in 1872 to democratize Lutheran church government further.194 Ultimately, the Fabri affair encouraged both old Germans and native Alsatian Protestants to regard the French church legislation as something best left alone, a stance that was only reinforced by the Catholic Church’s vocal opposition to German rule. The laws did not just give the state considerable power to police the Reichsland’s churches. They also maintained a system of confessional parity in the territory that was indispensable given the heightened degree of interconfessional

192 Möller to Burckhardt, 18 Feb 1874, ADBR 2G 482 F 41; see also the materials in ADBR 173 AL 30; Charles A. Witz, Projet de réorganisation des églises réformées d’AlsaceLorraine (Strasbourg: C. Vomhoff, 1872); and Vorschlag zur Reorganisierung der reformirten Kirche von Elsaß-Lothringen entworfen von dem reformirten Consistorium zu Bischweiler (Bischweiler: Fr. Roth, 1873). 193 Consistories of Colmar (4 Jan 1872) and Strasbourg (18 Jan 1872) to Möller, ADBR W 1049 (10). 194 PR 5/25 (22 June 1872): 193–94; ASPC 6 (1872): 222–26; Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 90 – 91, and (on the Union’s actual proposals), Georges Frick, La question de la réorganisation de l’église d’Alsace-Lorraine. Rapport présenté au Consistoire de Saint-Guilluame (Strasbourg: Heitz, 1872).

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tension in the years following the annexation. Long after AlsaceLorraine joined the German Empire, religious culture in Strasbourg was shaped by institutions and legal practices of French provenance. This arrangement did promote, as Friedrich Fabri feared, a noticeable degree of particularism in the Reichsland. But, this was not simply a matter of political opposition, as political authorities sometimes claimed. By maintaining local ecclesiastical institutions and customs, Alsatians were acting as German Protestants did in Catholic places like Baden, Bremen, and Bavaria, since it was at the local and regional level that notions of “national” religious culture were created in the nation of provincials. Indeed, even as immigrant (i.e., “old”) Germans acquired influential positions with the Reichsland’s Protestant churches, they promoted integration into the empire in ways that continued to uphold and validate local traditions. This last comment points to the one of the important factors in the history of Protestantism in Strasbourg after 1870. Although the legal and institutional setting of religious life in the city remained largely constant during the Reichsland era, the men who interpreted these laws, wrote additional regulations, and—in time—came to lead the churches were new. Even more critically, religious culture in Strasbourg developed in new ways after 1870 because the city itself changed. Strasbourg’s new status as the Reichsland’s capital helped trigger its evolution into a big city—a Großstadt. With this shift, both the physical and the personal dimension of how individuals experienced and understood religious community underwent a profound transformation.

CHAPTER TWO

STRASBOURG METROPOLIS Shortly after its founding in 1871, the German Association of Architects and Engineers (Deutsche Architekten- und Ingenieur-Verein), a preeminent force in the German city planning movement, started holding a national meeting every two years, each time in a different place. This tour of German cities provided members an opportunity to see how different municipalities were evolving and how they were addressing the technical challenges of urbanization, from housing and transportation to hygiene and land use.1 These meetings also celebrated urban modernity in Imperial Germany. They were only held in big cities (cities with more than one hundred thousand inhabitants), both in established Großstädte like Berlin, Munich, and Hamburg, and in newer ones like Danzig, Frankfurt am Main, and Hanover, whose spectacular growth after 1870 epitomized the late-nineteenth century transition into a more urbanized Europe.2 Local chapters arranged tours of their cities that called attention to famous city monuments as well as new construction and neighborhoods. Moreover, the hosting local chapter typically published a lavish volume that showcased the city and its architecture, past and present.3 In 1894, Strasbourg hosted the architects and engineers’ biennial gathering, which testified to the municipality’s emergence as a German big city. Technically speaking, Strasbourg already qualified for big city status in 1880, although it was only in 1885 that its civilian population broke the 100,000-resident threshold.4 The urban renaissance that drove

1 On the connections between the German Association of Architects and Engineers and city planning, see Brian Ladd, Urban Planning and Civic Order in Germany, 1860 –1914 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1990), 84 – 96. 2 In 1870, only about one-quarter of Europeans lived in cities; by 1914 almost 40 percent did (Russia excluded). Hohenberg and Hollen Lees, Making of Urban Europe, 219. On the generally frenetic pace of urbanization in Imperial Germany, see especially Reulecke, Urbanisierung, 68 – 86. 3 E.g., Frankfurt am Main und Seine Bauten (1886); Hamburg und Seine Bauten (1890); Berlin und Seine Bauten (1896). 4 As noted, if the military population is included, the threshold was broken in 1880. VBSS, 1870 bis 1888/89, 3 – 5.

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this demographic growth stemmed, to a large degree, from the return of German rule to Strasbourg. In striving to make the Reichsland’s capital an appropriate symbol of unified Germany’s political, cultural and military might, the German government catalyzed urban development. The urge to create new symbolic structures and military installations compelled the Germans to expand Strasbourg’s surface area, which subsequently opened up new areas for residential, commercial, and industrial use. Immigrants provided the labor to rebuild the city and staff the budding German administration, but their presence also created new demands—for markets, newspapers, theaters, tramways—that not only spurred greater economic development but demographic expansion as well. Indeed, there was considerable merit to the boasts of Strasbourg’s Alsatian-born mayor, Rudolf Schwander, when he asked in 1915: “What is Strasbourg today, with its 180,000 inhabitants, its [modern] port on the Rhine, its prosperous industries, its greatly enlarged surface area, its university, its artistic and scientific establishments, in comparison with the provincial town of 1870 and its 70,000 residents?”5 The depiction of Strasbourg that emerges from the Architects and Engineers’ Association’s book from the 1894 meeting, Straßburg und seine Bauten, resembles Schwander’s in many respects.6 Given the group’s interest in the modern city, almost half of the volume’s 672 pages are devoted to the “new Strasbourg.” There are sections on the new administrative, military, and cultural (e.g., university, schools, theaters) buildings, as well as the new health care facilities, slaughterhouses, restaurants, and housing projects. The book also devotes considerable attention to the infrastructural improvements that accompanied urbanization: railways, ports, canals, bridges and streets, public lighting, and sewers. However, in their book, these advocates of the modern city commenced their discussion of Strasbourg’s post-1870 development with none of these landmarks of urban modernity. Instead, they started with its churches. This is a telling detail, which reminds us that urbanization was not just 5 Remarks published in the 4 Aug 1915 edition of the Frankfurter Zeitung, cited by Sayous in “L’Évolution de Strasbourg,” 3. A native of Colmar, Schwander firmly supported the German cause in Alsace-Lorraine. After the German defeat in 1918, he opted to remain a German citizen and was appointed Oberpräsident of Hesse-Nassau. Igersheim, L’Alsace des Notables, 292. 6 Architekten- und Ingenieur-Verein für Elsaß-Lothringen, ed., Strassburg und seine Bauten (Strasbourg: Trübner, 1894).

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a secular, materialistic phenomenon—as generations of scholars have insisted—but a trend with a positive, sacred dimension.7 Without question, Strasbourg’s development into a big city profoundly altered the traditional rhythms of social existence, including the activities of its faith communities. The new urban space and its changing patterns of mobility and residence as well as the transformation of local economic and cultural life all affected how individuals understood and sought to satisfy their religious needs. Yet, urbanization also promoted the vitality of religious culture in places like Strasbourg. Congregations became larger and more diverse, due to the immigration of Catholics, Protestants, and Jews from across old Germany and other parts of the Reichsland. Urban expansion also enabled faith communities to mark new parts of the city as sacred with churches and meeting places for the community’s religious associations being erected in the new urban areas (Neustadt). Immigration and new intra-urban mobility patterns, too, stamped neighborhoods with a clearly confessional character for the first time in Strasbourg’s history. Municipal and territorial officials also ensured that urbanization promoted sacred as well as secular concerns. They provided crucial assistance for church construction projects and even volunteered to name new streets after important figures in the city’s confessional past. Urbanization as Germanization? From the outset, German policy strove to promote the integration of Alsace-Lorraine into the German nation. Realizing this objective, however, proved difficult, and not only because of local resistance. Much like the definition of Germanness after 1870, the specific meaning of “Germanization” was hard to pin down and vigorously contested. At the most general level, Germanization implied nurturing “German” ways in Alsace-Lorraine. It meant making German the territory’s official language and introducing legal, administrative, and educational practices that had become commonplace throughout most of old Germany. Officials in Strasbourg and Berlin believed that such measures would help Alsatians and Lorrainers “rediscover” their innate Germanness.

7 See, for instance, Tenfelde, “Urbanization and the Spread of Urban Culture,” 24 –26; and Hans-Jürgen Teuteberg, “Moderne Verstädterung.”

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They also felt that the benefits of German rule—e.g., improved schools, a more professional bureaucracy, economic revitalization—would ultimately win Alsatians and Lorrainers for Germany. Because achieving this type of Germanization required a strong oldGerman presence in Alsace-Lorraine, many contemporaries understood Germanization in terms of colonization.8 Old Germans controlled political and military authority at all levels. They were also encouraged to immigrate to Alsace-Lorraine to fill the positions in the greatly expanded civil service and promote German customs. Conversely, concerns about political reliability and training kept most Alsatians and Lorrainers out of the Reichsland’s public service between 1871 and 1918.9 The occupation of Alsace-Lorraine was also accompanied by a deliberate program of marking public space as German. Everywhere in Alsace-Lorraine, old Germans erected structures—representational buildings, monuments, even fortifications—to laud German might and leave no doubt as to the territory’s German status.10 Such top-down approaches to Germanizing Alsace-Lorraine played a major role in Strasbourg’s becoming a modern big city after 1870. Even before the ink on the Treaty of Frankfurt was fully dry, German military and political leaders planned to transform Strasbourg into a city capable of fulfilling the administrative, military, and cultural functions incumbent on a German capital in a borderland region. The clearest indication of these early links between urbanization and Germanization was a report from the head of the Prussian army, General von Moltke, and the head of the army’s engineering corps, General von Kameke,

8 Cf. David Blackbourn, The Long Nineteenth Century: A History of Germany, 1780 –1918 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 260; Nipperdey, Deutsche Geschichte 1866 –1918, 2:282–86; Hans-Ulrich Wehler, “Der Fall Zabern von 1913/14 als Verfassungskrise des Wilhelminischen Kaiserreichs,” in Krisenherde des Kaiserreichs, 70 – 88, here 73 –75. 9 Of course, native sons did represent the territory in the Reichstag and were elected to serve in municipal, district (Bezirk), and territorial assemblies. But they were largely excluded from the middle and upper ranks of the civil service and from the territorial government (only two Alsatians, Emil Petri and Hugo Zorn von Bulach, held senior posts in the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine) and the university. Silverman, Reluctant Union, 81–88. 10 See, for example, Nohlen, Baupolitik; Niels Wilcken, Architektur im Grenzraum: Das öffentliche Bauwesen in Elsaß-Lothringen 1871–1918 (Saarbrücken: Institut für Landeskunde im Saarland, 2000); and Annette Maas, “Kriegerdenkmäler und Erinnerungsfeiern im Elsaß und in Lothringen (1870 –1918): Von nationaler Konfrontation zu regionaler Versöhnung in einer Grenzregion,” in Historische Denkmäler: Vergangenheit im Dienste der Gegenwart?, ed. Sabine Behrenbeck (Bergisch Gladbach: Thomas-Morus-Akademie Bensberg, 1994), 55 – 68.

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to Emperor Wilhelm, dated 2 June 1871. The generals endorsed a long-standing desire of the town fathers to expand the city’s physical size by demolishing the ancient fortifications, which the bombardment of 1870 had already made useless, and construct a line of forts around Strasbourg’s new perimeter. But the justification was cast in exclusively military and political terms. They argued that only by increasing the terrain intra muros would there be sufficient land for expanding the garrison. They continued that “[ T ]he institution of numerous administrative authorities in Strasbourg, the city’s already woeful housing shortage, the need for an improved train station . . . and the creation of a canal linking Strasbourg to Mannheim along the Rhine, [all] speak in favor of a considerable expansion of the city.”11 A second memorandum from the Imperial War Ministry, dated 11 November, returned to this issue of housing by noting the need to provide for the thousands of patriotically minded old Germans who would be arriving in Strasbourg to take up positions in the Reichsland’s civil service and whose presence would “promote in an extremely rapid and efficacious fashion the complete Germanization of Alsace’s most important city.”12 In 1875, after much discussion and drama, Strasbourg’s expansion commenced.13 On 14 February, Emperor Wilhelm I signed a law that authorized the relocation of the city’s fortifications, which both increased the extent of the city intra muros from 232 to 618 hectares and made Strasbourg the empire’s largest city (in terms of physical space).14 Most of this area was part of the Neustadt and fell to the north and west of the historic city core (Altstadt). The final plan for the new wall also made provisions for a central train station within the fortifications (in the west, between the White Tower and Kronenburg gates) and a new harbor to the east of the Altstadt. The city’s notables played only

11 Confidential report, Motlke and Kameke to Wilhelm I, 2 June 1871, reprinted in Nohlen, Baupolitik, 321–22. 12 War ministry memorandum, 11 Nov 1871, cited in Nohlen, Baupolitik, 34. 13 On the deliberations prior to 1875, see especially Annette Maas, “Stadtplanung und Öffentlichkeit in Straßburg (1870 –1918/25). Vom Nationalbewußtsein zur regionalen Identität städtischer Interessengruppen,” in Christoph Cornelißen, Stefan Fisch, and Anette Maas, Grenzstadt Straßburg: Stadtplanung, kommunale Wohnungspolitik und Öffentlichkeit 1870 –1940 (St. Ingbert: Röhrig Universtitätsverlag, 1997), 205 –75, here 209 –18. 14 These figures (232 and 618 ha) represent the area that could be developed or built upon. In 1880, the top five cities in terms of total physical size were (in order): Strasbourg, Frankfurt am Main, Hamburg, Berlin, and Munich (4709 ha). Die Bevölkerung der Stadt Straßburg (auf Grund der Volkszählungsergebnisse von 1910) (Strasbourg: Friedrich Bull, 1913), 3*.

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a limited role in these negotiations. In 1873, Superior President Möller removed Mayor Lauth from office for publicly expressing pro-French sentiments. When the city council refused to serve under the newlyappointed acting mayor, Police Director Otto Back, District President Ernsthausen first suspended and then dissolved the council before placing full responsibility for Strasbourg’s administration in Back’s hands.15 Hence, it was Back who finalized the contract, dated 2 December 1875, which specified the terms of the land transfers between the military and the city. Accordingly, the army agreed to demolish the old fortifications by 1 January 1879, when the city would take possession of the former military terrain that was not reserved for other state purposes (see Figure 2.1). For this territory, the city of Strasbourg promised to pay the Imperial treasury seventeen million marks, without interest, in regular installments until 31 December 1893. This considerable sum, however, was soon reduced by one and a half million marks, since the Imperial government decided to reserve fifteen additional hectares in the Neustadt to provide a site for the new university.16 As Moltke and Kameke foresaw, the Strasbourg Neustadt quickly emerged as the center of and symbol for the efforts to Germanize Alsace-Lorraine. First and foremost, the Neustadt served as the seat of the Reichsland’s government, which in 1879 was consolidated in Strasbourg. Tired of fighting with Möller, Bismarck wished to divest himself of day-to-day responsibility for the Reichsland and he pushed a bill through the Reichstag that year to reorganize the administration of Alsace-Lorraine. By virtue of the law of 4 July, the Reichsland was henceforth led by an imperial governor, the Statthalter, who exercised the powers formerly held by the imperial chancellor and chancery, as well as many of those previously restricted to the emperor (e.g., the appointment and confirmation of church officials). A State Secretary for

Ernsthausen, Erinnerungen, 330 – 41; Otto Back, Aus Straßburgs jüngster Vergangenheit. Die städtische Verwaltung in der Zeit vom 12. April 1873 bis zum 25. April 1880 (Strasbourg: Karl J. Trübner, 1912), 1–16. 16 Strasbourg’s fiscally cautious notables roundly criticized Back for agreeing to these terms, but Back himself felt that the city’s share of the expansion costs was excessive. Nevertheless, Back defended this decision in his memoirs, regarding it as a necessary investment in the city’s future prosperity. Back, Aus Straßburgs jüngester Vergangenheit, 159 –77. See also, S. Hausmann, “Einleitung,” in Straßburg und Seine Bauten, 383 – 84; and Stefan Fisch, “Planung als Eigentumsbeschränkung in der Obrigkeitsstadt: Bemerkungen zur Straßburger Stadtentwicklung 1871–1918,” in Stadtentwicklung im deutsch-französischluxembrgischen Grenzraum (19. u. 20. Jh.), ed. Rainer Hudemann and Rolf Wittenbrock (Saarbrücken: SDV Saarbrücker Druckerei, 1991), 179 – 98, here 179 – 80. 15

ƒ

Territory added to Strasbourg in 1875 (fully incorporated in 1879, the Neustadt)

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Figure 2.1 The expansion of Strasbourg intra muros, 1875–1879. White circle numbers indicate Protestant parishes (1. New Church, 2. Young St. Peter, 3. St. William, 4. St. Thomas, 5. St. Aurelia, 6. Old St. Peter, 7. St. Nicholas, 8. Reformed). Black circle numbers indicate Catholic parishes (1. Cathedral, 2. Young St. Peter, 3. St. Magdalene, 4. St. John, 5. St. Louis, 6. Old St. Peter). The consistorial synagogue is indicated by $.

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Strasbourg i.m. to 1870 (the Altstadt)

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Alsace-Lorraine headed up the territorial administration, the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine was divided into four branches (Interior, Justice, Finance, and Agriculture), which were each led by an Undersecretary of State (Unterstaatssekretär).17 At the same time, the Reichstag was divested of its role in making laws for Alsace-Lorraine and these functions devolved to the Strasbourg-based Delegation for Alsace-Lorraine (Landesausschuß), an appointed body composed of ten notables from each of the three territorial districts.18 Although the Statthalter maintained their residence just off the Broglie, which was the traditional administrative political heart of Strasbourg, the rest of the territorial government was progressively installed across the Ill canal to the north, around what became the Kaiserplatz (imperial plaza, see Figure 2.2).19 Here arose the Imperial palace, the Ministry’s offices, the edifice for the Landesausschuß, and the territorial library, a collection of buildings that emphatically represented German might in the city and Alsace-Lorraine.20 Not only did the buildings house an administration dominated by old Germans; they were constructed according to plans of old-German architects and approved by oldGerman politicians and bureaucrats. Appearances, too, proclaimed the new order’s arrival. The monumental size, the Italian Renaissance style, and the extensive use of white Vosges sandstone visibly differentiated the Kaiserplatz ensemble from the Altstadt.21 17 In naming individuals to fill these new positions, Bismarck also succeeded in settling some political scores in Berlin. The appointment of Feldmarschall Edwin von Manteuffel as the first Statthalter removed one of the emperor’s trusted conservative confidants from Berlin. Likewise, the selection of Karl Herzog, the head of the Section for Alsace-Lorraine in the Reichskanzleramt, as the first Secretary of State paved the way for that agency’s dissolution one year later. 18 Law of 4 July 1879, Reichsgesetzblatt 1311, 165ff. See also Igersheim, L’Alsace des Notables, 42 – 44 and 48 –51, Vogler, Histoire politique, 175 – 81; Morsey, Die oberste Reichsverwaltung, 169 – 84; and Silverman, Reluctant Union, 36 – 45. Legislation for Alsace-Lorraine, however, still required the Bundesrat’s approval. 19 This shift was anticipated in the creation of formal plans for the Neustadt’s development (approved in April 1880). J. G. Conrath, “Bericht des Stadtarchitekten über den Bebauungsplan der neuen Stadtteile Strassburgs,” in Protokolle über die Sitzungen der Commission zur Feststellung des Bebauungsplans für die Stadt Straßburg (Strasbourg: Fischbach, 1879). See also Reinhard Baumeister, “Die Stadterweiterung von Strassburg,” Deutsche Bauzeitung, 13 (1878): 343 – 47, 356 – 57, 411; and 15 (1881): 13 –14, 17, 26 – 28; and Nohlen, Baupolitik, 36 – 44. 20 With the notable exception of Bismarck, the major streets in this governmental district (Regierungsviertel ) were all named for the Reichsland’s major political authorities: Emperor Wilhelm I, Oberpräsident Möller, and the first two Statthalters, Edwin von Manteuffel and Chlodwig von Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst. 21 Nohlen, Baupolitik, passim; Wilcken, Architektur, 53 –106; and Harold Hammer-

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Schiltigheim Gate

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Figure 2.2 The development of German Strasbourg, 1879 –1914. Circled figures indicate: 1. Imperial palace, 2. Territorial library, 3. Parliament (Landesausschuß ) building, 4. Statthalter’s palais, 5. Ministry building, 6. District presidency (Lower Alsace), 7. City hall, 8. Officer’s casino, 9. Protestant garrison church, 10. Catholic garrison church.

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This “imperial” style was also applied to many other buildings that were established in Strasbourg after 1871, which demonstrates another consequence of the city’s importance as a true regional capital. The district administration for the German railway made its headquarters in the new railroad complex on the city’s west side in 1883. The regional division of the German postal services constructed a spacious center for its operations just behind the Landesausschuß building. Branches of the imperial treasury, customs office, and national bank were set up in Strasbourg, as were a plethora of new territorial agencies, from the office of indirect taxation and land registration to the statistical office and the superior authority for the gendarmerie. Although Colmar retained the territorial court of appeal, the increased case load at the Strasbourg district court, especially in matters of administrative law, necessitated a new justice building, which was constructed in the monumental style due west of the Kaiserplatz.22 The preeminent institution of cultural Germanization in the Reichsland was the new University of Strasbourg that made its home in the Neustadt. Just as the University of Bonn helped integrate the Rhineland into Prussia, the University of Strasbourg was meant to promote AlsaceLorraine’s entry into the new German nation-state. To that end, the university, reopened in 1872. Christened the Kasier-Wilhelm-Universität five years later, it was to showcase the brilliance of German scholarship and science. It was reorganized along German lines and endowed with a generous budget that made it possible to appoint major and promising old-German scholars to each of the university’s five faculties: law, medicine, philosophy, science and Protestant theology. The fact that old Germans greatly outnumbered Alsatians and Lorrainers in both the faculty and student body only emphasized the importance of the university to the state’s mission germanisatrice. But it was equally apparent in the development of the university complex itself. Its buildings employed the same architectural language as the public administration structures. Moreover, the chief municipal architect, Geoffroy Conrath’s Schenk, “Die Stadterweiterung Straßburgs nach 1870. Politische Vorgaben historistischer Stadtplanung,” in “Geschichte allein ist zeitgemäß”: Historismus in Deutschland, ed. Michael Brix and Monika Steinhauser (Lahn-Giessen: Anabas-Verlag Kämpf, 1978), 121– 41, here 129 – 35. 22 Henri Nonn, Strasbourg et sa communauté urbaine (Paris: La documentation française, 1982), 36 –39; Handbuch für Elsaß-Lothringen (Strasbourg: Friedrich Bull, 1886); and, especially for the architectural dimension, Wilcken, Architektur, 110 –15, 152–59, and 195 – 97.

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organization of the Kaiserplatz aligned the centers of cultural and political authority along the same horizontal axis, with a major street (the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Strasse, now the Avenue de la liberté) running directly from the Imperial to the University plaza.23 The Neustadt also expressed the strength of German military power in Strasbourg. The new ring of fortifications made the Neustadt possible, with large spaces abutting the new fortifications intra muros reserved for military purposes. The Protestant and Catholic military churches were both erected in the Neustadt and new barracks were constructed in its northern (between the Stone and Schiltigheim gates) and eastern ( just north of the Kehl gate) reaches. These facilities were necessary to house the steadily increasing numbers of men attached to the Fifteenth Army Corps, which was based in Strasbourg. In 1866, the garrison stood at some 8,400 men, by 1885, this figure increased to 10,500, in 1910, it rose again to 15,450 (see also Table 2.1, below). On the eve of the Great War, almost one-fifth of all military personnel stationed in Alsace-Lorraine served in the territory’s capital.24 For both political and strategic reasons, Strasbourg remained a critical garrison city.25 Transforming Strasbourg into a modern, German, big city was not just a matter of increasing its size and marking the Neustadt with manifestations of German political, cultural, and military power. It also involved restructuring how the city operated. Both Otto Back’s appointment as municipal administrator and, after his promotion to District President in 1880, the Bavarian Georg Stempel’s subsequent appointment played a major role in this process. Instead of a part-time mayor with no specific training in city administration, Strasbourg was now led by full-time, career civil servants. Although the old-Strasbourg bourgeoisie initially opposed this development that they regarded as a

23 On the early history of the German University of Strasbourg, see especially Craig, Scholarship and Nation Building, 12 –17, 29 –77. On the Conrath plan for the development of the Neustadt see, Conrath, “Bericht des Stadtarchitekten”; Nohlen, 36 – 43; and Hammer-Schenck, “Stadterweiterung,” 123 –29. 24 Metz may have had a more extensive set of fortifications, but Strasbourg’s military population was larger (15,455 to 13,633 in 1910), comprising 18.78% of the Reichsland’s total military personnel. Statistisches Jahrbuch für Elsaß-Lothringen 1911 (Strasbourg: Statistischen Landesamt für Elsaß-Lothringen, 1912), 1; Statistique de Strasbourg (Strasbourg: Imprimerie alsacienne, 1923), 14; Wilcken, Architektur, 170 –71; Nonn, Strasbourg, 36. 25 By contrast, Cologne and Magdeburg, which shared with Strasbourg the characterization as “service cities” (Dienstleistungstädte)—both lost their fortifications during the Kaiserreich period (in 1881 and 1912, respectively). Ladd, Urban Planning, 91– 92; Krabbe, Die deutsche Stadt, 76 –77.

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hateful intrusion on municipal rights and traditions, by the mid-1880s they came to appreciate the professionalism and skill with which Back and Stempel managed the city’s interests.26 Thus, when the government finally permitted city council elections in 1886, the newly elected council did not hesitate in recommending Back as mayor, a position he accepted and held until retiring in 1906.27 In 1895, a new communal law (Gemeindeordnung) also took effect in Alsace-Lorraine that gave cities like Strasbourg a degree of autonomy comparable to the old-German municipalities. Accordingly, Strasbourg’s city council could now pass budget resolutions to subsidize the cost of a new rectory, decide to build or rename city streets, and create new agencies to deal with urban poverty or housing, all without seeking authorization from the district president or, in many instances, even the Ministry.28 Despite the prominence of these aspects of Strasbourg’s evolution into a modern, big city, it would be a mistake to view urbanization solely as the by-product of Germanization from above. On the one hand, the newness of the German nation-state meant that Germanization was never a coherent, clearly-defined program. On the other, as scholars like Celia Applegate and Alon Confino have emphasized, notions of Germanness have long been rooted in local experiences and practices, so Germanization must imply giving reign to local traditions or, at the very least, framing the national in local terms.29 In this sense, paradoxically, making Alsatians into Germans implied respecting regional peculiarities, preserving aspects of the regional heritage, and encouraging the Reichsland’s participation in the collective process of creating a German national identity. Although rarely perceived as such, this “bottom-up” approach to Germanization also influenced the course of Strasbourg’s urbanization. 26 Back’s successor as municipal administrator, Stempel, was no stranger to Strasbourg. A native of the Palatinate, he studied at the city’s Protestant Gymnasium and had close ties to such influential men as Johann Friedrich Bruch (who, like Stempel, was a native son of Pirmasens). Igersheim, L’Alsace des Notables, 296. 27 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:226 – 30. 28 As Rolf Wittenbrock notes, this change in communal law made it possible for Strasbourg to pursue extremely innovative strategies for meeting urban needs between 1895 and 1914. Wittenbrock, “Die Auswirkungen von Grenzverschiebungen auf Stadtentwicklung und Kommunalverfassung: Metz und Strassburg (1850 –1930),” in Grenzen und Grenzregionen, ed. Wolfgang Haubrichs and Reinhard Schneider (Saarbrücken: SDV Saarbrücker Druckerei und Verlag, 1993), 239 – 65, here 254 – 57. Krabbe provides a solid overview of German traditions in Die deutsche Stadt, 14 –19 and 35 – 47. 29 Applegate, Nation of Provincials; and Confino, Nation as Local Metaphor. Similarly, Jennifer Jenkins, Provincial Modernity, stresses the need to view the construction of German national identity as both a bottom-up and a top-down process.

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Until the 1890s, the desire to remake Strasbourg into a German city left few meaningful traces on the Altstadt. German authorities did not take advantage of the devastation caused by the 1870 bombardment to remake the city core. Rather, in a gesture both conciliatory and practical, they permitted city leaders to rebuild the damaged structures—the city hall, the prefecture, the Aubette, the theater—in the image of the originals.30 Some overdue renovations and improvements were realized along the way, but behind the restored façades. In the western parts of the city—the entire region west of the Ill canal between the White Tower and the Stone gates—such revitalization was impossible because the entire area lay in ruins. Hence, the city built these neighborhoods entirely anew in keeping with urban reform plans dating from the 1850s. The person charged with carrying out these programs, City Architect Conrath, was also a holdover from the French period.31 Indeed, the new ideas on city planning were implemented almost exclusively in the Neustadt. Not only did this heighten the contrast between old and new Strasbourg, but it left the impression that the Neustadt was the old-German city. While the old city presented an image of chaos with its meandering streets of variable size and cramped plazas, the Neustadt projected a sense of order (see Figure 2.2, above). The new streets were broad, straight, and organized to promote the easy flow of traffic from one part of the Neustadt, such as the train station, the Kaiserplatz, the university, the new residential areas, to another, as well as between the old and new city. They also served to keep the new city well lit and aerated, hygienic concerns that were a major feature of late nineteenth-century urban planning throughout Western Europe.32 All construction in the Neustadt was subject to stringent building and zoning codes, which ensured that the problems of the old city (e.g., 30 Only the Lutheran New Church congregation decided against rebuilding in the style of the original, opting instead to construct an entirely new church in a Romanesque style (see Chapter 5). 31 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:277–78; Jean-Pierre Klein, “Strasbourg, capitale du Reichsland,” in Strasbourg: Urbanisme et architecture des origins à nos jours, ed. Jean-Louis Gyss (Strasbourg: Oberlin, 1996), 87–100, here 91; Maas, “Stadtplanung und Öffentlichkeit,” 210 –12; and Denis Durand de Bousingen, “Politique urbaine et urbanisme politique,” in Strasbourg architecture 1870 –1918, ed. Théodore Rieger (Strasbourg: Le Verger Éditeur, 1991), 14 –20, here 16 –18. In all, the German government extended more than 3 million marks to the city of Strasbourg and over 36.5 million marks to private individuals as compensation for the wartime destruction. These funds were paid out of the 5 billion gold mark indemnity France owed to Germany as one of the terms of peace. Hausmann, “Einleitung,” 382. 32 For German trends see Ladd, Urban Planning, 43 – 48, and for France, Cohen, Urban Government, 211– 40.

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violation of alignment plans, building out of proportion to the plot size) were not imported into the new.33 It is tempting to view the emphasis on the Neustadt as well as its specific approaches to urban development as another instance of topdown Germanization, as scholars like Viviane Claude have done.34 Closer analysis reveals that it is more appropriate to view it as an instance of grass-roots, bottom-up Germanization as well. First, although old Germans—especially Back and District President Karl Ledderhose—approved these plans, members of the old-Strasbourg bourgeoisie, above all Conrath, played a decisive role in their formulation. Indeed, the commission that Back convened in 1878 to review the projects prepared by Conrath and the Berlin architect, August Orth, comprised experts on urban planning such as Reinhard Baumeister of Karlsruhe and they preferred Conrath’s proposal over Orth’s.35 Moreover, Conrath was responsible for executing the municipal building plan (Bebauungsplan) approved on 7 April 1880 and hence the city’s urbanizing efforts in the Neustadt. The principles and laws that guided Strasbourg’s expansion were also not simple appropriations of old-German norms.36 First, as Brian Ladd has emphasized, the field was very much in its infancy in the 1870s.37 True, individuals like Baumeister and groups like the Society of German Engineers and Architects and the Society of German Hygienists were elaborating principles to guide urban development in Germany, but Strasbourg’s leaders put together their development plan when these concepts were still in their infancy and practical experience was limited. In short, Strasbourg was a workshop, a place to try out ideas that could (and did) become part of a specifically German approach to urban planning. Equally important, the laws and ordinances governing the expansion were themselves innovative and departed from both French and Ger-

33 Baumeister, “Stadterweiterung”; Klein, “Strasbourg,” 98 –100; Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:274 –76. 34 Viviane Claude, “La germanisation de Strasbourg après 1871,” Les annales de la recherche urbaine 37 (1988): 38 – 45. 35 Nohlen, Baupolitik, 36 – 43; Klein, “Strasbourg,” 95 – 99. 36 Claude, 39, contends that by 1874 –75 German architects, engineers, and hygienists had arrived at a set of norms, a development highlighted by the 1876 publication of Baumeister’s classic text, Stadterweiterung in technischen, baupolizeilichen und wirtschaftlichen Beziehungen (Berlin: Ernst und Korn, 1876). 37 Ladd, Urban Planning, 77–110.

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man (especially Prussian) traditions. The key text here was the law of 21 May 1879, which authorized the city of Strasbourg to impose considerable restrictions on the right to build in the Neustadt.38 Instead of allowing property owners to develop their lots with minimal interference from the state, as was customary in France, the city government now required owners to adhere to building lines (Fluchtlinien) and a series of building, fire, and health regulations. The law also obligated property owners to contribute to the cost of new street construction by means of levies assessed as a proportion of the width of the lot facing the street. In this manner, Strasbourg gained powers to shape the course of its urbanization that many of its Prussian peers lacked.39 In the years after 1880, Strasbourg continued to make a name for itself as a pioneer in urban planning and reform. Although old Germans, including Professors Otto Mayer (law) and Franz Joseph Krieger (medicine) and Adjunct Mayor Hans von der Goltz played leading roles in these initiatives, the policies were developed in Strasbourg. In 1892, the measures for improving urban hygiene, sanitation, and circulation in the Neustadt were extended to the Altstadt as well as other cities in the Reichsland.40 In 1910, the municipality of Strasbourg also introduced one of Europe’s first zoning systems into its urban plan.41 Indeed, from the turn of the century on, the city devoted increasing attention to the Altstadt’s problems. It created a housing commission in 1898 and revamped the entire system of municipal poor relief.42 But the biggest, and most controversial, project of urban renewal was the “great piercing” ( großer Durchbruch/grande percée) of the western Altstadt, launched in 1907. The “piercing” involved carving a new, wide, S-shaped street (the present rue de 22 novembre) to let in considerable “light and air” into one of the most overcrowded parts of the city, while also improving traffic flow in that quarter. To accomplish these objectives, however, numerous old buildings along the route were torn down 38 As Stefan Fisch points out, until 1892 the provisions of this law were limited to Strasbourg. Fisch, “Planung,” 183. 39 For the text of the law, see Hausmann, “Einleitung,” footnotes to pages 386 – 87; C. Denu and E. Ollivier, Le plan d’extension de la ville de Strasbourg, 1871–1880, unpub. dossier from the École d’Architecture de Strasbourg (Strasbourg, 1981), 175 –76. 40 Hausmann, “Einleitung,” 388. 41 Stéphane Jonas, “La Ville de Strasbourg et son université,” in Strasbourg, capitale du Reichsland Alsace-Lorraine et sa université 1871–1918, ed. idem (Strasbourg: Oberlin, 1995), 17–55, here 49 –50; Domincus, Straßburgs deutsche Bürgermeister, 93. 42 Stephane Jonas, “Strasbourg 1900, ville de frontière et d’innovation (1890 –1918),” Revue des sciences sociales de la France de l’Est 19 (1991– 92): 13 –30, esp. 18 –22.

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and some 455 families displaced. Schwander, who succeeded Back as mayor in 1906, didn’t live to see the project completed (this occurred in 1957), but his administration deserves the credit for conceiving it and laying the foundations for its eventual realization.43 The Measure of a Modern City The expansion of Strasbourg’s urban space and the changes to territorial and municipal government did more than just promote the city’s Germanization and its new ideas about urban planning. They made it possible for faith communities to claim portions of the Neustadt and, consequently, for urbanization to promote sacred ends. In order to make sense of this development, as well as some wider consequences of urbanization for Strasbourg’s faith communities, we must first take stock of the specific changes that urbanization had wrought on Strasbourg. Not only did Strasbourg’s physical space expand after 1870, it also experienced considerable population growth. Table 2.1 presents the basic data on Strasbourg’s demographic development under German rule. Again, Strasbourg achieved “big city” status in the 1880s, and between 1871 and 1910 the city expanded by some 93,237 persons, an increase of 109 percent. As in the period before 1870, immigration was primarily responsible for this growth, especially in the periods 1871–1880 and 1885 –1895, when over 60 percent came from immigration.44 However, in contrast to the French period, natural increase also contributed substantially to German Strasbourg’s growth. Not only did it account for roughly 34 percent of the total between 1871 and 1905, but between 1905 and 1910, population growth stemming from natural increase (64.90 percent) actually exceeded that from immigra-

43 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:281– 84; and, especially, Stefan Fisch, “Der Straßburger ‘Große Durchbruch’ (1907–1957). Kontinuität und Brüche in Architektur, Städtebau und Verwaltungspraxis zwischen deutscher und französicher Zeit,” in Cornelißen et al., Grenzstadt Straßburg, 103 –204. 44 Immigration was especially important for offsetting the deaths related to the bombardment and, particularly in the early 1870s, the decline due to autochthonic emigration to France. (In 1872, Möller decreed that those Alsatians who wished to maintain their French citizenship—the optants —had to fix their domicile to French territory by 1 October 1872.) On the issue of the “option,” see Silverman, Reluctant Union, 66 –70; and especially, Alfred Wahl, L’option et l’émigration des Alsaciens-Lorrains (1871–1872) (Paris: Éditions Ophrys, 1974).

strasbourg metropolis Table 2.1

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Strasbourg’s civilian and military populations, 1866–1910

Year

Civilian Civ. IM %CIM Civ. EM Military % Mil

1866 1871 1875 1880 1885 1890 1895 1900 1905 1910

75,784 60,528 78,130 61,046 85,489 64,484 95,013 71,919 101,464 76,095 109,861 81,518 120,115 86,212 136,305 92,315 152,270 98,181 163,436 104,544

% Change 1866–1910

115.66

72.72

79.87 78.13 75.43 75.69 75.00 74.20 71.77 67.73 64.48 63.97

15,256 17,084 21,005 23,094 25,369 28,343 33,903 43,990 54,089 58,892

8,383 7,524 8,817 9,458 10,523 13,639 15,493 14,736 15,408 15,455

286.03

84.36

9.96 8.78 9.35 9.05 9.40 11.04 11.42 9.76 9.19 8.64

Total 84,167 85,654 94,306 104,471 111,987 123,500 135,608 151,041 167,678 178,891 112.54

SOURCE: Statistische Jahresübersichten, 4. NOTE: For 1866, the figures for civilian population intra and extra muros (respectively, IM and EM) reflect an attribution of the entire military population to Strasbourg

tion (35.10 percent).45 This development is one of the strongest testaments to the city’s improved sanitary conditions that allowed for the greatest advances in the rate of natural increase at a time when birth rates were falling.46 Although Strasbourg’s native bourgeoisie acted as if the old Germans arrived in droves to colonize the city for the new German nation-state, the reality was more complicated. For one, the proportion of nativeborn residents in the Reichsland’s capital was constant throughout the period: 40 percent.47 For another, both before and after 1870, the single largest group of immigrants to Strasbourg hailed from the Lower Rhine district (21 percent in 1885, 22 percent in 1910). In short, neither the

Statistique de Strasbourg (1923), 15. Significantly, the period of greatest growth in Strasbourg, 1895 –1905 (an increase of roughly 32,000) occurred when both the levels of natural increase and immigration were strong. 46 That is, after 1900 mortality rates dropped more quickly than natality. Karl Eichelmann, “Der Geburtenrückgang in Straßburg, i. Els.,” Annalen des Deutschen Reichs 46 (1913): 685 – 99, esp. 686 – 88. 47 It should be noted that after 1885, the category of “old German” failed to capture the entire immigrant German population. Children born of old-German parents, for instance, officially counted as “local,” as did those who had acquired Alsace-Lorrainer citizenship. For a further discussion of these difficulties, see especially Alfred Wahl, “L’immigration allemande an Alsace-Lorraine (1871–1918),” Recherches Germaniques 3 (1973): 202–17. 45

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traditional source of immigration into Strasbourg, nor its contribution to the total varied meaningfully between 1870 and 1914.48 Nevertheless, by 1885, old Germans did represent 30 percent of Strasbourg’s population, and by 1910 this level declined by only 2 percent. This oldGerman contingent was quite diverse. Prussians accounted for just over a third of the entire old-German presence, the vast majority of whom came either from the Rhineland or Westphalia. Indeed, throughout the Reichsland period, most old Germans in Strasbourg were born either in Prussia’s western provinces or in neighboring Baden, Württemberg, or Bavaria (the Palatinate). While old Germans found employment in all sectors of the local economy, their presence was most evident in the civil service, the liberal professions, and the military. According to the 1895 occupational census, for instance, over 80 percent of those employed in these sectors were old Germans.49 Herein lay one of the reasons for the natives’ animosity towards the immigrants: these were the very same occupational sectors where the Strasbourg bourgeoisie had traditionally been dominate.50 The influx of new residents coupled with the opening of new habitable space to trigger a major shift in residential patterns. Throughout the Reichsland period, Strasbourg experienced high rates of intraurban mobility. Particularly in the 1870s, when available housing was especially short in supply, the newly arrived took rooms where they could find them and then moved as soon as better quarters were available, which enabled the vacated residence to be rented again. In 48 Statistische Jahresübersichten für Straßburg, 15 –17; see also Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:345 – 47. 49 Old Germans also had notable positions in the transportation, construction, and commercial sectors. Die Ergebnisse der Volkszählung vom 2. Dezember 1895 (Strasbourg: Elsässische Druckerei, 1897), 124 –27. 50 For their part, many old Germans, military men above all, but also civil servants and immigrant Bildungsbürger, expressed little interest in developing amicable relations with the local population. The rift between old Germans and old Strasbourgeois at the upper levels of Strasbourg society has received considerable attention in both contemporary accounts and subsequent scholarship. Indicative here are the memoirs of Elly Heuss-Knapp (daughter of the noted Strasbourg economist, Georg Friedrich Knapp), Ausblick vom Münsterturm: Erinnerungen (Tübingen: Rainer Wunderlich, 1952), 45 – 56; and those of Suzanne Herrenschmidt (the daughter of the noted Strasbourg industrialist Léon Ungemach), Mémoires pour la petite histoire: Souvenirs d’une Strasbourgeoise (Strasbourg: Istra, 1973), 7– 9; see also Histoire de Strasbourg 4:218 –21. As François Uberfill points out, among Strasbourg’s lower middle-class and working class populations, relations between old Germans and Alsatians were more amicable and resulted in a considerable amount of intermarriage. Uberfill, La société strasbourgeoise entre France et Allemagne (1871–1924) (Strasbourg: Publications de la Société Savante d’Alsace, 2001), 185 – 87.

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his memoirs, Arnold Nöldeke, son of the oriental philologist Theodor Nöldeke, describes a typical scenario. The family took up residence on the Weißturmstraße in 1872, moved one year later to the Münstergasse, and to the Sandplätzchen in 1880, before finally settling down in an old patrician house on the Kalbsgasse in 1885.51 Although the Nöldeke’s remained in the Altstadt, many of his colleagues—including Lujo Brentano and Georg Wilhelm Knapp—completed their migration by moving to spacious apartments and villas in the Neustadt.52 Strasbourg’s middle and working-class populations also changed residence frequently and moved to take advantage of vacant dwellings in both the Altstadt and in the suburbs that were generally less expensive than those in the Neustadt. This movement is particularly evident in Protestant parish registers, which were revised every three years. The “Portner” Karl Ackermann, a member of the Old St. Peter parish (itself located in one of the poorer parts of the city), for instance, changed his address five times between 1871 and 1892 alone.53 By the outbreak of war in 1914, the percentage of Strasbourg’s population living in the Altstadt had in fact declined markedly (see Table 2.2). Whereas in 1866, 81.9 percent of all residents lived intra muros, by 1910 only 41.4 percent did. The primary reason was the development of the Neustadt. In 1895 already, roughly 13 percent of Strasbourg’s residents were living there, a figure that rose to almost one-quarter (24.9) by 1910. Equally significant was the impressive growth of Strasbourg extra muros that commenced shortly after the annexation. Given the severe housing shortage intra muros for most of the 1870s, immigrants and also longtime residents availed themselves of opportunities in the suburbs.54 They settled primarily in Ruprechtsau (142.3% change 1866 –1885), Neudorf (188%) and Kronenburg (439%).55 The creation of mature communities in the suburbs—with schools, shops, and churches—played a critical role in their continued expansion throughout the Reichsland era. By the 1890s, places like Neuhof, Königshofen, and Grünberg also grew

51 Arnold Nöldeke, Jugend-Erinnerungen aus dem deutschen Elsaß (Hamburg: Handfeste Verlag, 1934), 16 – 17. 52 Lujo Brentano, Elsässer Erinnerungen (Berlin: Erich Reiß, 1917), 7–9; Heuss-Knapp, Ausblick, 15 –17. See also, more generally, Marie-Noële Denis, “Vivre à Strasbourg: Professeurs et étudiants,” in Jonas, Strasbourg, capitale du Reichsland 57– 87, here 60 –74. 53 AMS, SPVP, 107. 54 185 residential buildings were destroyed during the bombardment. Die Ergebnisse der Volkszählung vom 1. Dezember 1900 (Strasbourg: M. DuMont Schauberg, 1906), xxxviii. 55 Bevölkerung der Stadt Strassburg 1910, 10.

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Percentage of Strasbourg’s population in the primary city sectors, 1866–1910

Year

Altstadt

Neustadt

(1)

(2)

(3)

(4)

(5)

(6)

1866 1895 1910

81.9 62.2 41.4

0.9 12.6 24.9

5.9 5.7 6.0

5.8 10.3 14.7

2.4 1.9 2.6

.6 2.7 4.4

1.9 3.2 3.7

.6 1.4 2.3

SOURCE: Bevölkerung der Stadt Strassburg 1910, 10. NOTE: Column headings represent: (1) Ruprechtsau; (2) Neudorf; (3) Neuhof; (4) Kronenburg; (5) Königshofen; (6) Grüneberg.

and attracted inner city residents (principally native Strasbourgeois and Alsatians) who wished to escape the inner city but could not afford to relocate to the Neustadt.56 Changing residential patterns in Strasbourg also modified urban population densities significantly. In the 1870s and 1880s, the flood of new immigrants exacerbated the overcrowding in the Altstadt. In 1866, there were on average 298 residents per hectare intra muros, this figure rose to 319.48 in 1874 and 352.90 in 1885. The Altstadt experienced modest growth until 1895, when inner-city population density peaked at 367.2 inhabitants/hectare. Although Strasbourg’s overall population density was low in comparison to many other German big cities (1895: 143 persons/ha in Strasbourg, 1890: 169 in Halle, 173 in Frankfurt/Main, 321 in Cologne, and 745 in Berlin) several Altstadt neighborhoods had population densities well above this average, even as late as 1910.57 Statistical district nine, for example (see Figure 2.3), which encompassed the area around “Little France,” increased from 884 civilians/hectare in 1875 to 995 in 1895 before dropping to 921 in 1910.58 By contrast, population densities in the Neustadt lay well below citywide averages, with the exception of the residential quar-

56 According to the 1910 census, only 16.1% of Strasbourg’s extra muros population was born outside of Alsace-Lorraine (a slight decline from the 17.4% registered in 1895). Volkszählung 1895, 2–3; Statistische Jahresübersichten, 4 –5. See also Friedrich Horn, Die Entwicklung der Wohnverhältnisse und ihre Ursachen in der Stadt Strassburg i. E. in den Jahren 1900 –1918, eine kritische Untersuchung (Strasbourg: Strassburger Druckerei und Verlagsanstalt, 1915), esp. 14 –19 and 77–78. 57 Reulecke, Urbanisierung, 218. In 1905, Strasbourg’s average population density was 162 persons/ha, which was much lower than cities like Halle (262 persons/ha), Frankfurt am Main (266), Cologne (321), or Berlin (719). 58 In 1910, the next most densely settled area was the Krutenau (district 17) with 778 persons/hectare. Bevölkerung der Stadt Strassburg 1910, 40.

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ter immediately behind the Kaiserplatz (statistical district E3) which attained the level of 179 persons/hectare in 1905 (city average: 162) and 210/ha in 1910 (city average: 172). Overall, the Neustadt had the highest proportion of old-German residents in the entire city, with 36.51 percent in 1910. But in some districts, notably E4 (Heleninsel) and E5 (the eastern Neustadt, running from the University north to the Ruprechtsau Gate) the proportion of old-German citizens was considerably higher, respectively 42.74 and 45.19 percent. After 1900, several areas of the Altstadt experienced a notable population decline due to the onset of what contemporaries termed “city-building.”59 That is, along the major commercial streets (e.g., Alter Weinmarkt, Meisengasse, Münstergasse, Kinderspielgasse) residential buildings were increasingly converted into stores and businesses. Between 1900 and 1910, the number of buildings that primarily served as residences in statistical districts 1, 2, 3, 6, 8 and 12 dropped from 948 to 929 and the number of households sank by 146. According to the municipal statistical office, the commercial areas alone lost over one thousand residents between 1895 and 1910; statistical districts 2 (Schöpflin school), 3 (New Church), 8/8a (Old St. Peter) and 12/12a (Cathedral) experienced the city’s sharpest decreases in population density (respectively 12.40, 20.26, 18.50/18.94, and 11.15/15.99 percent).60 In short, from a demographic perspective, Strasbourg was a very different city in 1910 than it had been in 1870. It was larger and its population spread out over a larger area with more people living outside than inside the historic city core. Yet, within the context of Germany, the rate of change in Strasbourg was moderate.61 With the exception of Danzig, all of its peers from 1871 grew more rapidly in the same period, at rates varying from 197 (Bremen) to 356 percent (Frankfurt/Main). While Strasbourg had been the fourteenth largest city in the Empire in 1871, it was in twenty-sixth place in 1910, overtaken by newcomers such

See, for instance, Krabbe, Die deutsche Stadt, 88 – 90. Volkszählung 1900, 44 – 45; Bevölkerung der Stadt Straßburg 1910, 11–12 and 40; Horn, “Entwicklung,” 8 –14 and, for a comparative perspective, 23 – 47. The decline of inhabited dwellings in district 8 reflected, too, the preparations for and execution of the first stage of the “great piercing.” 61 However, Strasbourg’s rate of growth was quite impressive compared to its former French peers. Thus, when it rejoined France in 1918, Strasbourg still ranked among the ten largest French cities (number nine, between St-Etienne and Le Havre). Statistique de Strasbourg (1923), 12. 59

60

Figure 2.3

The statistical districts for Strasbourg intra muros. Districts E1– E5 correspond to territory added to the city in 1875 (reprinted from Volkszählung 1895).

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as Essen, Duisberg, and nearby rival, Mannheim.62 In his introduction to the 1910 census, Statistics Bureau Director Karl Eichelmann asserted that the principal reason for this more leisurely course of urbanization was the military fortifications, which hindered industrial development in the Strasbourg region as they did before 1870. Absent the industrial pull-factor, Strasbourg was forced to rely on regional immigration, which, while significant, was incapable of spurring more rapid rates of growth.63 Consequently, Strasbourg never acquired a large foreign (e.g., Italian, Polish) population (only 3.62 percent in 1910), nor was it necessary to construct Mietskaserne (“rental barracks” or tenements) to accommodate the immigrants.64 Indeed, the wave of changes accompanying Strasbourg’s urbanization hardly altered the city’s character as an administrative, commercial, cultural and transportation center. Rather, developments between 1870 and 1914 tended to strengthen these long-standing areas of importance. Strasbourg’s designation as the Reichsland’s capital greatly enhanced its status as an administrative city, just as the expansion of the garrison reinforced its character as a military base. Strasbourg also remained a major educational center at every level. Not only was the University reorganized and enlarged, but after 1871 the city erected four new secondary schools—three technical high schools (Realschulen), and a higher girls school (the höhere Mädchenschule)—and built up the most advanced system of primary education in the Reichsland.65 Moreover, between 1866 and 1895, the proportion of Strasbourg’s working population engaged in civil service, military employment, or the free professions

62 Die Ergebnisse der Grundstückszählung vom November 1905 und der Wohnungs- und Volkszählung vom 1. Dezember 1905 (Strasbourg: M. DuMont Schauberg, 1909), 26*; Reulecke, Urbanisierung, 203. 63 Bevölkerung der Stadt Straßburg 1910, 2– 6. Eichelmann, however, also pointed out that if one discounted the growth of many established big cities that came from incorporating neighboring settlements, then Strasbourg actually grew at a rate comparable with cities like Bremen, Breslau, Magdeburg and Stuttgart. 64 Bevölkerung der Stadt Straßburg 1910, 21; Christoph Cornelißen, “Deutsch-Französische Wohnungspolitik in Straßburg 1886 –1929,” in idem et al., Grenzstadt Straßburg, 21–102, esp. 36 – 38; and Denis, “Vivre à Strasbourg,” 67–76. On the problem of urban housing elsewhere in Imperial Germany, see Ladd, Urban Planning, 81– 84, 106 –10, and 186 – 92; as well as Lutz Niethammer and Franz Brüggemeier, “Wie wohnten Arbeiter im Kaiserreich?,” Archiv für Sozialgeschichte 16 (1976): 76 –134. 65 By 1914, two of these Realschulen (the one by St. John and the one by the Kaiserpalast) had been promoted to “Oberrealschulen.” VBSS, 1910 bis Ende 1918 (Strasbourg: Imprimerie Alsacienne, 1930), 442– 43, 473 – 84. See also Vogler, Histoire culturelle, 310 –14. We will return to the issue of public education in Strasbourg in Chapter 6.

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remained stable at roughly 20 percent and made it (in 1895) the most service-oriented big city in the entire German Empire.66 The 1895 occupational census substantiated the low level of industrialization in Strasbourg. Of Germany’s big cities, Strasbourg ranked twenty-seventh of twenty-eight in this sector. This did not mean that Strasbourg was lacking industrial activity. In each of the Reichslandera occupational censuses (1882, 1895, 1907), at least 40 percent of the working population was classed as “industrial.” But most of this activity was small- and medium-scale and not what one now normally considers “industrial.” In 1895, for instance, garment trades and cleaning comprised 27 percent, building trades 18 percent, and foodrelated activity (milling, brewing, processing, tobacco) 16 percent of the “industrial” total. The period also witnessed significant concentrations in the food processing sector (creation of the Grands moulins de Strasbourg, the Ungemach plant), and a notable rise in metalworking following the arrival of the firm Wolf Netter and Jacobi (8 percent of all industrial activity in 1895). Nevertheless, the heavy industry of both the first (textiles) and the second (iron, steel, chemicals, and electricity) industrial ages was effectively absent from the Reichsland’s capital.67 Under German rule, Strasbourg reemerged as an important commercial city, due above all to major advancements in the transportation network. For both military and political purposes, the annexation prompted the construction of new railway lines, which improved Strasbourg’s ties to Lorraine, the Saarland and Palatinate, and, via Baden (Kehl), the rest of the Empire. Aided by the facilities of the new train station, which was completed in 1883, both passenger and commercial traffic through Strasbourg increased dramatically over the new tracks.68 Equally important, Strasbourg regained its position as a significant Rhine port. At the same time that municipal authorities, supported by the Chamber of Commerce, struggled to begin regularization work on the Rhine, the city invested heavily to modernize its port facilities along the new canal linking the Rhine-Marne to the Rhine-Rhone canals. 66 Volkszählung 1900, xxxiii–xxxvii. After Strasbourg (at 21% in 1895) came Danzig (14%), Dresden (13.5%), Stuttgart (13.4%) and Königsberg (13.0%). 67 Volkszählung 1900, xxxiii–xxxvii and 120 –31, Statistische Jahresübersichten, 30 – 33; Statistisches Jahrbuch für Elsass-Lothringen 5 (1911): 32. See also Sayous, “L’Évolution de Strasbourg,” 14 –16; and Nonn, Strasbourg, 31– 35. 68 As Nonn notes, passenger traffic increased from two to four million between 1881 and 1901 (total of arrivals and departures). Similarly, the tonnage of merchandise shipped through Strasbourg doubled (from roughly 1 to 2 million) between 1897 and 1911. Nonn, Strasbourg, 26.

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After the regularization project commenced in 1898, the city built two spacious ports—one for industrial, one for commercial products—which opened in 1901 to take advantage of the new Rhine traffic. Although Strasbourg was just beginning to realize the full potential of the new port prior to 1914, the early figures were impressive. Between 1901 and 1913, the volume of traffic through Strasbourg’s canal and Rhine ports increased from 933,000 to 2,727,000 tons.69 The occupational censuses provide the clearest indication of Strasbourg’s improved commercial fortunes. In 1895, commerce and transportation accounted for only 21.79 percent of the city’s total employed population; it ranked nineteenth of the twenty-eight German big cities in this category. Twelve years later, 26.77 percent of Strasbourg’s population was engaged in commerce and transportation (the increase came almost entirely from public service/free professions), which put Strasbourg on par with cities like Cologne and Leipzig.70 With its new ports and railway lines, Strasbourg blossomed as a collection and redistribution center. Agricultural products (grain, hops, milk, honey, livestock, lumber) figured prominently here, but so too did coal, petroleum, and textiles (from Upper Alsace). Alongside this wholesale trade existed a thriving retail trade, both in large department stores and in smaller shops and boutiques (butcher shops, bakeries, vegetable stands, stationers, piano stores, jewelers, etc.).71 The big city’s development begat further economic growth. The number of hotels, cafés, and restaurants expanded rapidly to accommodate the increasing number of residents and visitors. The spate of building projects, the extension of railroad lines, the construction of the ports, and new commercial activity promoted the banking sector’s expansion. Indeed, throughout the Reichsland period, Strasbourg retained its importance as a regional banking center with ties running both west of the Vosges and east of the Rhine. The growing population and the expansion of administrative and cultural activities also fostered a resurgence in publishing.72 Despite strict censorship laws, Strasbourg’s 69 Sayous, “L’Évolution de Strasbourg,” 129 – 31; Nonn, Strasbourg, 23 –26; Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg 4:307–12. 70 At least according to the conditions of 1895. Comparative data for 1907 were not published, but with 26.77%, Strasbourg would have ranked seventh in Germany in 1895, between Leipzig (28.1%) and Cologne (26.6%). Volkszählung 1900, xxxiii–xxxvii and 120 –31, Statistische Jahresübersichten, 30 – 33; Statistisches Jahrbuch für Elsass-Lothringen 5 (1911): 32. 71 Nonn, Strasbourg, 28 – 30; Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:323 – 39. 72 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg 4:313 –19, 330, 338.

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output of daily and weekly newspapers (e.g., Straßburger Post, Der Elsässer, Straßburger Zeitung, Der Volksfreund, Der Kirchenbote), learned journals, books, and government publications made it not only the undisputed publishing capital of Alsace-Lorraine, but one of the top ten German publishing markets.73 In 1914, both the native Alsatians and the immigrant Germans in Strasbourg could be proud of how the city evolved after 1870. It was not only larger and better equipped with housing, but cleaner and more sanitary. Although Strasbourg resembled a massive construction site for much of the Reichsland period, the city also took pains to create new parks and promenades in both the old (quay St-Nicholas) and new (Orangerie, Kaiserplatz, University) parts of the city. More of the city also benefited from bright lights. Whereas the local gas concession maintained a mere 1,040 lanterns in 1870, by 1897 it had some 3,030 and in 1908, 5,624 lanterns in its network, with 1654 of these located extra muros.74 Strasbourg also benefited from a modern tram system that aided circulation within the city and facilitated movement between Strasbourg and neighboring towns and villages (e.g., Schiltigheim, Bischheim, Wolfisheim). Begun as a horse-drawn tramcar system in 1879 with 9.95 km of track, the initial lines were electrified and extended after 1893, reaching a total system length of 78 km in 1918. Just as the new train lines could bring tourists and businessmen to Strasbourg for short periods of time, the tram system made it possible for individuals to live in places like Kehl and Schiltigheim, and still take advantage of Strasbourg’s stores, theaters, concert halls, and fairs, even its job market. These developments, too, were a measure of Strasbourg’s modernity; a sign that it was not just a big city, but the heart of an emerging metropolitan region.75

73 Thanks to the so-called “Dictator paragraph” (Paragraph 10 of the 30 December 1871 Law on the Administration of Alsace-Lorraine), German officials in the Reichsland had virtually unrestricted power to ban or forbid the publication of newspapers, which it used on numerous occasions between 1871 and 1897. The introduction of the imperial press law of 1898 weakened this power, but it was not officially abrogated until 1902. Hiery, Reichstagswahlen, 74. See also Alfred Wahl and Jean-Claude Richez, L’Alsace entre France et Allemagne 1850 –1950 (Paris: Hachette, 1994), 322–24. On the urban orientation of German publishing, see Hans Heinrich Blotevogel, “Kulturelle Stadtfunktionen und Urbanisierung. Interdependente Beziehungen im Rahmen der Entwicklung des deutschen Städtesystems im Industriezeitalter,” in Urbanisierung im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, ed. Hans-Jürgen Teuteberg (Cologne: Böhlau, 1983), 143 –185, here 153 – 59. 74 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:298 – 306 and 387– 91. 75 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 303 – 05 and 346 – 48; Nonn, Strasbourg, 135 – 47;

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Big City, Godly City By focusing on demography, sanitation, housing, transportation, and municipal politics, scholars have long promoted the notion that nineteenth-century European urbanization was a secular process. Not only have they excluded religious life from their purview, but they have also refused to consider that “secular” subjects like immigration and urban planning might also have had significant “sacred” dimensions.76 Strasbourg’s development after 1870, indeed, suggests that urbanization was not such a secular phenomenon after all. Demographic change in the Reichsland’s capital was as much a matter of confession Table 2.3

Evolution of Strasbourg’s civilian population by confession, 1866–1910

Year

Cath.

%C

Prot.

%P

Jewish % J

1866 1871a 1875 1880a 1885 1890 1895 1900 1905 1910

43,750 43,319 44,855 49,251 51,712 56,053 61,572 70,957 80,594 86,456

57.73 55.44 52.47 51.84 50.97 51.02 51.26 52.06 52.93 52.90

28,893 31,510 37,095 41,873 45,540 49,498 54,003 60,297 65,890 69,639

38.13 40.33 43.39 44.07 44.88 45.06 44.96 44.24 43.27 42.61

3,126 3,088 3,267 3,493 3,711 3,958 4,012 4,499 5,016 5,712

% Change 1866–1910b

97.61

141.02

82.73

4.12 3.95 3.82 3.68 3.66 3.60 3.34 3.30 3.29 3.49

Other

%O

Total

– 213 272 396 501 352 528 552 770 1,629

– 0.27 0.32 0.42 0.49 0.32 0.44 0.40 0.51 1.00

75,784 78,130 85,489 95,013 101,464 109,861 120,115 136,305 152,270 163,436

664.79

115.66

SOURCE: VBSS 1870 –1888/89, 21 and Statistische Jahresübersichten, 4. a In 1871 and 1880, “other” includes both “other Christians” and “other religions.” b Percentage change for “other” calculated between 1871 and 1910.

and more generally, Robert E. Dickinson, The City Region in Western Europe (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1967), 6 –13. In the Strasbourg region, the interpenetration of the city and the surrounding area never reached the level where annexations were necessary, as occurred in many parts of Germany between 1885 and 1918. Krabbe, Die deutsche Stadt, 95 – 98. 76 See here especially the remarks in Teuteberg, “Moderne Verstädterung.” As examples of this secular approach to urbanization, see such recent studies as Krabbe, Die deutsche Stadt; Reulecke, Urbanisierung; Jean-Luc Pinol, Le monde des villes; and Cohen, Urban Government. One of the rare exceptions to this trend is Massard-Guilbaud, “The Genesis of an Urban Identity.”

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as it was nationality or class, and the influx of new residents altered Strasbourg’s confessional composition, both overall and at the neighborhood level. Urban development also permitted the sacralization of new municipal areas in the Altstadt and Neustadt, frequently with the support and financial assistance of both municipal and territorial political authorities. Throughout the Reichsland era, government officials paid close attention to the confessional dimension of Strasbourg’s demographic evolution. Questions regarding religious affiliation were standard elements in the quinquennial census surveys, enabling us to document many aspects of the confessional dimension to Strasbourg’s emergence as a big city.77 As Table 2.3 reveals, Strasbourg’s primary faith communities—Catholic, Protestant and Jewish—were all significantly affected by the demographic expansion between 1871 and 1910. In absolute terms, the Protestant population increased the most (141 percent), but the number of Catholics living in Strasbourg nearly doubled, and the Jewish community grew by some 82 percent. As a result of these differing growth rates, the relative contribution of each group to the total also underwent notable changes. Due largely to the strength of old-German immigration between 1871 and 1900, the proportion of Protestants living in Strasbourg rose for the first time since the capitulation to France in 1681. When the rate of old-German immigration to Strasbourg diminished after 1895, however, the Catholic preponderance in Alsace-Lorrainer immigration caused the percentage of Protestants living in the capital to recede.78 Nevertheless, in 1910 it still stood well above the levels of 1866 and 1871. Effectively constant through the entire period was the relative size of Strasbourg’s Jewish community; it fluctuated between 3 and 4 percent of the total. Strasbourg’s faith communities did not just grow in size between 1871 and 1910; they also became more diversified internally. Immigra-

77 Cf. Statistisches Handbuch für Elsaß-Lothringen (1885 –1906); Statistisches Jahrbuch für Elsaß-Lothringen (1907–1914); Statistische Mitteilungen über Elsaß-Lothringen; and, after 1895, the city’s own Beiträge zur Statistik der Stadt Strassburg. Indeed, the fact that German authorities attached such importance to gathering data on religious affiliation is itself a testament to the ongoing salience of confessional identity to German political life. 78 In 1895, for instance, roughly 55 percent (54.69) of all old-Germans in Strasbourg (according to place of birth) were Protestant, only 41 percent Catholic, and 3.5 percent Jewish. By contrast, in the same period, Catholics comprised 59.59 percent, Protestants 36.03 percent, and Jews 3.98 percent of Alsace-Lorrainers who had immigrated to Strasbourg. Volkszählung 1895, 90 – 97.

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tion brought men and women to Strasbourg who had different ideas about what it meant to be Catholic, Protestant or Jewish. The Catholic community was the least affected by this development, since, according to the 1895 census, almost three-quarters of the Catholics living in Strasbourg had been born in the diocese of Strasbourg (74.43 percent and 44.8 were native to Strasbourg itself ). Another 16.5 percent of the city’s Catholics hailed from the nearby dioceses of Cologne, Freiburg, Metz, Mainz, Speyer and Trier, where the style of Catholicism was very similar to that practiced in Strasbourg. Indeed, among Germany’s big Catholic cities, Strasbourg (the fourteenth largest Catholic city in 1910) stood out for having one of the most homogeneous Catholic populations in terms of religious custom and practice.79 The impact of immigration on Strasbourg’s Protestant community between 1870 and 1914 was much more consequential. Strasbourg’s Protestant population in 1895 bore a certain resemblance to the Catholics: 45 percent were local and 52 percent immigrants. The immigrants, however, encompassed a wide variety of traditions. The old Germans (roughly 30 percent of the total in 1895) came from several different state churches (Landeskirchen), each with its own customs, preferred hymns, and ideas of piety. Protestants from Germany’s united churches (in the Palatinate, Baden, and old Prussia) had the most difficult transition in this respect, because this type of church was absent in the Reichsland.80 But even immigrants from Alsace’s small towns and rural areas (22 percent in 1895) found the religious traditions in Strasbourg somewhat foreign, which demonstrates the vitality of local Protestant culture in rural Alsace.81 Judging from the 1895 census data, immigrants comprised an even higher percentage of Strasbourg’s Jewish population. At this point, only 36 percent of the community was born locally, 33 percent came

Again, this was largely a function of the absence of serious industry in Strasbourg that drew masses of Polish and, later, Italian Catholics elsewhere (especially in Westphalia and parts of the lower Rhine). See, Friedrich Wilhelm Saal, “Die katholische Kirche in Dortmund und die Industrialisierung im Ruhrgebiet,” in Elm and Loock, Seelsorge und Diakonie, 129 –57; and Liedhegener, Christentum und Urbanisierung, 392–27 (Bochum). 80 At best they could attend the services for the military population that were conducted according to the Prussian military church liturgy. However, civilians could not formally join a military congregation, which meant that they would have to go to one of the city’s Lutheran or Calvinist pastors for church rites (baptisms, weddings, funerals). We will return to the problem of the military church in Strasbourg in subsequent chapters. 81 Lienhard, Foi et vie, 73 – 90. 79

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from other parts of Alsace-Lorraine (primarily Lower Alsace), and 26 percent from old Germany (primarily from neighboring Baden and the Bavarian Palatinate). Here, too, the differences between religious life in rural and urban Alsace combined with the unique development of Judaism on both sides of the Rhine between 1800 and 1870 to produce a Jewish community in Strasbourg that was divided along lines of class (middle class versus poorer Jews of rural origin), ethnicity (Alsatians versus German and, later, east European Jews), and religious practice (reformed versus orthodox).82 These tensions prompted the creation of an orthodox-leaning independent religious association (Ez Chaim) in 1882, which, six years later, broke away from the state-recognized consistorial community. In 1892 the “Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft,” whose membership drew primarily on poorer Alsatian, old-German, and eastern European Jews, completed the rupture by opening its own synagogue on the rue Kageneck.83 By the end of the nineteenth century, the expansion of the Neustadt, the development of the city extra muros, and the high rates of intraurban mobility also reworked how Strasbourg’s Catholics, Protestants and Jews lived. On the eve of the Franco-Prussian war, members of the three faith communities were fairly evenly mixed within the intra muros neighborhoods.84 Outside the city walls there were decidedly more Catholics than Protestants in 1866 (64 to 36 percent), and basically no Jews (according to the official census figures).85 By 1900, this picture had changed appreciably. Within the bounds of the fortifications, several of the city’s statistical districts (see Figure 2.3, above) assumed a pronounced confessional character, although none could be characterized as a confessional “ghetto.” Catholics, for instance, comprised over 60 percent of the population in the districts surrounding the cathedral (12a), the Catholic gymnasium (5), “Little France” (9) as well as the

As Vicki Caron points out, the Reichsland period was characterized by a substantial degree of rural to urban migration that benefited Strasbourg. Caron, Between France and Germany, 105 –12 and 162 – 69. 83 Robert Weyl, “La communauté juive de Strasbourg entre le libéralisme et la tradition (1808 –1988),” Communauté nouvelle 38 (Sept–Oct 1988): 109 –25, esp. 119 –21. 84 Indeed, when we look at the percentage of Catholics or Protestants living in a given district relative to the entire Catholic or Protestant population, we find that they are still rather evenly distributed across the city. In 1910, however, the proportions of Catholics residing in the thirty-three statistical districts ranged from 0.4 to 4.0, while those for Protestants varied between 0.3 and 5.5. Bevölkerung der Stadt Straßburg 1910, 62. 85 The following discussion refers to civilian populations only. Data for 1866 come from Volkszählung 1900, lxiv. 82

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districts directly across the Ill from the Cathedral (13) and the Catholic gymnasium (19). In the Altstadt, Protestants were in the majority in the areas around the St. Thomas church (10, with 51 percent) and in two districts with a high number of military installations (18, near the arsenal; and 22, immediately west of the hospital campus). Because old Germans took the lead in settling the Neustadt, it began as a strongly Protestant area (58 percent in 1895), but by 1910 the influx of (Catholic) Alsatians and native Strasbourgeois had reduced the size of the Protestant share to 51 percent.86 In 1900, Jews were most prominent in the two districts directly across the canal from the new consistorial synagogue, which opened in 1898 (8a and 6, with respectively twenty and 23 percent of the total). But 25 percent of the city’s Jewish population lived in two other districts: 7 (where the old consistorial synagogue was located) and 25 (in the Kageneck, where the independent synagogue was constructed). Ten years later, Jews maintained a strong presence in districts 7 and 8a, but they had also begun to establish themselves in the Neustadt, with 22 percent of the city’s Jews living in district E3 (the area around the Kaiserpalast) alone. Throughout the Reichsland period, however, Jews continued to avoid living extra muros and constituted less than twotenths of 1 percent of that population.87 Thus, the areas beyond the walls remained the preserve not just of Catholics, but also increasingly Protestants, who by 1910 made up roughly 43 percent of the extra muros total (an increase of 7 percent from 1866). The growing numbers of Catholics, Protestants, and Jews living in Strasbourg had another important consequence for the city’s urban development. They prompted the faith communities to construct new facilities for worship and associational activity, which expanded their own claims on the urban space intra and extra muros. This wave of church and synagogue building was not unique to Strasbourg. After decades of inactivity, new churches and synagogues started springing up everywhere in Germany’s cities after 1870. Berlin alone witnessed the construction of thirty-eight new Protestant and forty Catholic churches between 1870 and 1914. In Munich, eighteen new Catholic

86 Volkszählung 1895, 78 – 80; Volkszählung 1900, 89 – 91; Bevölkerung der Stadt Strassburg 1910, 61– 63. 87 In fact, if we concentrate only on the population intra muros, the percentage of Jews living in Strasbourg between 1866 and 1910 actually increased, from 5.05 in 1866 (5.00 in 1871) to 5.36 in 1910.

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churches were erected between 1887 and 1913. Likewise, in cities from Leipzig and Stuttgart to Bochum and Hanover, existing parishes were divided into smaller, neighborhood-based units, which received their own—new—churches.88 Indeed, by the eve of the First World War, Germany’s big cities experienced not only the most dramatic phase of urbanization, but also the greatest period of church construction since the Middle Ages. Altogether, some thirty churches and chapels were erected in Strasbourg between 1871 and 1914 that occupied parcels in all three sectors of the city: Altstadt, Neustadt, and extra muros. Apart from the new New Church, all of the Altstadt structures claimed new space (Figure 2.4). They included the new consistorial synagogue on the quay Kléber (Kleberstaden) (completed in 1898) and buildings for several independent religious communities and free churches: the synagogue of the “Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft” (1892), the “Zionskirche” of the “Evangelical Community” on the Zixplatz, the church for the French language “Protestant Worship Society” on the St. Martin’s bridge (1905), and the chapel for the Catholic St. Barbara Clinic (1877).89 In the Neustadt, new churches were built in each of the major districts: the long-awaited Catholic Young St. Peter church to the west (1893), the Protestant military church in the center (1897), and the Catholic garrison church to the east (1897). By 1914, Lutheran church officials had also begun discussions with governmental authorities to construct a parish in the heart of the Neustadt, a project that was interrupted by the

88 Compare, for instance, Hans Otte, “More Churches—More Churchgoers: The Lutheran Church in Hanover between 1850 and 1914,” in McLeod, European Religion, 90 –118, here 103 –107; Liedhegener, Christentum und Urbanisierung; 184 – 87; Wolfgang Ribbe, “Zur Entwicklung und Funktion der Pfarrgemeinden in der evangelischen Kirche Berlins bis zum Ende der Monarchie,” in Elm and Loock, Seelsorge und Diakonie, 233 – 63, here 260 – 61; Felix Escher, “Pfarrgemeinden und Gemeindeorganisation der katholischen Kirchen in Berlin bis zur Gründung des Bistums Berlin,” in Elm and Loock, Seelsorge und Diakonie, 265 –292, here 289 –292; and Hans Jürgen Brandt, “Katholische Kirche und Urbanisation im deutschen Kaiserreich,” Blätter für deutsche Landesgeschichte 182 (1992): 221–39, here 233 – 34. On conditions in Vienna, see Johann Weißensteiner, “Großstadtseelsorge in Wien. Zur Pfarrentwicklung von der josephinischen Pfarrregulierung bis in das 20. Jahrhundert,” in Elm and Loock, Seelsorge und Diakonie, 95 –128, esp. 104 –17. 89 Th. Schmitz, “Die Kirchen der Neuzeit,” in Strassburg und seine Bauten, 391– 404; Théodore Rieger, “Les églises et les édifices privés,” in Gyss, Strasbourg urbanisme et architecture, 258 –72; and Wilcken, Architektur im Grenzraum, 245 – 86. One could also add St. Magdalena (Catholic) to this list, which was almost entirely rebuilt after suffering from a major fire in 1904.

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war and never revived.90 The area immediately northwest of Catholic Young St. Peter also took on a decidedly confessional character, thanks to the construction of the Protestant Association House (Evangelisches Vereinshaus, Dreizehnergraben 8) in 1895 and, fourteen years later, the decision of the Catholic Caritas-Verband and the Volksverein to move their headquarters to Finkmattstrasse 6.91 Lastly, beyond the city walls, new Catholic and Protestant parishes churches were built in Neudorf, Königshofen, and Kronenburg, a Catholic parish church in NeudorfMusau, and in 1892, a Capuchin monastery in Königshofen.92 The faith communities’ conquest of urban space in German Strasbourg was remarkable in that it was supported and encouraged by the municipality. All the plans for expanding the city from the 1870s included provisions for new church construction. August Orth proposed building new churches on major public squares throughout the Neustadt (e.g., the Kaiserplatz, and the squares near the Ill, Kronenburg, and Kehl gates) as well as a new synagogue across the Ill-Canal from St. Stephan (where the Protestant garrison church was actually erected).93 The city’s concern bespoke its obligation under the prevailing (French) laws to meet the costs of new church and synagogue construction that could not be born by the recognized faith community itself.94 The city of Strasbourg assumed the lion’s share of the expenses for the parish churches built between 1875 and 1914. When it was not already in its

90 In response to a query from the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine about the number of Altstadt pastors, the Lutheran President, Friedrich Curtius, noted that the creation of a Lutheran parish in the area between the Ruprechtsauer Allee and the Fünfzehnerwörth would soon be necessary. Curtius to the Ministry (draft), 17 Feb 1914, ADBR 172 AL 138. This is also an area where Conrath, in his plan for Strasbourg’s expansion, foresaw the construction of a new church. “Plan des Herrn Stadt-Architecten Conrath,” appendix to August Orth, Entwurf zu einem Bebauungsplan für Strassburg (Leipzig: E. A. Seemann, 1878). 91 Paul Grünberg, ed., Handbuch für die Innere Mission in Elsaß-Lothringen (Strasbourg: Evangelischen Gesellschaft, 1899), 111–18; Rossé et al., Das Elsass, 3:495 – 97. In 1898 Strasbourg’s “Apostolic Community” also constructed a chapel for itself on the nearby Niederbronner Strasse; Rieger, “Églises,” 264. 92 Gustav Rominger, Straßburger Katholisches Jahrbuch für 1908 (Strasbourg: Hausdruckerei des Elsässischen Volksbotes, 1908), 63. 93 City council resolution of 31 May 1871, reprinted in Karl Eichelmann, Die Erweiterung der Stadt Straßburg (auf Grund des Vertrages der Stadt mit dem Deutschen Reiche vom 2. Dezember 1875) (Strasbourg: Du Mont-Schauberg, 1907), 8; Orth, Entwurf, esp. 13 (“Eines Theils [der Plätze] muss sich die Stadt für gewisse öffentliche Bauten, wie besonders von Kirchen, Plätze reservieren. . . .”); and 38 – 41. 94 See here, “Das Cultuswesen,” in VBSS 1870 bis 1888/89, 482–86; and Wilcken, Architektur im Grenzraum, 246.

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possession, the municipality acquired suitable parcels of land and paid the bills for architects, construction materials, and workers. The parish communities generally took responsibility for the cost of outfitting the new structure, paying for furniture, heating systems, and organs. Although the city held final responsibility for naming an architect and approving building plans, ecclesiastical authorities largely determined the physical requirements (including matters of style) for the parish churches. There was thus no single “German Strasbourg” ecclesiastical style, instead there was architectural eclecticism. Catholic Young St. Peter was built along neo-Romanesque lines, but St. Joseph (in Königshofen) was a hybrid of Romanesque and Gothic elements, and St. Florent (Kronenburg) employed traditional Romanesque forms. Similarly, Lutheran St. Sauveur (Kronenburg) reprised the Renaissance of Strasbourg’s golden age, but St. Paul (Königshofen) was modern.95 When the city’s financial stake in the construction was minimal, faith communities had more free reign in planning their buildings.96 Since the new New Church was funded largely through war reparations, its consistory ran its own design competition, and ultimately selected Emile Salomon, who trained at the École des Beaux Arts to build a monumental Romanesque church.97 Although municipal and territorial officials both contributed to meeting the expenses of the consistorial synagogue’s construction, the consistorial community shouldered most of the 775,000 mark burden. Thus, it was the consistory that oversaw the building of the imposing, neo-Romanesque structure that emerged on the quay Kléber between 1895 and 1898.98 The city played no part Rieger, “Églises,” 258 – 64; and Wilcken, Architektur, 261–86. Of course, the city had no responsibilities vis-à-vis independent religious communities (e.g., Ez Chaim and the Evangelischer Gottesdienstlicher Verein), nor toward the voluntary associations affiliated with the recognized faith communities (e.g., Caritas and the Protestant Inner Mission Society). Indeed, in light of the state’s obligations to the official faith communities, such groups and associations were deemed ineligible for municipal and territorial assistance. 97 Nevertheless, the budget for the project eventually exceeded the reparation funds, which forced the consistory to launch a public subscription campaign to complete the major projects and to delay the bell tower’s construction until 1887. Julius Sengenwald, Bericht über die Wiederaufbau der Neuen Kirche (Strasbourg: Fischbach, 1876); Thurm- und Glockenweihe der Neuen Kirche zu Straßburg —15. Juli 1888 (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1888). 98 The city donated the plot and gave 200,000 marks to the project, but in exchange the consistory had to yield the parcel where the existing synagogue stood (rue St. Helene). Mayor Back to the Jewish Consistory of Lower Rhine (draft), 19 Nov 1894, AMS, 13° Div IV 375/2101. The Landesausschuß contributed 60,000 marks. Jean Daltroff, La synagogue consistoriale de Strasbourg, 1898 –1940 (Strasbourg: Editions Ronald 95 96

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in the erection of the Neustadt’s two military churches. Instead, the Prussian war ministry paid for these Gothic structures and, thereby, helped mark these new areas of Strasbourg as sacred ground.99 While Strasbourg’s support for new church construction stemmed primarily from its legal obligations, the same cannot be said for the other means by which it gave its urbanization a confessional inflection. To wit, after 1880 the city began naming streets in the Neustadt after leading figures from Strasbourg’s religious past.100 This practice was particularly evident in three Neustadt regions: the area immediately west and north of the Kaiserplatz, the area to the west and east of the Ruprechtsauer Allee, and the area between the Kölner Ring and the Kehl Gate. Overall, more streets were named for Catholics (seventeen) than for Protestants (seven), which reflected the city’s importance as a center of medieval Catholicism as evidenced by appellations such as St.-Fridolin-Strasse, Erwinstrasse, Taulerstrasse and, after 1905, the partial renaming of the Zornstaden to Bischof-Werner-Strasse. Other selections represented the nineteenth-century awakening of confessional consciousness.101 Most of the other Catholic men so recognized were staunch advocates of the Catholic cause during the Reformation period and included most of the era’s leading polemicists (i.e., Fischart, Geiler, Murner, and Wimpheling). Notable men from the city’s Protestant past were also recognized with street names in the Neustadt. Hirle, 1996), 4 – 6. In opting for the neo-Romanesque style, the Karlsruhe architect Ludwig Levy deliberately avoided the typical, contemporary “oriental” styles (Orth’s plan included just such a synagogue) and contended that the latter was out of keeping with Strasbourg’s overall cityscape. Wilcken, Architektur, 265. 99 Schmitz, “Kirchen der Neuzeit, 397– 404; The choice of the Gothic doubly reinforced the “German” character of these churches. Not only did they serve the German garrison community, but they reflected a consensus within Germany that important churches should be constructed in the Gothic style; Wilcken, Architektur, 253 – 59. 100 Listing of street names taken from Die Ergebnisse der Volkszählung vom 1. Dezember 1910 (Strasbourg: M. DuMont Schauberg, 1911), 3 –10; see also the material in 27 AL 279; and Maurice Moszberger, Théodore Rieger, and Léon Daul, Dictionnaire historique des rues de Strasbourg (Illkirch: Le Verger, 2002). The number of new streets named for important Catholics and Lutherans was surpassed only by streets named after Reichsland cities and towns (most prominently in the western Neustadt, statistical districts E1 and E2, e.g., Wasselnheimstrasse, Mutzigerstasse, Weißenburgerstrasse) and streets named after other German cities (above all in E5, Kölner-Ring, Mainzerstrasse, Bonnerstrasse, etc.). By 1910, a fair number of the Neustadt’s streets also honored literary and musical personages (including Goethe, Wagner, Berlioz, and Alsatian poets like Daniel Hirtz and Ehrenfried Stöber). 101 In an article of 2 July 1881, the Kirchenbote expressed a wish that P. J. Spener, another native son, would also be recognized with his own street. KB 10/27 (2 July 1881): 111.

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They included Reformation-era figures like Martin Bucer and Jacob Sturm, such renowned eighteenth-century Lutherans as Blessig, Oberlin, Pfeffel, and Silbermann, and the nineteenth-century pastor FrédéricGuillaume Edel.102 Strasbourg’s approach to naming streets in the Neustadt was not unusual. By the nineteenth century it had become commonplace to honor important individuals in a city’s history in such a manner. Nor was the choice of prominent Catholic and Lutheran figures in Strasbourg surprising, given the importance of confessional affiliation in city life since the Reformation. In the Altstadt one could already find streets commemorating two leaders of the Reform in Strasbourg, Jean Sturm and Charles Marbach. Yet, seen against the broader background of Strasbourg’s evolution into a big city, these street names highlight aspects of nineteenth-century European urbanization that the rhetoric of secularization has long denied. Urbanization was a complex process. It supported “secular” developments from new approaches to housing and sanitation, to new modes of political action and municipal administration. But it also made possible a sacralization of the urban environment, a process in which both the faith communities and the “secular” state participated. Indeed, as the practice of naming new streets after men like Bucer and Brandt implied, urbanization was not an “either-or” phenomenon that permitted only secularization or sacralization. Rather, it encouraged both.103

102 The Dictionnaire des rues de Strasbourg (362) suggests that “Edelstrasse” was named for the noted local family of bell makers, but its actual location makes an association with the New Church pastor and religious inspector Edel (who belonged to the family) more compelling. After 1918, the main street due west of Edelstrasse was renamed to honor one of Edel’s colleagues at the New Church, the colorful, rationalist pastor George Louis Leblois. 103 On the problematic notion of the modern western European state as a secularizing force, see especially McLeod, Secularisation, 52–85.

CHAPTER THREE

THE PARISH MILIEU During the final decades of the nineteenth-century, socialists and other political radicals in Central Europe campaigned to end state support for organized religion with the slogan: “Religion ist Privatsache” (Religion is a private affair). Precisely because religion is a matter of individual choice, they argued, the state should use neither public funds nor the law to encourage and protect it.1 While intended as an attack on the churches, the socialists’ charge has merit. Religion is a “private” concern inasmuch as it is a matter of conscience. The private sphere remained an important site for religious practice and socialization.2 Prayers accompanied meals and bedtime. Mothers insured that children attended catechism classes and worship services. And, even in bourgeois households, the Bible was regularly read aloud en famille.3 Furthermore, Protestant theology characterizes salvation as something essentially personal that empowers Protestants to seek out religious nourishment according to their individual needs and inclinations.4 Yet, religion is also profoundly, even fundamentally, communal and public. Martin Luther observed that one learns best about Christ by 1 This was point six of the German Social Democratic Party’s Erfurt program, whose adoption in 1891 established the party as an orthodox Marxist organization. On the tensions between organized religion and socialism in Imperial Germany see Sebastian Prüfer, Sozialismus statt Religion: die deutsche Sozialdemokratie vor der religiösen Frage 1863 –1890 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002), esp. 178 – 99; and Willfried Spohn, “Religion and Working-Class Formation in Imperial Germany 1871–1914,” Politics & Society 19 (1991): 109 –32, esp. 119 –24. 2 It is this close association between religion and the private realm of the home that increasingly caused piety to be coded as something particularly feminine after 1800. Cf. Brown, Death of Christian Britain, esp. 58 –114; as well as the remarks in Lynn Abrams and Elizabeth Harvey, “Introduction: Gender and Gender Relations in German History,” in Gender Relations in German History: Power, Agency, and Experience from the Sixteenth to the Twentieth Century, ed. idem, (Durham: Duke University Press, 1997), 1–38. 3 Cf. Heuss-Knapp, Ausblick vom Münsterturm, 35–36. Knapp was the daughter of the noted old-German political economist Georg Friedrich Knapp and future wife of Theodor Heuss, West Germany’s first president. 4 On the individualization of piety, especially within German Protestantism, see Lucian Hölscher, “The Religious Divide: Piety in Nineteenth-Century Germany,” in Smith, Protestants, Catholics and Jews, 33 – 47, esp. 35 –39.

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observing how the faith community believed, lived and taught and not through individual mental exertion.5 One learns how to be a Lutheran or Calvinist and what that means through the association with a community. Indeed, until late in the nineteenth century, the churches’ schools taught Protestants to read and make sense of the Bible and other pious literature. Worship services exposed individuals to a variety of ideas, symbols, and behaviors that furnished both “text” and context for more personal and private devotions. In short, the parish exerted considerable influence on the development of individual and collective religious identity; consequently, the analysis of its size and geographical location, its ministers and its decision-making processes is essential for the investigation of religious culture, urban or otherwise. After 1870, the basic structures of parish life in Strasbourg were remarkably resilient to the tests of time. The relatively moderate pace of urban growth combined with the German administration’s desire to meet the territory’s legitimate ecclesiastical needs and defuse potential sources of political dissent to facilitate the adaptation of existing parish networks to new city conditions. Pastors continued to play central roles in parish life due to their calling as religious specialists for the community. By 1914, however, it was equally clear that the city and the church had changed the understanding of the parish milieu. Shifting demands resulted in transferring pastoral positions from the inner city to the suburbs. The establishment of military parishes and the rise of free churches further diversified the local religious marketplace and created challenges to the state churches’ position. Moreover, important changes within Strasbourg’s pastoral corps affected how ministers viewed and exercised their functions. With the commencement of German rule in Strasbourg, a new generation of pastors took on the leadership of Strasbourg’s parishes, with a second generation following at the turn of the century. The Reichsland period also marked a progressive professionalization of the Protestant clergy, similar to what Oliver Janz observed in Prussia and Frank-Michael Kuhlemann in Baden.6 These reforms improved the pastors’ intellectual and material position, largely to the benefit of their congregations. Furthermore, they fostered a greater sense of group consciousness among both the Lutheran and Reformed pastors. But they did not completely

5 Cited in August Hering, “Protestantismus und Kirche,” ASPC 13 (1914): 391– 424, here 405. 6 Janz, Bürger; Kuhlemann, Bürgerlichkeit.

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overcome the sense of difference between the two sister churches. Nor did they make the Reichsland’s pastors into “managers” of the parish milieu, at least in the terms of Olaf Blaschke and other advocates of the German milieu paradigm.7 The laymen on Strasbourg’s parish councils and consistories were actively engaged with the administration of the parish and its finances. They also exercised considerable influence on parish conditions and brokered compromises between pastors of different theological persuasions and helped to select pastors for the parish. But given the tense relations between immigrants and natives, these same arrangements between pastors and laity created obstacles for integrating the old Germans in local parish life that had not entirely been overcome even as the twentieth century began. The Evolution of Parochial Conditions in Metropolitan Strasbourg The main issue behind the changes in Strasbourg’s network of Protestant parishes was demography. As the number of Protestants living in the capital rose, the churches needed to provide for their spiritual needs. In that task, Lutheran and Reformed officials in Strasbourg enjoyed advantages that their counterparts elsewhere in Germany could scarcely imagine. First, whereas the number of new Protestants in cities like Frankfurt am Main or Berlin ran into the hundreds of thousands, the net increase in Strasbourg was fairly modest, only some 36,000 parishioners. Second, by keeping French church law in effect for Alsace-Lorraine, the Reichsland’s government was obligated to create new parishes (or provide provisional, state funded ministerial support) where demographically warranted. Elsewhere in Imperial Germany, well into the 1880s and 1890s, financial and organizational shortcomings undermined the efforts of state churches to address the ecclesiastical needs of its urban denizens.8 Third, parish conditions in Strasbourg were actually quite good. There were twenty-six Protestant pastors in all: two at the Reformed church, twenty-one at the seven intra muros Lutheran churches, two Lutheran pastors extra muros (one each at 7 In addition to the literature cited in the Introduction (26n), see Blaschke, “Die Kolonialisierung der Laienwelt. Priester als Milieumanager und die Kanalisierung klerikaler Kuratel,” in Blaschke and Kuhlemann, Religion im Kaiserreich, 93–135. For an attempt to apply these ideas to German Protestantism, see von Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch, 154 – 86. 8 See Ribbe, “Entwicklung,” 244 – 57; Otte, “More Churches,” 92–102.

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Ruprechtsau and Neuhof ), and a Lutheran pastor for the city hospitals. On average, there were only 1211 Protestants per city pastor in 1871, so both state churches could absorb a certain amount of growth with their current ministerial resources. The primary long-term challenge for Protestant officials was not supply, but distribution. Even before the demolition of the city’s fortifications was complete in 1879, it was clear that there were significant shifts in parish populations underway. War-related death and emigration diminished the size of all of the city’s parishes, but the French-language congregations at New Church, St. Nicholas, and the Reformed Church were hit especially hard. Moreover, the compensation from the influx of new residents was, at best, imperfect. In his 1877 visitation report, Reverend Paul Witz noted that the Germans arriving in Strasbourg tended to join the Lutheran rather than Reformed church, with the result that the Reformed parish lost in both numbers and importance.9 But many inner city Lutheran pastors had only modest congregations, a fact that prompted the government in 1876 to suggest converting some of the pastoral positions into “preacherships.” The Superior Consistory recognized the merits of the state’s proposal, but felt that conditions in Strasbourg were still too unstable to warrant acting at that time.10 In part, the situation in the inner city was due to the number of immigrant Protestants who settled outside the city walls, in Ruprechtsau and, above all, in Neudorf (see Table 3.1). Traditionally, the Protestants in Neudorf joined the congregation of St. Nicholas or St. William. However, by 1876 the number of Protestants living in Neudorf had risen such that the Directory decided to establish a Lutheran parish there. This decision was significant in several respects. Not only did the Directory wish to create a new parish for Strasbourg extra muros, but it decided that the new parish would have definite geographic boundaries—it was “closed,” in the parlance of the time. It meant that both St. Nicholas and St. William would lose parishioners, since Neudorf Protestants could no longer belong to an inner city congregation. It also eliminated the southern sectors of the city (all extra muros) as potential sources of new parishioners for St. Nicholas and, to a lesser degree, St. Thomas.

9 “Kirchenvisitation in Straßburg, Bericht des Hern. Pf. Witz,” 1 Dec 1877, ADBR 2G 482 F 41. 10 AS 32 (1876): 39 – 42 and 118 –32.

the parish milieu Table 3.1

Intra muros Königshofen Kronenburg Neudorf Neuhof Ruprechtsau

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Strasbourg’s civilian Protestant population intra and extra muros, 1866 –1910 1866

1875

1885

1895

1900

1905

1910

23,586 640 223 1,576 323 2,232

28,834 1,141 480 2,701 435 3,020

34,770 1,447 1,039 3,519 521 3,513

39,156 2,136 1,700 5,659 662 3,968

41,125 2,573 2,371 7,905 879 4,582

42,339 3,026 3,189 10,032 909 5,120

44,376 3,446 3,446 10,756 1,577 5,424

SOURCE: Volkszählung 1900 and 1905, Bevölkerung der Stadt Strassburg, 1910. NOTE: For the period 1866 –1900, the suburban data include a very small number of military personnel (less than .01 percent).

Although the government was sympathetic to the Directory’s plan, it was not inclined to create a new state funded position when the inner city already had, in its eyes, a surplus of pastors. Consequently, after Heinrich Kienlen died in June (1876), Möller’s administration proposed transferring his position from St. William to Neudorf. Neither the St. William parish council nor the Directory were comfortable with this suggestion. St. William was a large parish that needed all three of its pastors. It also lay directly adjacent to the region that would become the future Neustadt, making further growth highly likely. In December the government yielded and allowed the Directory to take applications for the vacancy at St. William. A second opportunity to transfer a position from the inner city to the suburbs arose a few months later, when Georg August Schaller from St. Nicholas (German) died. Although the parish wanted to maintain the position, it conceded that the present circumstances did not warrant it. As a compromise, the parish council agreed to leave Schaller’s position vacant for the time being so that the Directory could divert the salary to the new parish at Neudorf, which was created in 1879. By 1887, the position at Neudorf was moved to the regular budget, which allowed the “St. Nicholas funds” to be used to support a second position at Ruprechtsau. Hope that St. Nicholas would grow enough to recover its third position was not made manifest and resulted in its elimination in 1905.11 The circumstances culminating in the creation of a new Neudorf Lutheran parish prefigured the trends reshaping parochial conditions after 1870. First and foremost, the consequences of urbanization 11

ADBR 133 AL 66 and 67.

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New Church Old St. Peter St. Aurelia St. Nicholas (F) St. Nicholas (G) St. Thomas St. William Young St. Peter Reformed

Parish registration in Strasbourg intra muros, 1872–1913 1874

1883

1898

1904

1913

781 480 353 69 504 524 433 960 197

691 377 465 78 298 632 661 1,155 203

713 815 624 61 477 711 1,077 1,205 273

694 754 458 (missing) (missing) 646 980 1,161 288

845 648 444 (missing) (missing) 596 1,103 1,091 312

SOURCE: ADBR 2G 482C and 173 AL 67, AMS SPVP 107 and TN 105, ST, SPJ, SPV, TN, and SW.

continued to fall unequally on the city’s Protestant parishes, as we can see most clearly from the census results and the electoral registration data for the inner city parishes (see Tables 3.1 and 3.2). As Pastor Witz noted, virtually all of the demand was on the Lutheran side, even if the Reformed community also experienced moderate increases in the 1880s. The suburbs gained Protestants more quickly than the inner city. This led to the creation of closed parishes in Kronenburg (1904) and Königshofen (1905), as well as the establishment of additional positions in the other suburban parishes. Ruprechtsau gained a second minister in 1887, Neudorf acquired a second pastor in 1901, and a third in 1911. Kronenburg and Königshofen both received an additional minister after 1914, but these positions were abolished in 1919.12 Even though the inner city was organized in terms of personal congregations, there was a strong correlation between place of residence and place of parish registration (Table 3.2). Consequently, the inner city parishes were greatly affected by the new residential patterns. The settlement of the Neustadt dramatically expanded the size of nearby St. William and Young St. Peter. The New Church also benefited, albeit to a much lesser degree. Significantly, the growth in the Neustadt resulted in no new allocation of resources. St. William raised the issue of acquiring a fourth pastor in 1892 and there was talk in 1914 of establishing a new Lutheran parish in the Neustadt, but nothing came of either idea.13 While they were responsible for the western areas extra muros,

Bopp, Evangelischen Gemeinden, 77, 84 – 85. SG PBKR, 9 Mar 1892; Curtius to the Ministry of Alsace-Lorraine, 17 Feb 1914, ADBR 172 AL 138. 12

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Old St. Peter and St. Aurelia witnessed notable increases in the size of their congregations, but growth rates leveled off after Kronenburg was split off from Old St. Peter in 1904 and Königshofen from St. Aurelia in 1905. By contrast, the parishes in the southern part of the Altstadt, St. Thomas and the two St. Nicholas communities, benefited little from urban expansion. There was a brief period of recovery and (in the case of St. Thomas) expansion in the 1880s and 1890s, but the overarching trend in these parishes was stagnation and, for French St. Nicholas in particular, decline. Financing of the new Neudorf parish was also indicative of future developments, but less obviously. For all of the rhetoric on the excess of pastors in the inner city, only two Altstadt positions were reallocated between 1875 and 1905: one at St. Nicholas (German) and, in 1905, one at St. Nicholas (French). Moreover, the latter position was officially transferred to Kaysersberg in Upper Alsace and not Königshofen. In other words, with the exception of the second post at Ruprechtsau, all of the gains in the suburbs to 1905 were achieved by increased allocations in the territorial budget. After 1905, under pressure from the Catholic-dominated Landesausschuß, which had complained about increases in support for the Protestant churches, the Ministry made a concerted effort to transfer positions from the inner city to the suburbs.14 During the negotiations for the creation of a third position at Neudorf, the Directory identified St. Thomas, Old St. Peter, and New Church as parishes that could best afford to lose a pastor, although it recommended waiting until a death or retirement to realize any reduction.15 Neudorf received its third pastor in 1911; therefore, when Knittel retired at St. Nicholas in 1914, August Ernst was “transferred” there and his position at St. Thomas eliminated. Similarly, on Ludwig Will’s retirement in 1914, the third pastoral position at Old St. Peter was lost. New Church held on to its four posts during German rule, but when

The number of Catholic priests in Strasbourg also expanded after 1870. The former Citadel parish moved to Musau and Königshofen and Kronenburg received new parishes. Since French law permitted only one curé per parish, their number increased only with the establishment of new parishes. Nevertheless, to accommodate the growing Catholic population, the number of vicars rose regularly, from twenty in 1877 to thirty in 1914. Jahrbuch für Elsass-Lothringen (1877): 107; Adreßbuch der Stadt Straßburg (1914): 451–52. 15 Ministry to the Directory (copy sent to St. Thomas), 10 June 1908, ST; TN PBK, 18 Sept 1908. In 1909, the Landesausschuß formally resolved to halt the creation of new parishes until further notice. KS-PBK, 9 June 1909, ADBR 173 AL 9. 14

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Paul Grünberg and Ernst Eichler emigrated in 1919, French authorities abolished its fourth post.16 The religious needs of the larger, more diverse population also affected parish conditions in Strasbourg. The inner city’s system of personal congregations encouraged church and state officials to maximize the number of religious options within the official church, even if it placed the city’s needs above those of a particular parish. A case in point was Julius Redslob’s nomination to St. William in 1877. Although the parish council and consistory wanted to replace Kienlen with a liberal pastor (Philip Lambs), the Directory decided that it had an obligation to appoint someone who could tend to the conservative members of Kienlen’s orphaned congregation. Hence, it opted for Redslob, who previously was vicar at St. William, first for his uncle and then for Kienlen.17 This action provoked a storm of protest and prompted the resignation of the religious and lay inspectors for the new St. William inspection, but Redslob was duly confirmed and installed in his office. Similarly, to ensure that conservative Lutherans had access to Frenchlanguage services and pastoral care, the Directory overrode the parish council’s and the consistory’s recommendations and appointed Johann Gottfried Roser to the vacancy at St. Nicholas (French) in 1880. Roser’s lack of tact and collegiality, however, divided the community so much that when he died in 1889, the parish hoped to obtain a more liberal pastor. The Directory was sympathetic, but the Ministry intimated that the tiny parish would warrant a second pastor only if he were conservative. The second position lay vacant for six years, since there were no suitable French-speaking candidates. When the other French-speaking pastor at St. Nicholas, Louis Horst, died in 1895, the Ministry hit upon the idea of having the Directory declare both posts at St. Nicholas vacant, and allowing the minister of an independent religious community that held religious services at the Evangelical Society’s chapel across the Ill, the “Comité du culte français,” to apply for one of the positions. The Comité was a fairly small group that rankled German authorities, because it used the French language for worship.18 However, the fusion faltered due to the prickly personality of the Comité’s minister, Bovon, and St. Nicholas’ unwillingness to see its parish officially

16 17 18

ADBR 136 AL 12/36; Bopp, Evangelische Gemeinden, 31–32, 71–76. Personnel file Julius A. Redslob, ADBR 172 AL 86. ADBR 133 AL 94.

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split into two. The Comité subsequently raised funds to build its own church near the St. Martin’s bridge. When the project neared completion in 1905, the Ministry announced that the second position at St. Nicholas (French) was superfluous and eliminated it.19 The discussions about the second pastoral position at St. Nicholas reveal an important limit to the government’s commitment to maintaining a diverse religious marketplace. Specifically, it preferred that French-language services occur only within the state churches and that they should be held to a minimum. It was much more successful with the Catholics on this point than with the Protestants. By 1887, the Cathedral was the only Catholic parish in Strasbourg where one could still hear a French sermon, whereas there were still four official French-language Protestant congregations in the capital.20 In 1898, however, as a condition for granting the ailing Louis Leblois a pension, the Ministry arranged for the New Church consistory to replace him with a German-speaking pastor. And with the elimination of the second French position at St. Nicholas in 1905, the number of French-language pastors was reduced to one per state church (one at St. Nicholas, one at the Reformed church).21 Ecclesiastical conditions in Strasbourg diversified further after 1870 with the emergence of alternatives to the official churches’ parishes. Although Lutheran and Reformed officials took a dim view of the new Christian sects in the city since the annexation, the religious inspectors’ reports and the police files from the period indicate that only a few groups had much of a presence in Strasbourg and they attracted a small number of people. As late as 1905, only 500 Strasbourg residents declared themselves to be members of groups like the Methodists, the “Evangelische Gemeinschaft,” the “Apostolische Gemeinde,” or the Salvation Army in the census.22 Fewer still availed themselves of the option, created by the introduction in 1903 of the Protestant “church 19 Personnel file Gustav Bieler (who was appointed to SNF in 1895), ADBR 172 AL 14; ADBR 133 AL 66 and 67; Paul Lobstein to Comité President Herrenschneider, 15 Oct 1895, ADBR 2G 482 F 85; Inauguration de l’Église Libre de Strasbourg (Souvenir du 25 mars 1906 ) (Strasbourg: Imprimerie Strasbourgeoise, 1906). Because the Evangelical Society was located on the Knoblochgasse, the Comité was known as the “Knoblochgasse Kapelle.” 20 “Sprachgebrauch in Straßburg,” Report to the District President of Lower Alsace, 24 Nov 1887, ADBR 35 AL 43. 21 Personnel file Louis Leblois, ADBR 172 AL 67. 22 Albert Fröhlich, Sectentum und Separatismus im jetzigen kirchlichen Leben der evangelischen Bevölkerung Elsaß-Lothringens (Strasbourg: Heitz, 1899), 169 –70; police files on the individual groups in ADBR 69 AL; Volkszählung 1905.

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tax,” to leave the church officially. In 1905, only fifty Strasbourgeois declared themselves to be “without confession” and only 106 more as “without religion”; ten years later these figures had increased only slightly (to 100 and 259, respectively). According to the records at the District Presidency, while most of those who initially quit the church were members of the sectarian communities, by 1910 the majority were socialists and people who had long ago severed their ties with organized religion.23 Introducing the old-German military church system in Strasbourg presented a much more serious challenge. Since the military chaplains followed the Prussian ecclesiastical ordinances and not Alsatian practices, it established a foreign church in the city. Furthermore, until a Protestant military church was dedicated in 1897, military authorities used the existing Protestant churches for worship space.24 These cohabitations, at St. Thomas from 1870 and at Old St. Peter from 1884, not only inconvenienced the civilian parishes, who altered their schedules to accommodate the soldiers, they also symbolized the military church’s undermining of the native Protestant establishment. Cohabitation blurred the churches’ status as Alsatian places of worship. In addition, the military churches competed with the Landeskirchen for the care of civilian souls. The immigrant old Germans, confronting hostile Strasbourgeois and foreign church customs, made clear their preference to worship with the military congregation. Having recognized that a state sanction of this practice would hinder the integration of the old Germans and harm the legitimate interests of the local churches, Superior President Möller advised Berlin to restrict the membership of the Reichsland’s military parishes to military personnel and their dependants. After careful negotiations with military authorities, Bismarck agreed, issuing a decree to that effect in 1873.25

23 ADBR 240 D 177. Unfortunately, the surviving records do not permit a more precise count of those who officially left the state churches of Alsace-Lorraine. For an empire-wide perspective on leaving the church, see Jochen-Christoph Kaiser, “Sozialdemokratie und praktische Religionskritik. Das Beispiel der Kirchenaustrittsbewegung 1878 –1914,” Archiv für Sozialgeschichte 22 (1982): 263 – 98. 24 Before turning to Old St. Peter, army officials approached St. William for permission to worship there, but the strongly Francophile parish council managed to reject the request. SG, Consistory President Riff to 15 Army Corps Command, 9 Apr 1884; ADBR 172 AL 239. 25 ADBR 136 AL 9/29.

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Nevertheless, this decree did not ameliorate all the friction between the military and civilian Protestant churches in Strasbourg. As long as space permitted, civilians were free to attend the military chaplains’ services and take communion there.26 Judging from the civilian parishes’ and the church authorities’ protests, it also appears that the military authorities were not very dutiful in observing the letter, much less the spirit of Möller’s decree.27 The military pastors accepted civilian children into their Sunday schools and religious education classes. While it was technically allowed, it touched on the more contentious issue of confirmation. In Alsace-Lorraine, confirmation instruction lasted for two years, whereas in the military church only one year was required. Some old-German parents sought to circumvent local practices by sending their children to the military chaplains, especially since the 1903 military church ordinance removed confirmation from the list of rites that could only be administered with the permission of the concerned civilian cleric. Military authorities insisted that only military children could benefit from the one-year preparation stipulation, but parents tried anyway, and several military pastors even put civilian children with only one year of instruction on their confirmation lists. Nevertheless, it appears that the basic division of labor between the military and civilian churches was fairly well established by 1900, since most of the complaints about military encroachment on the civilian parishes after that time involved newcomers, rather than established old-German residents.28 The Leaders of the Parishes The creation of new extra muros parishes and the gradual redistribution of resources between inner city and suburb was the most tangible evidence of the structural change of Protestant parish structures in Strasbourg after 1870. Accompanying these transformations was an even more important modification for parish life. As the Germans

26 Rudolf Richter, Kirchlicher Wegweiser für die Mitglieder der evangelischen Militärgemeinde in Strassburg i. E. (Strasbourg: Hubert & Fritsch, 1902). 27 In 1891, the Prussian Feldprobst had to reiterate that military clergy were not to conduct rites, including confirmation, for civilians without the consent of the concerned civilian minister. Memo from Oberpfarrer Steinwender, 11 Jan 1891, AMS GK 151/10. 28 AMS GK 115.

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established their authority in Alsace-Lorraine, the city’s Protestant parishes also underwent a changing of the guard. The older pastors passed away and a new generation of men arrived to lead the city’s Lutheran and Reformed congregations. After 1890, a second wave of pastors began ministering in Strasbourg and many of them would help ease the transition from German back to French rule after 1918. These men undertook the challenge of nurturing Protestant religious culture in the city, which effectively entailed promoting and maintaining a sense of Protestant community in the midst of profound cultural, social, and political change. A pastor’s personality played a major part in his ability to meet these challenges. Social background, training, and theological orientation as well as professional relationships and experiences were also important. These factors influenced his understanding of the pastor’s task and they affected his interaction with colleagues and parishioners. Altogether, eighty-eight men held official ministerial posts in Strasbourg between October 1870 and August 1914.29 Of the eighty-two pastors, seventy-six were in the Lutheran Church and six in the Reformed Church. The remaining six men (all Lutherans) served either as prison chaplain or as “free preacher,” which was a part-time position normally held by someone with other ecclesiastical or instructional responsibilities in the city.30 Reviewing the data for these men’s service in Strasbourg, they fall into three distinct groups. The first consists of the nineteen men (23.2%) who had been in Strasbourg since before 1865. Many of them were leading figures in Alsatian Protestantism and all, save five, had left office by 1884.31 The second group comprises the

29 Unless otherwise noted, the data for the discussion that follows are drawn from Marie-Joseph Bopp, Die evangelischen Geistlichen und Theologen in Elsaß und Lothringen von der Reformation bis zur Gegenwart (Neutstadt a.d. Aisch: Degener & Co., 1959 – 61); idem, Die evangelischen Gemeinden; Lutheran personnel files, ADBR 172 AL 1–120; and Lutheran personnel files (post-1870 births), ECAAL. 30 Frequently, the free preachers (there were two positions) were also professors at the Protestant Gymnasium or seminary, or chaplains at the Deaconess House. By the end of the nineteenth century, this position had lost most of its importance, so when the last two left office (Alfred Erichson, Director of the Protestant Seminary, who died in 1901; and Albert Löscher, who retired as prison chaplain in 1913) they were not replaced. Bopp, Evangelischen Gemeinden, 34. PB-SPG, vol. 4 (24 Jun and 30 Sept 1901), ADBR 172 AL 292. 31 The list includes Adam Maeder, pastor at the Reformed Church since the Restoration; the leaders of all three major factions in Alsatian Lutheranism: Johann Friedrich Bruch, Franz Haerter, and Friedrich Horning. From this group, only Christian Paira, the French-language pastor at the Reformed church, did not die in office, having opted instead for France in 1872.

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thirty-two pastors (39%) who arrived in Strasbourg between 1865 and 1885. These were the “new men” who led the churches inside and outside of Strasbourg for most of the Reichsland period. Making up the third and final group were the thirty-one pastors (37.8%) called to Strasbourg after 1885. Apart from the eldest members of this group, such as Theodor Höpffner and Johann A. E. Stern, these pastors were products of the Reichsland period who came of age and prepared for ministry after 1870.32 While the groups differ from one another in meaningful ways, the pastors’ biographical information shows that many elements in the profile of the “typical” Strasbourg pastor held constant across time. First, whether Lutheran or Reformed, most ministers were married. Only four of the 82 pastors never married (and two of them died in their thirties). Given Strasbourg’s confessional divisions, married clergy strongly differentiated Protestantism from Catholicism. There were also concrete benefits to the practice. Pastors’ experiences as family men helped them minister to their parishioners. Their wives also routinely played active roles within the parish, especially in the realm of social and charitable work. The challenges of urban ministry, coupled with the prestige and material benefits associated with the Lutheran positions, meant that most of Strasbourg’s pastors arrived as experienced pastors. Within the Lutheran Church, custom dictated that no Lutheran pastor could hold a position in Strasbourg without first serving in a rural or small town parish.33 Herein lay another reason for the opposition to Redslob’s appointment at St. William in 1877. Although Redslob had been an ordained minister since 1870, St. William would have been his first formal appointment as pastor, which was quite rare. The case of Ludwig Will, who was appointed to Old St. Peter in 1882, was more typical. At the time of his installation, Will had served fifteen years, first in the rural community of Assweiler, then in the city of Bischweiler. Fifteen years slightly exceeded the mean for all pastors (13.72), but was only slightly higher than the average for Will’s cohort (14.94 years). During the Reichsland period, it was most common to serve only one parish

32 A complete list of Strasbourg’s pastors and their parish affiliations appears as Appendix C. 33 This custom became binding only at the turn of the century, when the Superior Consistory grouped the Lutheran parishes into two groups (A and B) and required applicants for A-list parish positions (which included all of Strasbourg’s German-language posts) to have at least six year’s service as pastor. AS 54 (1899): 11–12 and 114 –15.

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before coming to Strasbourg, but half of the men in Will’s group (16) and just over two-fifths of group three had served in two or more parishes first. The mean for the entire sample is 1.4. The Reformed Church also took care to call only experienced ministers to Strasbourg after 1870. However, these men arrived on average with fewer years experience than their Lutheran colleagues (10.10 to 13.72 years), which reflects both the Reformed church’s smaller pool of candidates and Strasbourg’s lesser importance as a center of Reformed Protestantism (Mulhouse and Metz were much more prominent). Although Strasbourg’s parishes valued experience in a prospective minister, as a rule, pastors were in the full bloom of their career when they filled these vacancies, not men on the verge of retirement. The Lutheran parishes needed men who could still serve many good years, because once in Strasbourg, Lutheran pastors stayed there except for the most unusual circumstances.34 Nevertheless, over the course of the century, the pastor’s average age on his arrival in Strasbourg slowly dropped. For the period 1802–1870, the mean age was 40.77, whereas the mean for the Reichsland period was 39.0. Half of the Reichsland’s pastors started in Strasbourg between the age of thirty and forty. In fact, after 1870 the Directory only named one man to a Strasbourg post who was significantly younger than thirty—Johann Courvoisier, who at twenty-five became associate pastor at Ruprechtsau—largely due to the dearth of Lutheran candidates immediately after the annexation.35 Conversely, only three men took a clerical position in Strasbourg after turning fifty: Philipp Lambs, who came to St. Thomas in 1879 at the mature age of fifty-five, and two of the hospital chaplains, Ange Sommerau and Albert Lindner.36 Once more, the average age of the

34 Between 1870 and 1914, only three Lutheran pastors exchanged their posts for other jobs. Frédéric Eschenauer opted for France, while Thomas Beck and August Kayser left the ministry for academia (Beck becoming the director of the École alsacienne in Paris). Strasbourg’s posts didn’t have the same cachet within Reformed circles, which explains why both of the pastors called there in the 1870s (Tournier and Röhrich) left to accept better positions elsewhere. Nevertheless, once Reformed pastors established themselves in Strasbourg they, too, tended to remain there. (Maeder spent his entire career there; and both Piepenbring and Stricker spent over thirty years in Strasbourg.) 35 Two pastors in group three, Robert Will (Ludwig Will’s son) and August Hering were named to positions within only a few months of turning thirty. 36 Interestingly, Lambs won appointment to St. Thomas only after his colleague at Bischweiler, Ludwig Will, was pressured not to accept nomination there as the successor to Johann Baum.

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second cohort—Ludwig Will’s group—was slightly greater than the entire sample mean (at 40.55 years), while the Reformed ministers’ mean was lower (34.81). Strasbourg’s pastors were also rather urbane, which facilitated their ability to relate to the needs of their congregations. A large percentage of Lutherans, 32.9 percent, were born in Strasbourg itself, which marks a significant change from the pre-1870 period, where almost two-thirds (63.2%) of the pastors were native Strasbourgeois. But this shift did not reflect a “ruralization” of the city’s pastoral corps. Rather, it testifies to the progressive integration of Alsace’s Protestant communities over the course of the nineteenth century. As Philippe Jung and Bernard Vogler have demonstrated, more students of Protestant theology in Strasbourg hailed from the capital than from any other area of Alsace, making Strasbourg the preeminent source of Lutheran pastors for rural and small-town Alsace.37 Thus, among the thirty (36.6%) pastors born in Lower Alsace and the thirteen (15.9%) born in Upper Alsace, many—e.g., Friedrich Horning, Heinrich Blind, and Christoph Schadé—were children of native sons ministering in congregations outside of Strasbourg. Of course, men from families with roots in other bastions of Alsatian Protestantism also made their way to Strasbourg. But this was the norm only for the Calvinists. None of Strasbourg’s Reformed pastors were born there. Two came from elsewhere in Lower Alsace, three from Upper Alsace, and one from Switzerland. Parishes recruited sparingly outside of Alsace before and after 1871. At the beginning of the Reichsland era, only five of its pastors had been born outside the region.38 Two were Frenchmen “of the interior” (Paira and Eschenauer) and they both opted in 1872 to remain French citizens. The remaining three (Baum, Bruch, Kienlen) were born in Germany. By the final third of the nineteenth century, this was especially unusual since French law required all Protestant ministers to be French citizens. Bruch, however, had studied in Strasbourg when his native Palatinate was part of France. Baum, too, took his theology degree in Strasbourg and stayed as a teacher and preacher for almost ten years before being appointed to St. Thomas. Kienlen was born in

37 Between 1830 and 1870, 35% of Alsatian pastors were from Strasbourg. Philippe Jung, “Les étudiants de la Faculté de théologie de Strasbourg (1819 –1872),” BSHPF 136/4 (1990): 39 –54, and Vogler, “Recrutement,” esp. 99. 38 For the entire period 1802–1870, only eleven of Strasbourg’s ninety-five ministers (or 11.7%) were born outside of Alsace.

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Berlin, but his mother was a Strasbourgeoise, who returned to Alsace with her son upon her husband’s death. The political changes of 1871 hardly changed prevailing practices. German authorities confirmed the appointment of only one foreigner to a position in Strasbourg. Heinrich Röhrich went to the Reformed congregation largely because he was Swiss and, at the time of his calling, a pastor in Hamburg. Despite the large numbers of old-Germans living in Strasbourg and studying theology there, the Lutheran church named only six old-Germans to positions in the capital after 1871. Significantly, the two men who were called to inner city parishes, Paul Grünberg (Old St. Peter, 1892) and Ernst Eichler (New Church, 1898), were both named to serve pietist congregations, which was the segment of the Alsatian Lutheran church where old-German sympathies ran strongest.39 Appropriately, the remaining four men ministered to suburban congregations (Königshofen, Kronenburg, and Neudorf ), since those three areas had particularly high concentrations of old-German residents. Education played a major part in urbanizing the outlook of the Reichsland’s Protestant clergy and forming a group consciousness among the pastors.40 By virtue of their training, Alsace’s Lutheran and Reformed clergy belonged to the urban, educated bourgeoisie (Bildungsbürgertum). State law required all Protestant ministers to obtain a university degree in theology at a state institution prior to ordination, which meant that prospective Lutheran ministers took their degrees in Strasbourg, as did most Calvinists, if they were from Alsace or Lorraine.41 The obligation to study at a university faculty had one further, equally important consequence. It required Protestant youth to begin their schooling in an urban secondary school—either the state lycées in Colmar and Strasbourg or, most frequently, the Protestant Gymnasia in Bouxwiller and Strasbourg and not in a rural or small-town school 39 In 1904, Grünberg moved to the New Church as the successor to Gustav Haerter, so that both of the inner city’s old-German pastors ended up at the same parish. 40 For a useful comparative perspective with German Europe, see Oliver Janz, “Zwischen Amt und Profession: Die evangelische Pfarrschaft im 19. Jahrhundert,” in Bürgerliche Berufe. Zur Sozialgeschichte der freien und akademischen Berufe im internationalen Vergelich, ed. Hannes Siegrist (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1988), 174 – 99. 41 After 1815, French Calvinist ministers could study at either Strasbourg or Montauban in southern France. Alsatian Calvinists ministers’ deciding for Strasbourg was not just a matter of proximity or money. It was also influenced by language, since a considerable amount of instruction at Strasbourg was conducted in German until the 1850s and most of these ministers would go on to serve German-language congregations.

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house like Catholics did.42 In fact, until 1872 the overwhelming majority of the region’s pastors attended Strasbourg’s Protestant Gymnasium prior to pursuing the five-year program of study at the seminary and faculty. So by the time they were ordained, pastors had studied and lived with a large number of their future colleagues for many years. After 1872, the expansion of secondary schooling in the Reichsland diminished the Protestant Gymnasium’s position as a preparatory school for the theological faculty in Strasbourg. Nonetheless, university training at Strasbourg and residence at the Collegium Wilhelmitanum (the “Stift”) endured as a common experience among all candidates for ministry in Alsace-Lorraine, since they were required to take their theology degrees at Strasbourg (a condition that delayed the entrance of old Germans into the Reichsland’s pastoral corps).43 By virtue of their socio-economic background, Strasbourg’s pastors were also middle-class, as indicated by their father’s occupational status. Overall, the data reveal considerable continuity in the Protestant clergy’s social origins. Both before and after 1870, the largest number of pastors came from artisan families: jewelers, merchants, bakers, tailors, etc. The next largest group were the sons of pastors, followed by the sons of officials and professionals, and then teachers. In all, more than eighty-five percent of Strasbourg’s pastors had middle-class backgrounds. Relatively few came from agricultural or rural backgrounds (only around 8%) and almost none came from a working-class family. By contrast, over 40 percent of nineteenth-century Catholic seminarians in Alsace were farmers’ sons.44 Nevertheless, over the course of the nineteenth century the relative importance of the middle class groups changed significantly. In particular, the number of pastors from the lower middle classes (the petite bourgeoisie) declined notably. At the beginning of the century, almost

After his arrival in Strasbourg in 1891, Bishop Fritzen sought to improve Catholic priests’ educational preparation by requiring the Abitur (and, thus, a gymnasial education) for entrance to the Seminary. Only in 1903, with the establishment of a Catholic Faculty of Theology at the University of Strasbourg, were priests also obligated to attend university. On the creation of the Catholic Theological Faculty, see Craig, Scholarship, 136 – 65; Erwin Gatz, “Die Vorverhandlungen zur Gründung der katholisch-theologischen Fakultät an der Universität Straßburg (1898 –1902),” Römische Quartalschrift 77 (1982): 86 –129; and Muller, Dieu, 320 –27. 43 This was not a matter of Alsatian particularism, but stemmed instead from the traditions of the German territorial Protestantism. For instance, candidates for ministry in Württemberg also had to complete their studies at Tübingen. 44 Muller, Dieu, 248 – 49. 42

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half of Strasbourg’s pastors (48.8%) hailed from the city’s elite artisan and commercial families. By the 1860s, however, this percentage dropped to about 30% and sank to 22.6% for the cohort that arrived in Strasbourg after 1885. Even if we only consider the percentages for the French (pre-1870) and German periods as a whole, the difference is striking: 48.4% and 29.3%. A growing number of pastors came from the middle- and upper-middle classes; they were the sons of bookkeepers, civil servants, teachers, and even the occasional gendarme or soldier. Prior to 1870 only 4% of pastors were teachers’ sons, but after 1870 the figure rose to almost 10%. Similarly, the number of pastors from backgrounds other than artisans and teachers rose from 11.6% (1802–1870) to 23.2% (1870 –1914). The proportion of pastors’ sons in Strasbourg’s clerical ranks also witnessed a modest increase. They accounted for 22.1% of the total before 1870, and 26.8% afterward. The family ties within the Strasbourg pastoral corps were especially evident. Three of these pastors succeeded their fathers in office (Haerter, Horning, Riff ); four others (Blind, Lambs, Schaller, and Will) had fathers who served at different Strasbourg parishes.45 There are also two instances of brothers-in-law (Ungerer-Meyer/Knittel-Iltis) working in Strasbourg, and one case of a son and father-in-law (Gerold-Bruch). Closer review of the biographical data suggests that the degree of pastoral self-recruitment is understated, if the father’s occupation alone is considered. Taking into account the number of ministers whose mothers (but not fathers) were pastors’ daughters, who married pastors’ daughters, or who had other relatives (brothers, uncles) who became pastors, then 43 of the 82 Reichsland pastors (52.4%) had close family ties to the ministry. As Oliver Janz and Frank-Michael Kuhlemann have shown in their studies of Protestant clergy in nineteenth century Prussia and Baden, the importance of pastoral recruitment within the clerical milieu was not unique to Alsace, it applied to German Protestantism more generally.46 Whereas Janz argues that such trends fostered the clergy’s gradual detachment from the ranks of the Bildungsbürgertum, the evidence from Strasbourg and Alsace indicates instead that they promoted the integration of the pastors and their families into the world of the bourgeoisie, which corroborates Kuhlemann’s findings about Baden. Indeed, in light

45 46

Only Ludwig and Robert Will served simultaneously in Strasbourg. Janz, Bürger, 85–108; Kuhlemann, Bürgerlichkeit, 121–25.

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of the numbers of pastors from non-clerical, middle-class families and the relative stability of Alsatian enrolments in Strasbourg’s Faculty of Protestant theology from 1819 –1914,47 it is hard to argue that the Protestant ministry ceased to be an acceptable career choice for the Alsatian bourgeoisie. Admittedly, few pastors were the sons of doctors, lawyers, university professors (apart from theologians), or upper-level career servants. But many of them had close relatives who were. Johann Baum married a doctor’s daughter, Julius Redslob’s son Robert became a prominent jurist, and Michel Knittel’s son Émile served twenty-six years as the general secretary for Strasbourg’s civil hospitals. Finally, as a group, Strasbourg’s pastors retained close ties to the world of Bildung. After Baum’s death in 1878, pastors no longer did double-duty as regular theology professors (Ordinarien), although fifteen of the ministers serving in Strasbourg between 1870 and 1914 did hold doctoral degrees.48 Additionally, a fair number of pastors, including Eugen Engelmann, Karl Gerold, Paul Grünberg, Wilhelm Horning, Emil Nied, Karl Friedrich Riff, and Karl Tubach, were active as historians, journalists, and writers of religious and theological literature. Unlike many other German big cities, the background and schooling of Strasbourg’s Lutheran and Reformed clergy positioned them well to maintain and nurture a sense of religious culture among the different social groups that comprised the city’s Protestant population. Even if education and training, as well as dress and speech, set the clergy apart from other segments of the population, pastors from artisan and lower middle-class families could still relate to the spiritual and material needs of the menu peuple. Neither the native nor the immigrant upper bourgeoisie could claim social distance as an excuse to disdain the clergy and stay away from the churches. Strasbourg was slow to recruit old Germans as ministers, but many Alsatian pastors came from good bürgerlich families and they could speak the language of the Bildungsbürgertum fluently, whether in French or in German.49

47 On average 11.8 Alsatians enrolled annually at the Faculty between 1819 and 1872, and 11.6 between 1872 and 1914. Jung, “Étudiants”; Vogler, “Recrutement.” 48 August Kayser resigned his position at Neuhof in 1873 upon receiving a fulltime appointment to the faculty. Ferdinand Ménégoz (who taught as a “Privatdozent” at the faculty from 1911–1918) and Robert Will received their doctorates after 1918, but they too resigned their pastoral posts after joining the faculty full-time (Ménégoz in 1920, Will in 1922). 49 Although there is some anecdotal evidence suggesting that the tensions between natives and immigrants encouraged old Germans to keep their distance from the

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In Chapter One, we noted that one of the first consequences of the shift from French to German rule was a reorganization of universitylevel theological study. The new theologische Fakultät replaced the Protestant seminary and faculté; furthermore, candidates for ministry had to pass a rigorous state-administered examination prior to ordination as in the other old-German state churches. While these reforms were clearly Germanizing, they are better understood as the initial process of completely modernizing the pastoral office in Alsace-Lorraine, which was driven both by the new administration’s political priorities and the particular needs of the local churches and their ministers. The changes to the formal preparation for ministry—exemplified by the introduction of first one, and then a second theological exam—represented a key dimension of this professionalization.50 The Reichsland’s churches also took advantage of the new environment to regulate more closely the activities of ministerial candidates. The historic differences between the region’s Lutheran and Reformed churches, however, prevented this bureaucratization from proceeding in exactly the same way, to the dismay of the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine. Similarly, the prevalence of theological liberalism in the Reichsland limited the churches’ desire to control training and preparation directly, as did many of the oldGerman state churches.51 Lastly, modernization involved improving the clergy’s conditions of employment, which benefited both the ministers and their congregations. By 1914, almost every aspect of preparing for Protestant ministry in Alsace-Lorraine had undergone considerable revision. Only two ele-

civilian (Alsatian) churches, the religious inspectors frequently observed that many old Germans, especially from the “better classes,” distanced themselves from the church well before arriving in Strasbourg. Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 16 –19. On the “Entkirchlichung” of the German bourgeoisie as a long-term, nineteenth-century phenomenon, see Janz, Bürger, 61–84, passim; and Lucian Hölscher, “Die Religion des Bürgers. Bürgerliche Frömmigkeit und protestantische Kirche im 19. Jahrhundert,” HZ 250 (1990); 595 – 630. 50 See in particular, Charles E. McClelland, “Zur Professionalisierung der akademischen Berufe in Deutschland,” in Bildungsbürgertum im 19. Jahrhundert, vol. 1, Bildungssystem und Professionalisierung in internationalen Vergleichen, ed. Werner Conze and Jürgen Kocka (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1985), 237– 47. 51 Janz, “Zwischen Amt und Profession,” 178 – 81; Christian Homrichhausen, “Evangelische Pfarrer in Deutschland,” in Bildungsbürgertum, ed. Conze and Kocka, 1: 248 –78, esp. 271–77.

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ments remained constant since 1871. First, most prospective ministers benefited from either state or church support to study theology. In 1821, the French state had created twelve full and twenty-four half stipends for Lutheran students at Strasbourg, and four full and eight half scholarships for Calvinist theologians. Superior President Möller confirmed this level of state support in 1872, but made the sixteen full and thirtytwo half stipends available to all Protestant students without confessional distinction.52 Second, because it was a condition of these scholarships, prospective pastors continued to lodge at the Protestant Seminary (Stift) for the duration of their studies. Indeed, this requirement, coupled with the fact that only the Directory and Reformed consistories could nominate men for the stipends, ensured that non-Alsatians rarely received these grants. Although the Stift remained a place of residence, after 1884 it ceased to be a place of instruction. Instead, theology students made their way to the new university campus in the Neustadt and attended classes at the faculty’s quarters in the main university building (Kollegiengebäude). Paralleling this shift in the faculty’s physical location from old to new (German Strasbourg) was an important transformation in the faculty’s composition. At the time of the (re-)founding of the university in 1872, Alsatians held five of the original seven full chairs in Protestant theology, which was a testament to the high quality of theological education in Strasbourg prior to 1872.53 But as these men retired and died, the cultural elitism prevalent in the university led to the calling of old-German replacements. Of the original Alsatian positions, Johann Baum’s chair and Eduard Reuss’s chair (at least until 1902) remained in Alsatian hands. In 1914 Gustav Anrich received Bruch’s former chair, but only after he completed a stint in Tübingen.54 Otherwise, talented native sons—notably Wilhelm Baldensperger and Albert Schweitzer—were blocked from full positions in Strasbourg. Baldensperger accepted a post in Giessen, while Schweitzer shelved his plans for a university career in favor of missionary work.55 Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht, 2:151–52. Craig, Scholarship, 52–53. On the history of the French faculty and seminary, see Gérold, Faculté de Théologie. A comparable account of the Faculty of Protestant Theology for the Reichsland period remains to be written. 54 Bopp, Evangelische Gemeinden, 448 – 51. 55 Craig, Scholarship, 170 –73. On Schweitzer’s testy relations with the theology faculty, see the letters to his future wife, Helene Bresslau, of 29 May 1904 and 20 May 1905, printed in The Albert Schweitzer-Helena Bresslau Letters, 1902 –1912, ed. Rhena 52 53

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Whether native or immigrant, Strasbourg’s theology professors were committed to the notion that rigorous theological study was an essential part of preparation for ministry. It promoted better preaching and understanding of scripture. It also facilitated the Protestant clergy’s ability to meet head on challenges coming from contemporary critics such as Catholicism, free thought, socialism, and modern science. Because German approaches to theological study at Strasbourg were already prevalent prior to 1872, students mostly experienced the rising standards as an increased quantity of material to master. During the French period, formal theological study at Strasbourg lasted five years. The first two years were devoted to philological and philosophical subjects, the final three to theological coursework. Under the German regime, a similar temporal division of effort prevailed. At the gymnasium and during the first two semesters at the university, theology students were expected to attend courses in ancient languages (Greek, Hebrew, and Latin), history, and philosophy. Then they concentrated on theological subjects during the final six university semesters. Both before and after 1872, students completed courses on the Old and New Testaments (history and exegesis), systematic theology, Christian morals, Christian dogma, church and dogmatic History, homiletics, catechesis, and practical theology. Since 1872, however, they also attended lectures on church law, the Protestant Reformation, and religious symbolism (Symbolik).56 After eight semesters of study, candidates for Protestant ministry in the Reichsland had one more hurdle to overcome: the new state exam. A mark of the clergy’s professionalization, the exam also epitomized the intellectual, extra-ecclesial bent to ministerial preparation in AlsaceLorraine. In this respect, the reforms in Strasbourg ran opposite to empire-wide trends. After 1872, the Reichsland’s Protestant churches lost any real power to influence appointments to the theological faculty, which meant—given the transition to a majoritarian old-German faculty—that individuals with few ties to the local churches were training their ministers. Furthermore, although the churches processed applications to take the exams (the Directory reviewed the dossiers of Lutheran candidates, and the government named a Lutheran pastor to chair the examination jury), the remaining five members of the jury Schweitzer Miller and Gustav Woytt (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2003), 51–52 and 73–74. 56 “Studienplan für die elsässischen Studierenden der Theologie, erlassen durch die theologische Fakultät der Universität Straßburg,” in Dursy, Kirchenrecht, 2:185–88.

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were all theology professors. In short, it was primarily the professors who determined who was ready to enter the ministry in Alsace-Lorraine, whereas in Prussia and even in liberal Baden, the university’s influence was mitigated, above all, by the requirement that candidates attend church-run seminaries (Predigerseminarien) prior to ordination.57 The challenge of the new exam was itself considerable. Students had four, four-hour written exams on the Old and New Testaments, church history, and philosophical theology. Those who passed these tests were then admitted to an oral exam before the entire jury, whose members could pose questions about any of the required theological sub-disciplines. In addition, students were tested on their ability to preach and give catechism instruction. But the circumstances in which the state theology exam was introduced exacerbated the difficulty. One major problem was linguistic in nature. At the University of Strasbourg, lectures and exams were given exclusively in German. Yet, even into the 1880s, most Alsatian students’ knowledge of German was imperfect, since they received all or part of their secondary schooling in French. (Indeed, some professors complained that students of this generation were fully competent in neither German nor French.) Herein lay part of the explanation for the Alsatians’ poor performance on the exams, especially in the first years.58 Another problem for Alsatian theology students was that they were not attending school full-time for all eight semesters. As Superior President Möller informed the Directory and the Reformed consistories in 1873, the introduction of compulsory military service for AlsaceLorrainer youths affected theology students. Because they were Gymnasium graduates, theologians enjoyed the privilege of serving only one year, instead of the normal three.59 Since they could complete this year while enrolled at the university, the course load was dramatically reduced: at most three courses in any one semester. This put most theology students at a disadvantage when it came time to take the exams. As Eduard Reuss informed the Superior Consistory in 1875, the examination commission was well aware of the imposition created Janz, Bürger, 142–74 and 207–12; Kuhlemann, Bürgerlichkeit, 130 – 42. In 1873, eight of eleven candidates failed the exam, in 1874 five of nine. Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 165. 59 Möller to the Directory, printed in AS 27 (1873–74): 119 –20. On the practice of this one-year “exemption,” see Konrad H. Jarausch, Students, Society, and Politics in Imperial Germany: The Rise of Academic Illiberalism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), 344. 57 58

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by military service, but the regulations permitted no allowances for it: students were marked as if they had been full-time students for four years. This arrangement kept exam scores low, even after Alsatian students gained greater fluency in German.60 The theology students’ compulsory military service was a sore spot in Protestant public opinion. Admittedly, Alsatians and Lorrainers were in general ill disposed to this consequence of the annexation. But Protestants were infuriated by what seemed to be a confessional double standard. The delegates to the Superior Consistory routinely complained that while Protestant theologians did their duty, Catholic seminarians did not.61 Such accusations were actually well grounded in fact. Until the 1890s, the military service boards routinely excused Catholic theologians in Alsace from service because they lacked the secondary school education that would entitle them to the one-year privilege. That is, educational standards and not confessional affiliation per se created the disparity. However, once Bishop Fritzen required seminarians to have a Gymnasium education, Catholic theologians found themselves facing the same military obligations as their Protestant peers. By the early 1880s it became clear to both the faculty and the churches that further reform of the Protestant ministers’ preparation was necessary. Not only were exam results still below expectations, but church leaders feared that current practices were depressing interest in theology—as indicated by the substantial drops in student enrollment.62 For its part, the faculty hoped to institute measures that would improve students’ performance on the state exam, such as lengthening the period of study to ten semesters. It also advocated introducing a second examination, to be taken at least one year after the formal end of schooling, a practice that by 1880 was already the norm in the other German state churches.63 The churches—and the clergy in particular—sought to direct greater attention to practical aspects of becoming a minister. As August Küss, a conservative, lay delegate averred at the 1884 Superior Consistory session, such attitudes did not AS 31 (1875–76): 183. Cf. Comments of President Kratz at the 28 October 1879 session, AS 35 (1879 – 80): 191– 93. 62 Vogler, “Recrutement,” 98. However, as Kuhlemann points out, student enrollments in Germany overall had ebbed in the 1870s and early 1880s. Kuhlemann, Bürgerlichkeit, 119. 63 Faculty memorandum on reforms to pastoral training, presented to the Superior Consistory on 13 November 1883, AS 38 (1883–84): 192– 98. 60

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constitute an attack on scholarship (Wissenschaft) itself. Instead, they reflected the belief that “learning alone does not make the pastor,” and that the relationship between academic and practical preparation was out of balance.64 These discussions about improving the training for pastors resulted in altering the qualifications for ministers serving in the Reichsland’s Protestant churches and took effect in 1887.65 The new regulations left most of the existing system intact. Theology students still had to take a state exam after eight semesters of study. However, this exam became even more academic, both because the examination commission now consisted entirely of theology professors and because the practical elements (with the exception of the sermon) no longer figured as part of the evaluation. Instead, once students passed the first exam they had to complete at least a one-year internship as a vicar with an established pastor. During this period, candidates were to gain practical experience in ministry, while also engaging in further, independent theological study. After the internship was over, students had to take a second theological exam with written (one essay), oral, and practical (sermon and catechism instruction) components. The second exam retained a strongly academic character. But it aimed to test the students’ understanding of those disciplines—e.g., dogmatics, apologetics, church history—that were particularly important to the “conscientious exercise of one’s office.” The second examination’s emphasis on the practical dimension of ministerial preparation was also apparent in the composition of its jury. Only one of the five members had to be a theology professor, whereas the chair and at least two other members had to be active Lutheran pastors (although one of the Lutherans was replaced with a Calvinist minister when a Calvinist student was being examined).66 The establishment of the second theological exam represented a further professionalization of the training for Protestant ministry in Alsace-Lorraine that now closely resembled what lawyers and civil servants experienced. These reforms also necessitated changes in the AS 39 (session of 28 Nov to 2 Dec 1884): 138 – 40. The regulation, dated 29 June 1887, appears in Otto Stübel, Sammlung der Bestimmungen des protestantischen Kirchenrechts in Elsaß-Lothringen von 1879 bis 1897 (Weissenburg i. E.: R. Ackermann, 1898), 4 –11. 66 The Reformed consistories had wanted to have the Calvinist minister be a standing member of the commission, but the Ministry declined to endorse this proposition. For many years, Emil Küss, the Directory’s general secretary (and a former pastor), served as the final member of the commission. ADBR 173 AL 40. 64 65

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churches’ relations with theology students and ministerial candidates and resulted in greater regularization of internal practices (bureaucratization) and efforts to improve the distribution of clerical assistance to pastors. Nonetheless, despite the Ministry’s concerted efforts, bureaucratization proceeded at different paces in the two state churches. Not only were their respective needs and situations different, but each had its public identity as a discrete state church to maintain. In the Lutheran church, the regulation of access to ministerial functions already began in the 1850s. Faced with a surplus of young theologians and strengthened by its new administrative authority, the Superior Consistory determined in 1855 that young theologians could not preach, give religious education, nor help distribute communion without authorization (the venia concionandi ) from the Directory, and that no student could apply for the venia before his third year of theological study. The previous year, the Superior Consistory also decreed that all ministerial candidates (that is, those who had completed their academic training) had to serve at least one year as a vicar before appointment to a pastoral position. As ordained ministers, vicars could perform church rites and hold religious services, but not administer a parish on their own.67 Although candidates had to serve as vicars, it remained the responsibility of the pastor needing assistance to find and support a vicar. Only if a pastor’s efforts were unsuccessful could he turn to the Directory to find one for him.68 The most frequent reasons for requesting a vicar were poor health, whether short or long term, and old age. But pastors might also need a vicar if their congregations were very large or—as was often the case with the religious inspectors—when they had extensive administrative responsibilities.69 Such provisions were altogether absent in the Reformed Church. Smaller in size and fully independent of another, the individual consistories admitted students to candidacy on their own and made decisions about a student’s capacity to preach or serve as vicars on an ad hoc basis. The 1872 reorganization of theological study in Alsace-Lorraine resulted in only modest changes to this state of affairs. It brought about

These regulations appear in Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht, 2:207 and 211. Directorial decree of 23 February 1848, RO 7 (1848): 57. Significantly, candidates could not turn down a Directorial appointment as vicar without jeopardizing their prospects for future nomination to a pastoral position. 69 In fact, after 1870, it became standard practice for the Strasbourg-based inspectors to have a vicar. 67 68

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a common definition for candidacy in the two churches, since only students who had passed the theology exam were now eligible for clerical appointment. The Lutheran church also decided it needed to modify its policy on granting the venia. According to the regulation approved on 22 October 1874, students had to complete at least four semesters at the university (including a course on practical theology and homiletical exercises) before applying for the venia. Furthermore, any student who preached without the venia was temporarily barred from taking the state exam.70 Superior President Möller actually postponed approving this regulation for several months and hoped that the Reformed consistories would also adopt it. But the Reformed consistories demurred and informed Möller that they saw no need to develop a standardized policy for themselves, much less adopt the Lutherans’.71 Additional reforms to the Lutheran and Reformed churches’ internal procedures followed the establishment of the second theological exam in 1887. Once again, the new regulations achieved a greater degree of bureaucratic uniformity in the churches. There was a single ordinance to cover both churches (Möller had written two). Furthermore, the Reformed consistories formally obliged their candidates to obtain a year of practical experience prior to ordination. The Consistories did not oppose these changes. But they did object to the manner in which the regulation came about. They were far from equal partners in drafting the text and they were asked to comment on it only after the Ministry concluded most of its negotiations with the Superior Consistory. The administrative arrangements for the second exam also conveyed a sense of inferiority for the Calvinists, since a Calvinist pastor only participated in the commission’s activities when a Calvinist student was examined. Curiously, the only substantive amendment that the Ministry accepted from the Reformed consistories in 1887 was one (proposed by Metz) that decentralized the process by ending the practice of the Strasbourg consistory (and its president) assuming administrative responsibility for the exams on behalf of the other consistories.

70 “Regl. Betr. die Erteilung des Kanzelrechts (venia concionandi ) vom 22. October 1874,” printed in Dursy Staatskirchenrecht, 2:207– 9. It is worth noting that no one, not even other German pastors, could preach in a Lutheran church without the Directory’s authorization. 71 Möller specifically asked the Consistories to consider endorsing the Lutheran’s policy on 24 July 1874. KS PBK 1:361– 62 (4 Aug 1874), ADBR 173 AL 9.

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On the Lutheran side, the implementation of the second exam resulted in substantial revisions to the policy of according the venia and the elaboration of an entirely new policy on vicars. But these reforms also reflected the shortage of candidates that plagued the church throughout the late 1870s and 1880s. While there were always enough men to fill pastoral vacancies during this period, pastors in need of vicars were not always so fortunate. Some, like Christian Karl Krieger at Old St. Peter, suffered through a series of short-term vicars, because once the young minister completed his year of service, he quickly acquired a pastoral position for himself. Others—including Krieger’s colleague Karl Theodor Fuchs—were told to make due, since there were no vicars to be had.72 This situation created real hardships for both the pastors and their congregations. It also encouraged theology students with the venia to preach more frequently, to the detriment of their studies. The Superior Consistory’s first step in addressing these concerns was the new ordinance on vicars approved in 1888. It had two main features. First, it specified that theologians must complete two years of practical service to a full pastor: the candidacy internship prior to taking the second exam, and the customary year of vicar’s service after ordination (thus, after passing the second exam). Second, to foster the most effective use of available resources, the Superior Consistory centralized the process for requesting and appointing vicars: all requests for ministerial assistance would be made to and filled by the Directory.73 Four years later, after further discussions with the theological faculty, the Superior Consistory resolved to postpone granting the venia until students had passed the first exam. Subsequently, the first state exam was known as the exam pro licentia concionandi, and the second the exam pro ministerio.74 In September 1888, acting State Secretary Max von Puttkamer approached the Reformed consistories about adopting regulations on the candidate year and vicars similar to those approved by the Lutheran church. Once more, the consistories were loathe to follow that path, feeling that the additional requirements placed on Calvinist ministers (obligatory candidacy internship and the vicar’s year) would only exac erbate existing difficulties in recruiting Calvinist clergy.75 And, again,

Personnel dossiers Fuchs and Krieger, ADBR 172 AL 30 and 63. The Ministry approved the ordinance on 27 June 1888; it was published in AS 42 (1887–88): 215 –18. 74 AS 47 (1892): 110 –12. 75 Indeed, by this point, urban growth in Mulhouse and Strasbourg, coupled with 72 73

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they decried the Ministry’s penchant for presenting ordinances to them as faits accomplis. The consistories’ protests, however, went unheeded. On 13 March 1889 Puttkamer went ahead and issued the regulation for the Reformed Church. In similar fashion, the government overrode the consistories’ concerns about linking the right to preach with the first theology exam and made the Lutherans’ rules on the pro licentia concionandi and pro ministerio examinations of 1892 binding on both churches.76 With the convocation of a Reformed Synod for Alsace-Lorraine in 1895, the consistories at last had more efficacious means to promote their interests vis-à-vis the state and the Lutherans.77 It also paved the way for coordinating the activities of the church’s theology students, candidates, and vicars. In 1896, the Synod approved a regulation that gave its executive committee (the Synodalvorstand ) full authority to admit students to the theology exams and formal candidacy. The executive committee also took upon itself the task of maintaining an up to date list of candidates so that each of the consistories would know who was available for appointment as either pastor or vicar. In 1905, the Synod won a major symbolic concession from the Lutheran church and theological faculty, in that the Reformed church obtained a permanent seat on the commission for the examination pro ministerio.78 Then, four years later, the Ministry decided to approve revisions that the Synod proposed to the Calvinists’ ordinance on candidates and vicars. Accordingly, Calvinist candidates could again be named as vicars (without special dispensation), if the Synod’s executive committee deemed it necessary.79 Along with the more rigorous preparation for ministry and the church’s increased control over ministerial candidates, the professionalization of the Reichsland’s Protestant clergy was characterized by improvements to the material conditions of clerical service. In one respect, Alsace-Lorraine in 1871 was already more developed than elsewhere in the Empire. Under French rule, the state had assumed full responsibility to pay the salaries and provide housing for the German immigration into Lorraine, created a serious shortage not just of candidates, but also ministers within the Reformed Church. 76 ADBR 173 AL 41; and “Ministerial-Verfügung betr. Abänderung des Regulativs (29 June 1887) vom 29. August 1892,” printed in Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht 2:11–13. 77 We will look at the creation of the Reformed Synod more closely in the next chapter. 78 See the remarks in AS 61 (1906): 15 –16. 79 MSV 16 (1909): 108 – 09.

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ministers of state-recognized religious communities.80 Communes and parishes could supplement this remuneration (and many did), but like other civil servants, the base salaries for French clergy and rabbis were provided by the state.81 When German rule commenced, the salaries for Protestant ministers in Alsace-Lorraine were quite low. In 1863, the French government raised the pay of ministers at “first class” parishes (communities with over 30,000 souls, thus, all Strasbourg pastors) to 2,100 francs (1,680 Marks),82 at “second class” parishes (communities with 5,000 to 30,000 souls) to 1,900 fr (1,520 M.), and at “third class” parishes (under 5,000 parishioners) to 1,600 fr (1,280 M.). According to Janz, at that time, only Protestant clergy in Bavaria and Württemberg were paid worse (at an average annual salary of respectively 455 and 539 th., or 1,365 and 1,617 M.). Prussian clergy, by contrast, earned on average 673 th. annually (2,019 M.), and Saxon clergy 831 th. (2,493 M.).83 At the beginning of the Kaiserreich, however, Alsatian pastors were no better off than their German peers with respect to support in times of infirmity and old age. French law did not guarantee pensions to Protestant clergy, and the low salaries precluded independent saving for retirement.84 In the 1850s, pastors started paying into two funds, the “Emeritus fund” and the “Widows fund,” that offered financial assistance to, respectively, senior clergy and their widows and dependants. Nevertheless, at best, this payment amounted to just over one-fifth of a pastor’s salary (in 1872 the highest possible “pension” was 480 fr), such that it really did not qualify as a pension.85 In sum, most Alsatian 80 By contrast, in the rest of Germany, pastors generally had sinecures, cobbled together from several sources (e.g., rents, fees for church rites, and the proceeds of the annual harvests). Kuhlemann, Bürgerlichkeit, 152–71; Janz, Bürger, 336 – 65. 81 The historical justification for this situation was the nationalization of church property at the beginning of the French Revolution. However, since a considerable amount of Protestant wealth in eastern France was never nationalized, an ordinance of 28 July 1819 stipulated that all income derived from this property would be deducted from the state-paid salaries—a condition that affected primarily the Protestant clergy in the Lower Rhine department. Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht, 2:303 – 08. 82 Hereafter, francs will be abbreviated as “fr”; Marks as “M.”; and thaler as “th.” 83 Janz, Bürger, 515; Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht, 2:308. The three class system was established by the imperial decree of 15 germinal XII (5 April 1804). Mark equivalents are based on the conversion rates established in 1873: 3 marks for every 1 thaler and 10 francs for every 8 marks. 84 By contrast, beginning in 1853, Catholic priests who completed at least thirty years of service could apply for a pension that was subsidized in part by wealth confiscated from the Orléans family. Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht, 1:97– 99. 85 Report given to the Superior Consistory, 10 June 1872, AS 28 (1872): 39.

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pastors could not afford to retire. Instead, they normally remained in office until their death and relied on the assistance of colleagues and vicars to discharge their pastoral duties. Such a situation was generally tenable in the short-term. Colleagues could deliver sermons or take over religious instruction. Other pastors at the parish could assume a larger share of the administrative burden. But in the long-term, illness and old age disturbed the personal relationships between pastor and parishioner, often to the detriment of the congregation’s health. This was particularly applicable to Strasbourg’s system of personal congregations, where the laity were free to move from pastor to pastor as they say fit. The political changes of 1870 –71 brought about significant improvements to the clergy’s material situation. Responding to the pleas of Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish ministers, Superior President Möller recommended (and Bismarck approved) a two-thirds increase in clerical salaries. Effective 1 January 1872, Strasbourg’s pastors saw their base pay increase from 2,100 to 3,200 fr (that is, from 1,680 to 2,560 M.).86 The budget for 1872 also established a fund that defrayed the expense of maintaining a vicar, providing on average 300 M. towards the stipends vicars received for their service (along with room and board).87 As appreciated as these changes were, ministers’ families in both urban and rural communities still struggled to maintain a modest, middle-class standard of living. Albert Schweitzer, who assisted at St. Nicholas (German) between 1899 and 1912, recalled in his memoirs: “In the autumn of 1885 I entered the Gymnasium at Mülhausen in Alsace. My godfather, Louis Schweitzer, . . . was kind enough to take me to live with him. Otherwise my father [then pastor at Günsbach], who had nothing beyond his slender stipend on which to bring up his large family, could hardly have afforded to send me to a Gymnasium.”88 The cost of living was highest in Strasbourg and the city’s clergy would have found it particularly difficult to make ends meet, if they did not have recourse to additional support. Most parishes paid the pastor’s expected contributions to the Widows’ fund. More importantly, 86 In the case of the Protestant clergy, the two-thirds increase was overall. Pastors at first-class parishes received slightly less, pastors at second-class parishes slightly more than this amount. Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht, 1:92, 2:308. 87 Initially, the fund was large enough to provide 40 stipends each year. By 1879, however, the demand for the stipends rose to a point that the budget item was increased from 12,000 to 14,000 M. (a gain of about 6 stipends). 88 Albert Schweitzer, Out of My Life and Thought: An Autobiography, trans. C. T. Campion (New York: Henry Holt, 1933), 2.

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every parish except Old St. Peter supplemented the pastor’s income, albeit to varying degrees. New Church contributed the most, 1,600 M. as of 1911, whereas the other parishes’ grants ranged from 160 M. at St. Thomas to 600 M. at St. Aurelia. In a special category altogether were the benefits attached to the senior positions at St. Thomas, St. Nicholas (German), and St. Aurelia. These pastors enjoyed prebends as canons of the St. Thomas Foundation, which amounted to 5,000 M. annually in 1911.89 Such supplements help explain the attractiveness of Strasbourg’s Lutheran positions, the peculiarly high number of applicants to posts, at St. Aurelia as well as Paul Grünberg’s decision to move from Old St. Peter to New Church in 1903.90 The general sentiment among the Reichsland’s Protestant clergy regarding pay was reflected in a petition sent to the Superior Consistory in 1880. The appeal’s main goal was to have church officials push for the introduction of formal pensions. Emil Nied, the organizer of the campaign, observed, “All other inhabitants of public offices who have become unfit for service may, after a certain number of service years, be released from their responsibilities with a lesser or greater pension. Only the pastor has to die in office.” But the clergy also sought another reform in order to be treated more like civil servants: the introduction of longevity pay. Indeed, although one hundred thirty-four pastors signed the petition (including seventeen of Strasbourg’s pastors), many did so with a twofold caveat: pensions should not come at the cost of pay increases based on years of service, nor should they require new contributions from the clergy’s salary.91 The Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine was actually highly sympathetic to such demands. But the Reichsland’s large, politically active Catholic population made it tricky to enact policies that would primarily benefit the territory’s Protestants. Indeed, Catholic public opinion continually decried Protestant (and Jewish) ministers being paid more than priests. It also complained that the state provided proportionally more resources

AMS, SPVP 181/60. Eleven people applied to succeed Schmidt in 1872, sixteen to replace Kromayer in 1896, and eleven for Meyer’s post in 1897. Grünberg had tried to move to a betterpaying position at St. Aurelia in 1896 (as Kromayer’s successor), but was unsuccessful. Personnel files Grünberg, Jaeger, Kromayer, Schweitzer, ADBR 172 AL 35, 54, 64, and 103; Paul Grünberg, Mein Nachlaß. Aufzeichnungen zu meinem 60. Geburtstag, 20.2.1917. Für die Familie und für Freunde (Strasbourg, 1917), 1. 91 Nied to the Superior Consistory, 24 Nov 1880; Nied to Directory President Kratz, 22 Mar 1881; ADBR AL 172 80. 89 90

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to the non-Catholic communities. In 1884, for instance, Protestants comprised less than ten percent of the Reichsland’s total population, but just over twenty percent of the budget went to pay the Protestant clergy’s salaries.92 The Ministry also had to contend with the state budget’s limits. Any increase in state support for the faith recognized communities—Protestant, Catholic, or Jewish—required expanding the overall territorial budget and the notables in the territorial assembly (Landesausschuß) already complained that the state was spending too much. Nonetheless, by packaging the various pieces of the religious affairs budget together as a single legislative item, the Ministry gained approval for two important measures that came into effect in 1884. First, the government established a fund—similar to the one that already existed for Catholics—that enabled the state to provide pensions to particularly needy pastors. Subsequently, in 1889, the Directory succeeded in obtaining a pension for Philipp Freydinger, who was incapacitated since the early 1880s by a severe nervous system disorder. A few years later, the Ministry offered a pension to the long-suffering and outspoken Louis Leblois in order to eliminate the French language parish at New Church.93 Second, the law authorized the creation of limited longevity pay for all territorial clergy. In the Protestant church, these supplements began after twenty-four and thirty-six years of service, with the amount varying according to the class of parish. Six years later, the Landesausschuß authorized funds to expand this system further such that pastors at first and second class parishes received supplements after twelve years, while the base salary for pastors at third class parishes was boosted by 80 M. After 1890, the Lutheran church took the lead in pressing for a more comprehensive reform of clerical salaries. In 1892 and again in 1895, the Superior Consistory took up the question and developed a series of proposals. It advocated eliminating the classification of parishes by size, since the difference between the cost of living in smaller and larger communities had diminished appreciably. Instead, pastors would receive a minimum base salary (2,000 M.), which would

92 “Zusammenstellung der Aenderungen, welche der Landesausschuß von ElsaßLothringen zu dem Entwurfe der Spezialetats für das Etatsjahr 1884/85 beschlossen hat,” ADBR 27 AL 521. See also the remarks of Otto Back at the 1897 Superior Consistory session, AS 52 (1897): 124 –29. 93 Personnel dossiers Freydinger and Leblois, ADBR 172 AL 29 and 67.

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increase with every six years of service to a maximum of 4,000 M.94 As always, the chief obstacle for these objectives remained financing. The Ministry suggested that raising the necessary funds for these (and other church) projects would require some form of church tax, a path that other German states were also pursuing to generate additional revenue for ecclesiastical purposes.95 Although concerned about the laity’s reaction to a new tax, especially if it was expressly for improving clerical salaries, the Protestant churches expressed their willingness to consider the reform.96 The territory’s Catholic bishops, however, categorically rejected the Ministry’s overtures to establish levies on behalf of all the recognized churches.97 The negotiations between the Protestant churches, the Ministry, and the Landesausschuß continued and reached fruition with the landmark legislation of 6 July 1901. Accordingly, on 1 April 1903 a new salary structure for Protestant clergy took effect that the Superior Consistory effectively outlined a decade earlier. Pastors who had served for at least ten years were then also officially entitled to a pension, equivalent to at least one-fourth of his salary (after forty years of service it reached the maximum of 3,300 M.), plus an annual housing allowance of 400 M. Third, the law created special levies on the territory’s Protestant population (the Protestant “church tax”), which would pay for the raises and the new pensions. The creation of the church tax made the entire deal possible, but it forced a further concession on the Protestant churches. Namely, families were now officially able to leave the state church and avoid the new tax liability.98 One year after passing the law on Protestant salaries and pensions, the Ministry sent the churches a draft regulation concerning the mandatory retirement of unfit pastors. Now that pastors 94 “Pfarrbesoldungsfrage und Kirchensteuer,” Special Report of the Directory to the Superior Consistory, AS 50 (1895): 46 –102, see also the group’s discussion of the report on 207–33. 95 Wolfgang Huber, “Die Kirchensteuer als ‘wirtschaftliches Grundrecht’,” in Die Finanzen der Kirche. Studien zu Struktur, Geschichte und Legitimation kirchlicher Ökonomie, ed. Wolfgang Lienemann (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1989), 130 – 45. 96 For this reason, the Reformed Synod proposed that the church tax should cover the churches’ other financial needs, such as the construction of new parish churches. MSV 6 (1900). 97 Cf. Bishop Fritzen to Emil Petri, 5 Apr 1899, ADBR 136 AL 19/67. Nevertheless, Fernand Geigel, a retired (Catholic) civil servant and specialist in church law, argued that the Catholic churches in Alsace-Lorraine would do well to follow the Protestants’ example. “F. Geigel’s Gesetzesvorschlag btr. Umlagen für allgemeine Bedürfnisse der kath. Kirche in Elsaß-Lothringen,” Straßbürger Diözesanblatt 23 (1904): 12–22. 98 ADBR 136 AL 19/69.

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had a right to pensions, Undersecretary Emil Petri argued, they should be required to retire if they could no longer carry out their responsibilities, as was the case with civil servants. The Superior Consistory and Synod were anxious about how this ordinance would affect standing policies on the deployment of vicars, but both ultimately agreed to endorse the text, since similar policies were in force in Prussia, Saxony, and Württemberg.99 By 1903 the Reichsland’s Protestant clergy had made great strides toward acquiring employment conditions commensurate with their status as liberally educated professionals. Clerical salaries still lagged behind those of similarly trained civil servants and university professors, even after another round of raises—a base salary of 2,200 M., longevity raises every three years, and a higher maximum salary of 4,440 M.—took effect in 1910.100 However, the gap had narrowed considerably. More importantly, from the perspective of the laity, pastors were no longer forced to stay in office at all costs. After the new pension provisions took effect, pastors routinely retired from office once they became seriously ill, began to feel the effects of old age, or had completed the minimum requirement for a full pension of thirty years of service. Significantly, and in contrast to Kuhlemann’s notes about Baden and Janz’s observations on Prussia, these improvements occurred without the intervention of a modern, clerical professional organization. In fact, the first organization of this sort in Alsace-Lorraine, the “ElsassLothringische Pfarrverein,” was not founded until 1911 (a year after the last raises took effect).101 Nevertheless, there were two groups through which Alsace’s Protestant clergy expressed collective opinions about major issues facing the churches. For the questions discussed in this chapter—salaries, pensions, and preparation for ministry—the pivotal group was the Pastoral Conference. Founded in 1834 by Inspectors Edel and Boeckel, this gathering of Lutheran and Reformed ministers was not just a forum for clergy to discuss theological and practical concerns,

99 Emil Petri to the Directory, 22 Feb 1902, printed in AS 57 (1902): 97–101; the deliberations at the 1902 session over the measure appear on 93 – 96 and 140 –141. The Synod’s approval of the regulation was printed in MSV 8 (1902): 2. 100 Law of 15 Nov 1909, concerning the Salary and Pensions of Pastors and their Dependents, printed in MSV 17 (April 1910). 101 Altogether, twenty-seven of the city’s pastors joined the association. A copy of its statutes appears in AMS, SPVP 191/81 ( Johann Klein, pastor at Old St. Peter, was on the group’s executive committee). On the pastors’ organizations in Baden, see Kuhlemann, Bürgerlichkeit, 245–55; and for Prussia, Janz, Bürger, 322–35 and 513–15.

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but it became a veritable para-ecclesiastical body. The Conference advocated raising clerical salaries both in the 1860s and 1870s and its views regarding a second theological exam and its lobbying for better salaries weighed heavily on the Superior Consistory’s deliberations in the 1880s and 1890s.102 The other group was Strasbourg’s Pastoral Society, whose membership was restricted to the city’s Lutheran ministers. Whereas the Conference’s purview was Alsace as a whole, the Pastoral Society focused on Strasbourg’s specific ecclesiastical concerns. It aimed to construct common policies for and on behalf of the city’s parishes; however, its resolutions had no official weight unless sanctioned by the Directory and/or the several parish councils. Consequently, when the Conference discussed pastoral training and salaries, the Society negotiated with the municipal school authorities over when students were to be released for religious instruction and with the city over new policies for the municipal cemeteries. Whereas the Conference convened only annually, the Society met several times each year, depending on its agenda. To encourage a sense of equality among the parishes, the meeting site rotated from one inner city church to another, so that every parish served as host once (for an entire year) every seven years. Furthermore, the pastors took turns hosting a festive meal on Martin Luther’s birthday (November 11th) as a purely social affair that even ministers who no longer regularly partook in business meetings attended. All told, the Society played no significant role in advancing the cause of clerical professionalization. But it provided a forum for collective clerical engagement and its actions noticeably raised the profile of the Lutheran parishes and clergy within Strasbourg.103 Pastors and Laity in the Parish There is a pronounced tendency in recent work on the history of religion in nineteenth-century Western Europe to associate the improvements in the Christian clergy’s professional situation with an amplification of clerical and ecclesial power. This is especially true for research on

102 In honor of the fiftieth anniversary of the Conference’s founding, Emil Nied published a brief history of the Conference’s activities, accomplishments, and membership. ASPC 8 (1884): 246 –305. The discussion of an examination pro ministerio occurred in 1886; ASPC (1886): 21–29. 103 PB-SPG, 1870 –1914, passim, ADBR 272 AL 291–292 and ECCAL.

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Catholicism by historians like Christopher Clark, Irmtraud Götz von Olenhusen, and Olaf Blaschke, who argue that the triumph of Catholic ultramontanism in the second half of the century was due as much to the better training of and greater bureaucratic control over priests as to the growing popularity and assertiveness of the Roman pontiffs.104 But the latest studies of German Protestantism have also been wont to link modernization and clericalization. Dietmar von Reeken has even gone so far as to characterize Protestant ministers as “milieu managers.”105 The problem with this research on Protestant history is that it marginalizes key distinctions between Catholicism and Protestantism, especially at the parish level. Although the Protestant clergy were the leaders of the parish community, they exercised their authority jointly with the parish’s lay representatives. The precise nature of this relationship varied amongst state churches, but the evidence from Strasbourg shows that it was essential for understanding a Protestant parish, whether Lutheran or Reformed, as a specifically Protestant community. The dynamics of clerical-lay relationships in the parish were structured by a mixture of law and tradition in Strasbourg. The Decree-Law of 1852 established the parish council as the legal representative of the parish community and vested in it—and not the parish clergy—the power to make major decisions on behalf of the community, which were subject to the oversight of higher church authorities.106 Many of these decisions concerned financial or administrative matters. The parish council prepared and reviewed the annual budget. It hired parish personnel such as the sacristan and organist. It maintained the official list of parish electors. But the council’s authority also extended into the community religious life. It had to approve changes to the customary times for religious services. Similarly, the council’s consent was required when pastors wished to introduce a new hymnal or alter the parish’s liturgical practices, for instance, by allowing the congregants to use individual cups during the communion service. 104 Christopher Clark, “New Catholicism,” in idem and Kaiser, Culture Wars, 11– 46; Irmtraud Götz von Olenhusen, Klerus und abweichendes Verhalten: Zur Sozialgeschichte der katholischen Priester im 19. Jahrhundert. Die Erzdiözese Freiburg (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994); Blaschke, “Kolonisierung.” 105 Janz, Bürger; von Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch, 154 – 65; and Martin Friedrich, “Das 19. Jahrhundert als ‘Zweites Konfessionelles Zeitalter’? Anmerkungen aus evangelischtheologischer Sicht,” in Blaschke, Konfessionen im Konflikt, 95 –112, esp. 110 –12. 106 At New Church and St. Thomas and until the turn of the century, Old St. Peter and St. Aurelia as well, the parish council and consistory were one and the same body Unless noted otherwise, the use of the word “parish council” in this discussion will be taken to include these parish council-consistories.

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The composition of the council evidenced the law’s intention for a collaboration between clergy and lay elders in the area of parish governance. As the spiritual leaders of the community, the chairmanship of the parish council was reserved for the clergy. When more than one pastor served at the same parish, which was true at all of Strasbourg’s parishes, the most senior pastor (at the particular parish, not in overall service) functioned as chair. Elders filled the other two statutory offices of secretary and treasurer. They also constituted a majority of the council’s membership and could outvote the clergy if they wished.107 The clergy and elders managed their responsibilities for the parish’s business in terms of a division of labor, rather than through confrontation. Mindful of the pastors’ training and calling as spiritual specialists, the elders routinely deferred to the clergy on matters relating to religious life. Decisions about who was to preach and lead the altar liturgy each month, for instance, were negotiated among the clergy without the council’s intervention. Pastors also had a free hand to organize the services for which they were responsible as their conscience dictated. However, when a parish’s pastoral posts were vacant or when the ministers could not agree among themselves, parish councils could and did exert their authority. In 1871, for instance, St. William found itself in the unusual position of having no pastoral leadership (two of the three titular pastors had just died, and the third was too ill to carry out his duties). Led by Georges Frick, a proponent of lay activism in the church, the council determined how to split the responsibilities for catechism instruction and worship services between the two vicars named to help out in the parish. More daringly, the council also decided early in 1872 to ban the Apostles’ Creed in services and religious education classes in light of the vicars’ conservative religious views.108 But when the council tried to make the ban permanent, following Engelmann’s and Tubach’s installations as pastors, Engelmann politely informed the laity that “the inclusion of exclusion of liturgical elements was a matter of conscience and, as such, beyond the council’s authority.” While Frick contested Engelmann’s interpretation, the council let the matter rest.109

107 The balance between clerical and lay forces was closest in the parishes where the parish council and consistory were different bodies (At St. William and Young St. Peter, there were seven lay elders and three pastors), and largest where they were the same (e.g., fourteen to two at St. Aurelia). 108 SG PBKR, 1:274 –76 and 287– 88 (26 Sep 1871, 19 Oct 1871, 1 May 1872). 109 Ibid., 337– 39 and 340 – 41 (21 Dec 1874 and 12 Apr 1875).

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Much more frequently, the parish council resolved disputes between the pastors. In 1872, when the New Church’s pastors couldn’t agree on the annual table of preaching duties, the elders on the council voted to dispense with it altogether.110 Sixteen years later, as the new bell tower reached completion, the laity settled a policy difference among the pastors and upheld the liberal ministers’ wish not to ring the new bells at services when the congregation recited the Lord’s Prayer.111 At Young St. Peter, too, the council strove to balance conflicting interests within the parish, but with less success. After the death of Friedrich Horning in 1884, the parish council adopted a series of new policies to promote greater attendance at religious services and more cohesion within the parish. They set up a new schedule for regular worship and altered the times for Sunday catechism. The council also decreed that the parish’s pastors should assist one another with the distribution of communion, rather than seek special assistance from the Directory. After installation as his father’s successor, however, Wilhelm Horning informed the council that he would not abide these policies. He felt that they violated his orthodox religious beliefs and his estimation of the congregation’s particular needs.112 The lay elders’ primary sphere of responsibility encircled parish finances and the administration of parish property. The parish treasurer, an elder, worked with the president to prepare the parish budget. In addition, he made recommendations on how the parish should manage its assets (property, bonds, endowments) to meet its financial obligations. Many parishes named one of their lay elders to oversee the general management of parish property as parish “ædile.” At St. William the ædile also oversaw the rental of pews to parishioners, a function assumed by the “Stuhlvogt” at Young St. Peter, and by the sacristan elsewhere. For major projects, such as the rebuilding of the New Church in the early 1870s, councils established building commissions, where the lay element predominated. When the New Church consistory established its committee in early 1871, the only pastor it appointed to the seven member board was President Leblois. The committee supervised the

“Faits du Temple Neuf,” entries for 1872, TN; PBK 7: 47, AMS TN 103. PBK, vol. 8 (188 – 89), AMS TN 104. 112 SPJ PBKR, 2:49 –52 and 56 –57 (Feb and May 1884). At St. Nicholas (French), Johann Roser adopted a similar posture, not only denying the council’s authority to administer the parish but refusing to attend council meetings, which later provoked admonishment from the Directory. Personnel file Roser, ADBR 172AL 92. 110 111

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planning of the new building, watched over the various stages of its construction, and spearheaded the fundraising campaign to meet building expenses not covered by the war indemnity.113 Because the law regarded the councils as the parish communities’ legal representatives, the elders felt comfortable challenging their clergy under certain circumstances. In particular, they resolutely opposed reforms that threatened the right of Protestant families to choose their own minister, that is, changes to the system of personal congregations. When the Pastoral Society proposed the creation of ministerial districts in the 1894, the laymen at New Church forbade their pastors to participate in the project. One decade later, lay activists on all the Lutheran parish councils banded together to force the Directory to delay establishing the district parish as the norm for inner-city Strasbourg.114 The laity also maintained that it, and not the pastors, had the power to decide who might use the church. Thus, even though Wilhelm Horning tried to prohibit non-orthodox religious groups (like the pietist-affiliated Young Christian’s Men Association) from holding their annual meetings at Young St. Peter during his stint as president (1890 –1908), the parish council repeatedly opted to grant requests from such organizations.115 Despite the councils’ legal obligation to look after the parishes’ interests, their claim to representation was weak. First of all, the inner city’s system of personal congregations meant that there was no single parish community to represent. Instead, once the Decree-Law of 1852 eliminated the requirement of selecting elders from the community’s most wealthy members, Strasbourg’s parish councils and consistories were comprised of delegations from each of the church’s resident congregations. At Young St. Peter, for example, each pastor was entitled to have two members of his congregation in the council, while the seventh elder normally came from the president’s congregation. To maintain these arrangements, parish council elections in Strasbourg were strictly controlled. At every parish in the weeks before an election (regular elections were held every three years in either late January or early February), the sitting parish council drew up a slate of candidates for presentation to “Faits du Temple Neuf,” entries for 1871–77, passim, TN. ADBR 172 AL 143; SB 45/7 (16 Feb 1908) 54 –55. A fuller discussion of this important issue follows in Chapter 8. 115 These requests, however, were supported by the parishes’ other ministers (Hackenschmidt and Hertzog), who were themselves active in such organizations. SPJ PBKR, vol. 2, passim; and Wilhelm Horning, Köstliche Mühe, 2:72–86. 113 114

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the electors. In some parishes this process took place during an official council session, more frequently it occurred during an informal meeting. As a rule, incumbents were recommended for reelection. When there were vacancies to fill, the pastors of underrepresented congregations were asked to nominate worthy candidates, who were invariably placed on the official slate.116 The parishes then announced the names of the official candidates along with the balloting specifics (date, place, time) on each of the final three Sundays before election day, as required by statute. Around the turn of the century, New Church, Old St. Peter and St. Thomas experimented with printing copies of the official slate and distributing them among the electors. But conservative forces at Young St. Peter stubbornly refused to pursue that strategy and insisted that “a responsible elector would attend religious services regularly and learn about the elections and the candidates at that time.”117 These practices substantially explain the overwhelming lack of interest in parish elections, a trend that continued apace between 1870 and 1914. On average, only twenty-five percent of Protestant electors voted in Strasbourg’s parish and consistory elections. The highest rate of citywide participation occurred in 1883 (30.76%) and the lowest came in 1901 (21.92%). Among the individual parishes, electoral participation was highest at New Church, St. Aurelia, and the Reformed Church, where the average rate exceeded thirty percent. At Old St. Peter, St. Thomas and St. William, turnout averaged from 25 to 28 percent. Only partial electoral data for St. Nicholas (German or French) is available, but there, too, rates appear to have been above the municipal average. Significantly, the lowest levels of electoral participation in Strasbourg were found at one of the city’s largest and most thriving communities: Young St. Peter. The mean level of participation there was ten percent and only in 1883 (for reasons that are not at all apparent) did more than fifteen percent of the electors participate in the balloting. Here, though, a lack of churchly interest was not the reason for the poor turnout. Rather, parishioners were aware that the elections were mere formalities, ratifications of agreements that had already been reached among the congregations’ leaders.

116 Cf. SG PBKR (11 Jan 1877); SPJ PBKR (29 Dec 1882); RK PBKR (18 Oct 1882), ADBR 173 AL 61; TN PBK (4 Dec 1906); ST PBK (17 Dec 1873, 16 Dec 1891). 117 SPJ PBKR, 3:80 – 81 (10 Jan 1895).

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By all accounts, Strasbourg’s Protestants accepted these arrangements because they understood that they were electing people to carry out specific administrative and financial duties in the parish. There were neither explicit religious requirements for running for office, nor specific religious duties for counselors to fulfill. But these electoral practices had one further consequence: they precluded significant change to the social structure of the parish councils. Because sitting members were re-elected until they either died or decided not to run again, the only opportunity to infuse new blood into a council was when a vacancy arose, but they came sporadically. The one exception was the decade of 1870, when death, old age, and emigration to France prompted every parish to elect at least four (and some consistories as many as twelve) new elders. But because the nomination process privileged established parishioners who had the time, inclination, and aptitude to help conduct parish business, the new counselors differed little from the men they replaced. Consequently, while the parish boards underwent a certain rejuvenation after the Franco-Prussian war, they remained the preserve of the city’s Protestant notability. During the French and the German period, parishes drafted architects and businessmen, merchants and doctors, chemists and engineers to serve as elders. They elected civil servants, bureaucrats, university professors, and pensioners but also men from artisanal backgrounds—printers, goldsmiths, bakers. Gardeners were conspicuous on the membership lists at St. Aurelia, as were brewers at St. William and Old. St. Peter. In other words, like the pastors, the elders hailed from the same middle-class groups that had long provided the leadership for Strasbourg’s Protestant community. Interestingly, the profile of the Reformed church’s parish council differed only slightly from its Lutheran counterparts, in that it elected fewer artisans and more professional men (insurance directors, bank employees, heads of construction firms).118 After 1870, this conservatism also enabled the native population to use parish government to express opposition to the new political regime. Although Superior President Möller made German the official language of church business in 1872, every parish council and consistory in Strasbourg, save those of Old and Young St. Peter, continued

118 Electoral data has been culled from parish council and consistory meeting records, announcement registers, and, when available, the actual electoral protocols.

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to conduct most of their affairs in French. This approach applied not only to internal correspondence, but also the protocols of parish council sessions. Only when the parishes corresponded with the Directory or civil authorities did they switch to German and translate excerpts from the minutes as necessary. When questioned about this practice, parishes like St. William claimed that the secretary’s command of German was not up to the task, while the Reformed parish stated that a majority of the council had difficulties with German, which made a strict application of the language decree an undue imposition on the council’s ability to function.119 Despite these weak excuses, neither ecclesiastical nor political officials made any serious attempt to force the issue until 1887. Then, as part of a general clamp down on Francophile tendencies in the Reichsland after the Boulanger Affair, the Ministry decreed that all parishes in the German language zone had to maintain all their records and conduct all their correspondence in German, effective 1 January 1889. French-language parishes, like St. Nicholas, had an additional three year grace period, but then they too had to make the switch.120 Similarly, Strasbourg’s parish and consistorial elders felt no special compunction to have old-German colleagues. Prior to 1890, only the Reformed Church’s parish council included an old German, although immigrant Germans represented a sizeable segment of the capital’s Protestant population by that time. At New Church, old Germans tried to force the issue by promoting their own slate in the 1888 elections. This move produced an unusually high level of participation, 44.81%, but no victories for any of the old-German candidates. Nevertheless, the tactic was not without effect. Three years later, one old German, Georg Roth (a professor at the conservatory), was placed on the official list and elected. That same year, Young St. Peter nominated and elected Mayor Otto Back to a seat.121 In 1895, the old Germans repeated the “New Church strategy” at the city’s other high profile parish, St.

119 A copy of the 1872 language decree and its application to the churches appears in AS 27 (1872–73): 50. On the situation in St. William see SG, PBKR, 1:301; and for the Reformed church, Consistory President Röhrich to Möller, 17 Nov 1874, ADBR 2G 482 F 41. 120 On the increasing political tensions in the Reichsland starting in 1887, see Hiery, Reichstagswahlen, 241– 65. The results of the Ministry’s investigations into the churches’ use of French, as well as its negotiations with the faith communities to achieve full compliance with the law, are found in ADBR 1049 W 1. 121 PBK, vol. 8 (25 Jan 1889 and 1 Feb 1892) AMS TN 104; SPJ PBKR (November 1891–February 1892).

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Thomas. Once more, the old-German campaign excited considerable interest (turnout that year reached 53.21%), but the alternative slate met with defeat. But there too the old Germans had made their point. In 1898, Hans Peter Plön was elected along with the rest of the official slate, as was Theology Professor Wilhelm Nowack, one of the instigators of the 1895 effort, in 1901.122 In fact, by the turn of the century, old Germans had won election to all of Strasbourg’s parish councils and consistories (with the exception of French St. Nicholas). These victories brought about little discernable change to how the parishes conducted their affairs, but they indicated that notwithstanding ongoing tensions, old Germans had become full-fledged members of the capital’s Protestant community. After 1872, the council’s representation took on greater significance, because Strasbourg’s Lutheran parish councils and consistories began to help choose their pastors. This change, along with subsequent modifications to the pastoral appointment process during the Reichsland period, strengthened the laity’s position within the parish milieu. The power to nominate Lutheran pastors remained in the hands of the laydominated Directory, but the parish elders came to exert considerable influence over the selection of the new minister. Strasbourg’s Calvinist laity exerted even greater influence choosing their clergy, due to differences in the organization of the two churches and the parish’s status as the consistorial seat. The Decree-Law of 1852 transferred the right to nominate clergy from the Lutheran consistories to the Directory and resulted in the centralization of the entire appointment process in the Lutheran church. In the Reformed church, this law confirmed the consistories’ power to name clergy, but it also made the newly-recognized parishes integral to the appointment. The consistories made their choices based on a presentation list drawn up by the parish. When a vacancy opened at a Reformed parish, the parish council was responsible for inviting clergy to present themselves as candidates by posting an announcement, for instance, in the Sonntagsblatt or the Progrès religieux. But parishes didn’t have to limit themselves to these applicants. Nor, if a pastor was leaving office, did they have to wait to replace him until he had physically left. Thus, when Camille Tournier decided to accept a position in Gebweiler

122

Nowack to Stern, 15 Jan 1895; and PBK ( January 1895 and January 1898), ST.

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(outside of Mulhouse) in 1883, Strasbourg’s parish council charged him to recruit Eduard Stricker as his replacement.123 Reformed parishes could recommend a maximum of three candidates to the consistory. The official list presented the candidates in alphabetical order, but the parish’s representatives to the consistory could inform the body of the parish’s preferences during the session. Legally, the parish’s wishes were not binding on the consistory. However, the organization of the Reformed consistories ensured that Strasbourg’s choices were nominated. Since Strasbourg was the consistorial seat, the entire parish council voted in the consistory and most of the delegates for the other parishes were selected from Strasbourg’s congregation. Except for a brief period in the 1870s, when Strasbourg’s clergy were new in office, a Strasbourg pastor also served as the consistory president. The rural parishes may not have been entirely pleased with these arrangements, but they served urban interests well and gave Strasbourg’s council the de facto right to appoint its ministers. Entirely different circumstances prevailed in the Lutheran church. After 1852, the local community had no voice in the appointment process. The Directory announced all vacancies and set the deadlines for applications. Then, relying on the religious inspector’s report on the applicants and the parish’s needs, the Directory deliberated and made its decisions. The Lutheran clergy and the laity complained bitterly about the lack of parish input, but only in 1872, after considerable discussion in the religious press and the Pastoral Conference, did the Superior Consistory secure government approval for modifications. The reforms stopped short of the Evangelical-Protestant Union demands and those of lay activists like Georges Flach, who pressed for direct appointment by the parish.124 But they did secure a meaningful role for parishes in the process. Both the parish council and members of the community could now state their preferences with respect to the officially designated list before a three-member commission (Erhebungskommission),

123 RK PBKR, 1 May 1883 and 23 May 1883, ADBR 173 AL 61. The elders may also have called Röhrich to Strasbourg as Maeder’s replacement in 1873, but the parish council and the consistory minutes for late 1872 and early 1873 are ambiguous on this point. 124 Georges Flach, La question de la nomination des pasteurs (Strasbourg: Jean-HenriEdouard Heitz, 1869); Petition of the Union Protestante-Évangélique, printed in PR 4/51 (1871). An account of the history of the reform, as well as the final measures taken in 1872, appears in AS 28 (1872): 220ff.

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composed of the religious inspector, the consistory president, and one of the lay inspectors.125 Where the parish council and consistory were distinct bodies (e.g., St. Nicholas, St. William and Young St. Peter), the consistory also gave the commission a recommendation on the official candidates. Then the religious inspector, who chaired the commission, submitted the inquest’s findings to the Directory, which—as before—made the actual appointment. Initially, the amended procedure worked without problems in Strasbourg. The Directory endorsed the New Church’s wish in 1874 that Gustav Haerter succeed his father in office. One year later, opinions at St. Nicholas (German) were evenly split over who should replace the arch-liberal Johann Bruch. Half of the parish preferred the liberal Kaltenbach, while the other half liked the conservative Knittel. The consistory voted 9 – 4 to favor Knittel, but Inspector Heintz conceded that “the good relations in the parish would not be troubled by naming either candidate.” In the end, Kaltenbach made the Directory’s decision easy. Shortly after the inquest, he withdrew his candidacy, assuring Knittel’s nomination.126 Albert Schweitzer later confirmed the aptness of Heintz’s observation: “Mr. Knittel represented orthodoxy softened by pietism; Mr. Gerold was a liberal. But they fulfilled the duties of their office together in a truly brotherly temper. Everything was carried out in a spirit of harmony. It was thus a really ideal work that went on in this unpretending church. . . .”127 Then there was a vacancy at St. William in 1877. The parish council, parish notables, and consistory contended at the February inquest that “the parish had no need for an orthodox or conservative pastor,” and they supported the nomination of Philipp Lambs. Parishioners who favored Julius Redslob, however, sent a petition to the Directory and challenged the leadership’s ability to speak for the entire community. The petitioners asserted that the elders rigged the January 1877 elections to ensure that only liberals sat on the parish council and denied poorer parishioners and women the opportunity to speak at the inquest. These arguments proved effective. When the Directory defended its controversial decision to appoint Redslob to the Superior Consistory, it specifically referenced the difficulties regarding the parish council’s In the event that one of these men could not serve, the Directory would name the substitute. 126 Personnel files Gustav Haerter and Knittel, ADBR 172 AL 37 and 61. 127 Schweitzer, Out of My Life, 27. 125

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function as a truly representative body, especially in light of Strasbourg’s system of personal congregations.128 The Redslob case revealed some notable shortcomings in the new appointment process that groups within the church did not hesitate to exploit for partisan purposes. Indeed, to the dismay of church officials, after 1872 intrigue and controversy routinely accompanied the search for a new pastor. Orthodox Lutheran activists, for instance, used Redslob as a precedent to acquire greater influence in Strasbourg. When positions opened up at St. Thomas in 1878 (Baum) and Old St. Peter in 1892 (Bögner), orthodox forces gathered signatures to substantiate the existence of a community that needed its own pastor. They also lobbied consistorial elders for support and encouraged electors to appear before the inquest commissions. In 1878, seventy-two electors and six elders gave their support to the orthodox candidate Fischer at St. Thomas. In 1892, the agitation on behalf of the orthodox Krafft was so intense that Old St. Peter’s liberal pastors (Will and Blind) actively assisted Paul Grünberg’s campaign, although he was both a pietist and an old German. High in drama, the orthodox campaigns had low results. Liberals (first Ludwig Will, then Philipp Lambs) won appointment to St. Thomas as did Grünberg at Old St. Peter.129 Orthodox forces also failed to obtain a second post at Young St. Peter after the Directory named August Ernst Hertzog instead of Hamm to the vacancy created by Emil Nied’s death. Ironically, the orthodox party’s lack of success was directly related to their tactics. The inquest commissions and the Directory felt that neither notables’ testimonials, nor petitions produced convincing accounts of parish sentiments. When reviewing the petitions, the commissions paid particular attention to the signatories from the “orphaned” congregation, thinking that their wishes warranted special attention. But frequently the congregation’s own opinion was divided. In 1892, the commission discovered that equal numbers in Bögner’s congregation supported Krafft and Grünberg. Moreover, thirty-three of Bögner’s parishioners had signed both appeals. This latter finding is especially noteworthy, for it illuminates another common criticism: most people

Personnel file Redslob, ADBR 172 AL 86; AS 33 (1877–78): 24 –26, 198 –233. On account of some (later) unsubstantiated rumors about his personal life, Ludwig Will took the unusual step of declining his nomination to St. Thomas. The post was declared vacant again and this time Lambs was appointed. Personnel files Grünberg, Lambs, Ludwig Will, ADBR 172 AL 35, 66, and 118. 128 129

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signing the petitions had little or no personal knowledge of the candidates. But when a candidate was well known in the community, petitions on his behalf could carry considerable weight. For instance, at Young St. Peter in 1890, the petition, which was signed by a large number of Nied’s parishioners in favor of Nied’s one-time vicar, persuaded the Directory to name Hertzog over Hamm, who was actively supported by both the parish council and the consistory.130 Although criticisms of the appointment process—its promotion of unrest within the parishes, its lack of respect for clerical seniority, its detainment of a new pastor’s installation—had been mounting since the mid-1870s, the German administration long refused to let the Superior Consistory amend it. First Möller and then the Ministry and Statthalter contended that change should come only after the Church had lived with the policy long enough to be able to make meaningful, long-term reforms and not just quick fixes. But in 1891 the government finally relented. Two years later, the Directory presented a revised procedure to the Superior Consistory that the Ministry sanctioned (after further modification) on 7 July 1894.131 The new regulations had two primary goals: to limit the amount of agitation related to appointments and to provide for better representation of the parish will. Henceforth, applicants could not preach in the parish with the vacancy (or in a nearby church) before the official designation list had been set. Furthermore, the inquest commission would no longer consider petitions or invite notables to express their views. The consistory was also excluded from the process, unless the consistory simultaneously functioned as the parish council.132 Instead, whenever a vacancy occurred, the parish would elect a group of men—equal in number to the number of parish elders—to vote with the elders on the choice of the new pastor. In addition to restoring dignity to the selection process, the modifications of 1894 dramatically increased lay participation in and influence over pastoral appointments. Indeed, at the consistory-parishes of St. Thomas and New Church twenty-eight men had the right to vote on the parish’s recommendation against only three pastors. More importantly, because at least half of those voting had a clear mandate to Personnel file August Ernst Hertzog, ADBR 172 AL 44. Printed in AS (1894): 389 – 91. 132 In fact, many parishes had already curtailed this practice by deciding not to make the necessary announcements to the congregation in the weeks before the inquest. Cf. ST PBK, vol. 1, 2 Mar 1887. 130 131

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help choose the pastor, the Directory’s need to second-guess the parish’s recommendation all but vanished. That is, for all intents and purposes, the lay-dominated parish assemblies now nominated Lutheran pastors. In fact, after 1894 only two of the fourteen inner-city appointments were even slightly controversial, because the regulations still did not promise the orphaned congregation a majority on the expanded parish board. When Gustav Haerter died in 1903, only eight members of his congregation were members of the New Church’s special assembly. Six of them voted for Haerter’s son-in-law, Friedrich Dietz of Barr, but the majority endorsed Paul Grünberg, whom the Directory duly appointed.133 A greater furor arose at Young St. Peter in 1908, when several of the electors from outgoing pastor Wilhelm Horning’s orthodox Lutheran congregation failed to win seats to the expanded council.134 The council then voted eleven to two to recommend Paul Wagner (who was also of an orthodox Lutheran persuasion) over Wilhelm’s brother Paul, with the hope that ending the Horning dynasty would diminish the division that long prevailed in the parish. The two representatives from Horning’s congregation on the parish council resigned in protest, but to no avail. The Directory appointed the parish’s official choice: Wagner.135 Over the course of the Reichsland period, the forces of modernity perceptibly reshaped many of the basic structures of Protestant parish life in Strasbourg. Local faith communities gained an ever greater voice in the choice of their spiritual leaders, so that by the turn of the century both Lutheran and Calvinist parishes in Strasbourg were effectively selecting their own ministers. As we have seen, the expression of the community will did not always proceed without incident. Although contemporaries took a dim view of the turbulence surrounding some appointments, we should not lose sight of the advantages it entailed. Nomination contests were not merely expressions of intraconfessional rivalries, nor rarely were they simple battles between personalities. Rather, the excitement reflected the fact that the choice of a pastor

133 Personnel file Paul Grünberg, ADBR 172 AL 35. It is likely that political factors were also at work here. Dietz was Alsatian, but theologically liberal. Like Haerter, Grünberg was a pietist, but again, an old German. 134 For this election, turnout was much higher than usual for the parish, namely 26 percent. 135 Personnel file Paul Wagner, ADBR 172 AL 115.

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remained of great consequence for the congregation’s and parish’s future. It determined how individual Protestants related to the parish and, no less important, how they experienced religious community there. The positive consequences of modernity are also evident in the changed circumstances of the Protestant minister. After 1870, the Reichsland’s Protestant clergy received an even more rigorous intellectual preparation for the ministry, which enabled them to meet the many challenges of modern society head on. At the same time, church and university officials promoted a more involved practical training for theologians, lengthened the apprenticeship prior to appointment as an independent pastor, and required candidates to demonstrate their ability to apply their book learning to the practical concerns of parish life. The professionalization of the Reichsland’s Protestant clergy did not just mean that the parishes obtained better-trained ministers. Changes to the churches’ internal procedures vis-à-vis candidates and vicars made it easier for sick, older or overburdened pastors to receive assistance with their duties. Moreover, professionalization helped to bring about better salary conditions and pensions for the clergy, which put an end to pastors remaining in office when they could no longer personally carry out their responsibilities. Finally, if urbanization provoked adjustments to the network of parishes and the deployment of clerical resources in Strasbourg, the churches succeeded, to an impressive degree, in adapting to their new environment. Viewed from the larger German context, this dimension of the modernization of parish conditions in Strasbourg was rather exceptional. Nevertheless, the exception helps to shed light on trends that scholars, eager to equate urbanization with secularization, have long overlooked. Church authorities may have been slow to create new parishes or dispatch additional personnel to existing congregations. Nevertheless, after 1870 a substantial reinforcement of the parish milieu, occurred in every German big city, so that even in metropolitan Berlin, parishes could still function meaningfully as purveyors of religious culture.

CHAPTER FOUR

CONTESTED VISIONS: CHURCH AND STATE IN THE REICHSLAND Although the parish milieu exerted enormous influence on the form and substance of Protestant culture, the broader parameters of parochial action in Strasbourg—just as in other state churches throughout Europe—were set by the superior church authorities and the state. As we have seen, the highest instances of church government determined who ministered at the parishes. They approved the hymnals for services and the catechisms in religious education classes. The state, for its part, had the power to create new parishes and change the number of curates serving at a given church. In conjunction with the Superior Consistory and Reformed Consistories, the government also released ordinances and regulations that determined how the churches conducted their internal affairs, ranging from the preparation of pastors for public ministry to the rules for parish and consistorial elections. In the course of helping structure life within the parish, the actions of ecclesiastical authorities and state officials contributed to the development of another key dimension of religious culture in Strasbourg: the public image of the faith community. Protestant institutions and leaders defined what it meant to be Lutheran or Reformed, whether by setting policy for the church as a whole or by negotiating with the state for the approval and/or financing of such policies. The success or failure of these efforts was an indication of the Church’s standing in French public life. The Church gained public attention, too, by advocating the case for religion in public life, such as the inclusion of religious education in public schools. As representatives of a confessional minority in a predominantly Catholic region, Lutheran and Reformed leaders in Alsace also had the vital task of defending their confessional interests. They lobbied the state to attend to the Protestant community’s particular needs, while also remonstrating against governmental decisions that privileged Catholics over Protestants in violation of the spirit of the concordatary legislation. Developments after 1870 elevated the importance of the institutional aspect of religious culture. On the one hand, Strasbourg’s emergence as

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Alsace-Lorraine’s political and administrative capital gave this form of religious culture a specifically urban cast. Strasbourg was no longer just an ecclesiastical center; by 1879 it was the place from which the state set religious policies for the territory. This convergence also meant that religious and ecclesiastical affairs figured more prominently in urban discourse, particularly in the pages of the city’s secular and confessional press. Moreover, the Reichsland’s Lutheran and Reformed churches discovered that the annexation created a new challenge to their traditional modus vivendi: the German state. This is not to suggest, as older interpretations of the culture wars (Kulturkämpfe) have implied, that the imperial German state had a secularist agenda. Recent research has demonstrated that in Germany it was the (Catholic) church’s political power, and not the general place of religion in German public life, which was at issue in such conflicts. Moreover, far from diminishing the cultural relevance of religion, the battles between church and state during the final third of the long nineteenth century modernized and rejuvenated confession as a force in German social and political life.1 Rather, many of the Reichsland’s Lutheran and Reformed Churches’ difficulties stemmed from the differences in Protestant tradition on the two sides of the Rhine. To the east, a conservative Protestant theology held sway in church organizations that were effectively divisions of the civil government (Staatskirchentum).2 To the west, in post-Napoleonic France, liberal theological positions remained prominent in the churches that, while independent, were closely regulated by the state (the “Bonapartist” model). After 1870, German officials took advantage 1 The literature on the Kulturkampf and on church-state conflicts in late nineteenthcentury Europe is extensive. Ronald J. Ross, The Failure of Bismarck’s Kulturkampf: Catholicism and State Power in Imperial Germany, 1870 –1887 (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 1998), provides a solid overview of older studies but it also characterizes the Kulturkampf as primarily political in nature. More recently, Gross, War Against Catholicism, has demonstrated how the anti-Catholic animus in the 1860s and 1870s reflected at least as much liberal fears about the course of German social, political, and economic development, as it did the content of Catholic belief itself. Exemplary for their attention to the consequences of these battles over local religious life and social relations are the essays in Clark and Kaiser, Culture Wars. The seminal work on the ongoing, even renewed salience of religion and confession in the Kaiserreich is Smith, German Nationalism, but see also the provocative discussions about “modern” confessionalism in Blaschke, Konfessionen im Konflikt. On the consequences of the Kulturkampf for the Protestant church, at least in Prussia, see Klaus Erich Pollmann, “Das landesherrliche Kirchenregiment unter Wilhelm II.,” in Religionspolitik in Deutschland: Von der Frühen Neuzeit bis zur Gegenwart, ed. Anselm Doering-Manteuffel and Kurt Nowak (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1999), 165–76. 2 Nowak, Geschichte des Christentums, 77– 80 and 137– 40.

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of the extensive supervisory powers in the existing French legislation, which French (Catholic) bureaucrats had used only sparingly, to promote their own visions of how the local Protestant churches should adapt to the new political and cultural climate. During the early decades of German rule, government officials actively proposed reforms regarding how the churches conducted their affairs, instead of waiting for the church governments to act on their own. Even when the church councils initiated changes, Ministry officials frequently made amendments that reflected their hyper-legalistic approach to church affairs and a desire to promote a Germanization of the churches, for instance, by introducing old-German ecclesiastical practices and promoting a union of the Lutheran and Reformed communities. To advance their agenda for the Protestant churches, German authorities in Strasbourg had one more tool at their disposal: the power of appointment. Most frequently, the government used it to keep individuals with anti-German sentiments out of important church offices. But political figures, like the Statthalter, could also—and did—exercise this prerogative to promote particular religious tendencies within the church. The story of Protestant church politics in the Reichsland does not speak just to the internal workings and external image of its Lutheran and Reformed communities, but also to the complex interactions between religion and political culture in Imperial Germany. It calls attention to Germany’s self-understanding as a Christian state and its ongoing, positive involvement in religious matters; points often overlooked in recent discussions of the culture wars.3 Above all, it reminds us that, for all the rhetoric about a “Holy Protestant Empire of the German Nation”—as Heintrich Treitschke famously called the Kaiserreich—Germany remained a land of multiple Protestantisms.4 Politicians and churchmen may have played down the differences within the Protestant fold when they wanted to disparage Catholics and Catholicism,5 but they remained significant enough to make the task of Germanizing Alsace-Lorraine’s Protestant churches contentious, like the larger project of incorporating the Reichsland into the Reich. Ultimately, the organization of both the Lutheran and Reformed

3 Cf. Steinhoff, “Christianity and the Creation of Germany,” in Cambridge History of Christianity, vol. 8, ed. Sheridan Gilley and Bryan Wilson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 282–300. 4 Cited in Nowack, Geschichte des Christentums, 158. 5 Cf. Martin Friedrich “Das 19. Jahrhundert.”

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churches underwent significant changes between 1870 and 1914 and their formal ties to the broader German Protestant community were palpably strengthened. Still, this national integration did not rest on a unitary idea of Germanness imposed from above, instead it grew out of the recognition of the churches as legitimate Landeskirchen, which were expressions of regional culture and the federal component in German nationalism. New Directions in Protestant Church-State Relations Following the demise of Friedrich Fabri’s reform plans in 1871, there were plenty of reasons for the Reichsland’s Protestant leaders to expect a return to ante bellum Protestant church-state relations. Not only did Bismarck refuse to reorganize the Lutheran and, to a lesser degree, Reformed Churches, but, as noted in Chapter One, he retained the entire system of French church law in German Alsace-Lorraine. In the short term, this meant that neither Protestant nor Catholic hopes for greater freedom would be met. This situation rankled Catholics, who in 1870 –71 regarded the Prussian approach to church-state relations as one of the few positive benefits that could arise from the annexation.6 Protestants, however, were relieved that the institutional arrangements and religious practices that had taken root in the region since the French Revolution were no longer in jeopardy. The threat of a conservative takeover in the Lutheran church passed, while the legal equality among the territory’s four recognized religious communities was confirmed.7 Moreover, the German government’s initial efforts to appease the Protestant community, such as allowing the Superior Consistory to nominate the new Lutheran president, suggested that the switch to German rule might actually heighten the churches’ traditional sense of autonomy. Although the laws governing the Protestant churches underwent few modifications after 1871, Protestant church-state relations in the Reichsland evolved in many new ways. The explanation for this seemSilverman, Reluctant Union, 95. Indeed, at least on paper, the Reichsland’s Catholics, Protestants and Jews enjoyed a measure of equality that was lacking elsewhere in the Empire, since Bismarck and German liberals pointedly refused to adopt the language of confessional parity in the constitutions for the North German Confederation and the Second German Empire. Schnabel, Deutsche Geschichte, 4:26 –27; Lill, “Die deutschen Katholiken,” 352–53. 6 7

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ingly contradictory combination of continuity and innovation lay in the laws and the administrative practices that developed out of them. On the one hand, the laws provided the state—in particular the head of state and his ministers for religious affairs—considerable authority over the churches, authority that the French ministers had exploited only in part. On the other hand, the 1852 Decree-Law was peculiar for determining many details regarding Protestant governance and organization by ministerial decree. By 1870, these statutory prerogatives developed so that the Ministry for Religious Affairs could alter many church structures and procedures without resorting to the legislative process. In short, the ecclesiastical regime that the French bequeathed the Germans in 1871 was driven at least as much by the men exercising the state’s authority over the Protestant churches as it was by the laws themselves. The establishment of German rule in Alsace-Lorraine meant that an entirely new group of men determined the state’s prerogatives over the territory’s churches for whom French legal and bureaucratic practices were completely foreign. Although most of these old Germans were trained lawyers and jurists with deep respect for the letter of the law, nothing prevented them from interpreting and applying the statutes in accordance with their own political and ecclesiastical principles. In fact, during the entire Reichsland period, only two native Alsatians held government positions with significant responsibility for ecclesiastical policy: the Lutheran Emil Petri, who was Undersecretary for the Division of Justice and Religious Affairs between 1898 and 1914; and the Catholic Hugo Zorn von Bulach, who led the entire Ministry as Secretary of State from 1908 to 1914. By the time these men were appointed, however, a German approach to reading French church law in the Reichsland was already thirty odd years in the making. Almost as soon as the Reichsland was established, another reform was advanced that progressively streamlined the state’s authority in ecclesiastical affairs and concentrated it in the officials who were resident in Strasbourg. During the French period, the state’s power was concentrated in Paris, in the hands of the head of state and the Ministry for Religious Affairs (normally attached to the Ministry of Education).8 The prefects also had a part in implementing policy and providing information to the

8 However, on the eve of the Franco-Prussian war, the Ministry for Religious Affairs was attached to the French Ministry of Justice.

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government in Paris as the local agents of the Ministry of the Interior. After 1871, responsibility for religious affairs was split between Berlin and Strasbourg. The powers vested in the French head of state were transferred to the German emperor, who received assistance from the imperial chancellor’s office (Reichskanzleramt).9 By virtue of the imperial decree of 29 January 1872, the Superior Presidency for Alsace-Lorraine assumed most of the former French ministries’ functions, including those of the former Minister for Justice and Religious Affairs.10 Consequently, it was primarily Möller, assisted by Superior Governmental Counselor (Oberregierungsrat) Heinrich Richter and later, Governmental Counselor (Regierungsrat) Eugen Dursy, who determined the nature of Protestant church-state relations in the opening years of the Reichsland era. The creation of the Superior Presidency also a limited the prefects’ authority, which was indicated by their new title: district president. The District President of Lower Alsace (or his representative) attended the sessions of the Lutheran Superior Consistory, as provided by law. Otherwise, the district presidents’ competence in ecclesiastical matters was largely restricted to gathering information on clerical appointments, supervising local religious communities, and advising the administration about the local impact of changes in ecclesiastical policy. The imperial law concerning the constitution and administration of Alsace-Lorraine that was promulgated on 4 July 1879 greatly advanced this administrative consolidation in Strasbourg. It provided for a resident Statthalter, a sort of viceroy, to rule the Reichsland on the emperor’s behalf. Among the many prerogatives delegated to the Statthalter, from Edwin von Manteuffel to Hans von Dallwitz, were most of the emperor’s powers in ecclesiastical matters. Although the emperor still named the Catholic bishops and the Lutheran presidents, the Statthalter now confirmed the appointments of pastors and priests, the elections of consistory presidents, and the nominations of Lutheran religious inspectors. As head of the administration in Alsace-Lorraine, the Secretary of State led the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine. The Ministry itself was composed of four divisions, each led by an Undersecretary. Initially, religious affairs were handled within the Division of the Interior with the understanding that it should administer education and religion These functions were eventually delegated to a special Alsace-Lorraine bureau, directed by Karl Herzog. 10 Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht, 2:133 –34. 9

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together.11 Manteuffel’s displeasure with Undersecretary Albert von Pommer-Esche, however, led him to strip the education portfolio (1881) and then the religious affairs (1882) portfolio from the Interior Division. Heinrich Richter led a new technical bureau, the Superior School Authority (Oberschulrat), which assumed education, while the Division for Justice, led by Max von Puttkamev, took over religious affairs.12 Each undersecretary had primary responsibility for the affairs in his division, unless the Statthalter or the State Secretary took interest in a specific issue. Consequently, most of the decisions regarding religious policy during the Reichsland era were made by made by the two longserving undersecretaries for Justice and Religious Affairs: Max von Puttkamer (1882–1894) and Emil Petri (1898–1914).13 However, the civil servants (Räte) in the division handled the routine work. They reviewed the actions of the church governments, made recommendations on appointments, and researched questions of church law. They drafted all the ordinances, regulations, and laws that affected the churches and formally presented them to the undersecretary for action. The advisors also helped brief the undersecretary on topics he discussed with the State Secretary and/or Statthalter. Only a small number of the counselors, however, actually concerned themselves with religious affairs. Two bureaucrats handled this portfolio: one had responsibility for Protestant affairs, the other non-Protestant (that is, Catholic and Jewish) issues.14 But other bureaucrats (Referenten) in the division could be assigned to one or the other area in a secondary capacity, as necessary. The most striking element of the Germans’ approach to Protestant religious policy in the Reichsland was their willingness to exploit fully

11 Bismarck to Wilhelm I, 10 Jul 1879, GStA Rep 89, 2.2.1, 3616, 32–33; Morsey, Reichsverwaltung, 182 – 86. 12 Arnold Sachse, “Die Schulpolitik des Statthalters Frieherrn von Manteuffel,” ZGO 39 (1926): 557–70, here 559 – 60; and Mantueffel to Wilhelm I, 1 Jun 1882, GStA Rep 89, Nr. 3616, 175–76. Sachse served in the Reichsland’s educational bureaucracy for most of the 1880s. 13 Puttkamer, the cousin of the Prussian Minister Robert von Puttkamer, was promoted to State Secretary in 1887. Nevertheless, he continued to lead Justice and Religious Affairs until 1894, when he was replaced as Undersecretary first by Heinrich Hoseus (1894 – 95) and then by Eduard Rassiga (1895 – 98). ADHR, AL 87318; GStA, Rep. 89, 2.2.1, 3617, 176, 200, and 210; GStA, Rep. 89, 2.2.1, 3618, 40 – 42. 14 This division of labor reversed the confessional orientation that prevailed in Paris between Catholic and non-Catholic faiths. “Geschäftsverteilung in der Abteilung JustizKultus,” 22 Jul 1882, ADBR 87 AL 1590.

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their legal prerogatives. In other words, the German administration was no longer content to let the organs of Lutheran and Reformed church government run themselves. This shift in posture is best explained by three factors. First, and perhaps foremost, authorities in both Berlin and Strasbourg felt that a more activist policy was necessary to prevent the churches from emerging as symbols of opposition to German rule. Second, without the lone exception of Manteuffel’s successor as Statthalter, Chlodwig von Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst (1885–94), all of the men with responsibilities vis-à-vis the Protestant churches were themselves Protestant.15 Several were even actively involved in Protestant associations and causes, notably Statthalter Manteuffel and Hohenlohe-Langenburg (1894–1907) and Ministerial counselors Alexander von der Goltz and Heinrich Hildebrand. Third, by virtue of their presence in Strasbourg, these civil servants acquired a familiarity with the Protestant churches’ inner workings that their predecessors in Paris never had. Whereas the Parisians normally appointed an Alsatian jurist or law professor to the post of governmental commissioner in the Directory and Superior Consistory, Möller and Manteuffel appointed old-German members from the Religious Affairs Division: Heinrich Richter (1872–80) and Alexander von der Goltz (1880 –1913). Only on von der Goltz’s retirement did the government depart from this tradition by naming the (Alsatian) Director of Direct Taxation, Adolf Goetz. Moreover, Heinrich Hildebrand, who took charge of the Protestant Referent from 1895 to 1907, served as a member of the New Church consistory from 1898 until his death in 1916. So, how did this new spirit in Protestant church-state relations manifest itself ? The first element was not particular to the Protestant churches, but was part and parcel of the new administration’s approach to ecclesiastical affairs. Namely, following the tradition of confessional parity developed in German lands since 1815, it regarded church policy primarily as a matter of law. Admittedly, the French Bonapartist tradition also tended to define the relations between church and state in legal terms, as Statthalter Manteuffel noted in his 1882 recommen-

15 This situation was deplored by the Reichsland’s Catholics who felt that a Catholic should head the Division in a Catholic region. The Catholic Volksfreund protested in 1898, “And Herr Petri [a Lutheran] shall now be in charge of Catholic affairs!” VF (23 Jan 1898). Their wishes were finally granted in 1914 when Joseph Frenken, a Catholic and Center Party member from Cologne, succeeded Emil Petri. Rossé, Das Elsass, 1:173.

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dation that Berlin transfer the religious affairs portfolio to the Justice Division. “Since the relationship of the state to the different confessions [in Alsace-Lorraine] was grounded principally in legal norms, this combination was in keeping with the nature of the issue.”16 Nevertheless, from the beginning, the German bureaucracy in Strasbourg had an unmistakable penchant to treat questions of ecclesiastical policy from a legal perspective. For instance, in 1872, when the Reichsland’s Reformed Consistories campaigned to convoke a territorial synod, Möller blocked the initiative on the narrowly legalistic grounds that the law did not permit the type of organization that the consistories wanted.17 Similarly, when the Superior Consistory attempted to draw up bylaws for its sessions in 1885, the Ministry determined that the body was not empowered to do so on its own authority, “since they could affect matters such as the language of debate and the powers of the District President [or his representative],” issues that were outside the Superior Consistory’s competence.18 Of course, the Ministry’s recourse to legalist and formalist arguments for ecclesiastical policy could also be highly opportunistic. Whether out of necessity or expediency, the Ministry was perfectly capable of exploiting the gray areas in the law. One notable example occurred in the 1880s when the question arose as to whether the Protestant Theological Faculty should be officially represented in the Superior Consistory. Until 1872, the Faculty was represented by virtue of its ties to the Protestant Seminary (university professors also held chairs in the Seminary). But when the Seminary was closed as an educational institution and its administrative functions transferred to the St. Thomas Foundation, which was created in 1873, the question of who would exercise the Seminary’s right of representation remained. In 1875 the Superior Consistory decided this matter in favor of the Foundation and not the Faculty.19 The Foundation routinely selected a theology professor as its delegate between 1875 and 1886; nevertheless, the Faculty yearned for its own representation—a position the government fully endorsed. In 16 Manteuffel to Wilhelm I, 1 June 1882, GStA Rep 89, Nr. 3616, 175–76. In this same letter, Manteuffel asserts that it was French tradition to link justice and religious affairs. But in fact, after 1815 it was most common for the Minister of Education to handle the religious affairs portfolio, not the Minister of Justice. 17 Möller to Pastor Burckhardt (Guebweiler), 12 Feb 1874, ADBR 2G 482 F 41. 18 AS 41 (1886): 49 –50. 19 Between 1872 and 1875 no delegate was sent. President Kratz summarized the 1875 discussion at the 1884 Superior Consistory session, AS 39 (1884 – 85): 37– 41.

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1885, the Superior Consistory conceded that there were advantages to having an official Faculty representative, but it also concluded that legislative action would be necessary since current law provided for only one representative from the Seminary. The Ministry, however, took advantage of the ambiguous legal situation and simply issued an ordinance on 12 May 1886 to grant the Faculty its own Superior Consistory delegate.20 Political considerations also prompted the German government to intervene in Protestant church affairs more actively than was customary. On one level, the logic behind the Germans’ actions was precisely what is enshrined in the Organic Articles and the Decree-Law: the recognized faith communities—Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish—have an obligation to promote public order. Consequently, the state endeavored first to neutralize the churches, blunt their ability to promote opposition to German rule in the Reichsland, and then to encourage integrating into the broader German community. The first part of this political program was pursued in a variety of ways. On the one hand, the government strove to prevent the churches from developing settings where people could pretend that the annexation did not occur. The churches had to adopt the government’s language policies. Ministers had to pray for the health of the German Empire and emperor in their liturgies.21 Men who decided not to become German citizens were denied the right to vote and be elected to church offices. On the other hand, the state thoroughly politicized the process of nominating and confirming individuals to ecclesiastical positions. When possible, the government strove to promote individuals who were sympathetic to the new regime. It also prevented those with avowed anti-German sympathies from obtaining influential or prestigious positions. For every major church appointment—from pastor and consistory president to religious inspector and church president—the state ran a background check on the nominee that included an assessment of

20 For the debates in the 1885 session, see AS 40 (1885 – 86), 44 – 47 and 85– 93. The text of the Ministry’s ordinance was published in AS 41 (1886 – 87): 8 – 9. 21 This was a stipulation of the Concordat and Organic Articles, but the political tensions and questions about the legality of the Concordat after 1871 delayed fully inaugurating the practice for several years. The Protestant churches regularized the practice by 1874 (cf. Directorial decree of 13 Oct 1874, AS 29 [1874]: 253), but the Bishops of Strasbourg and Metz didn’t reintroduce the prayers until 1881. Sachse, “Die Kirchenpolitik des Statthalters Freiherrn von Manteuffel,” ELJ 5 (1926): 146 –71, here 168 –71.

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his political sentiments. In 1871, for instance, the District President in Strasbourg requested a private report from Police Commissioner Mayer that was to take into account not only the pastors “religious orientation” but also his “political and social position.”22 The results of those inquiries were also a requisite feature of every report prepared for the Statthalter’s or Emperor’s review. For instance, when the Directory recommended Theodor Hoepffner as the next religious inspector for New Church, the Police President of Strasbourg informed District President Halm: “There is no reason to object to Pastor Hoepffner’s appointment. He enjoys the great confidence of the community and is friendly to the German cause (deutschfreundlich). In religious matters, he belongs to the moderate liberal party.”23 From these reports, it is also clear that “liberal” political views or even being known as a Francophile did not necessarily place a candidacy in jeopardy. In 1872, the District President of Colmar reported that Johann Theodor Beck, who was nominated to St. Nicholas (French), was “both religiously and politically liberal.” Nevertheless, the official continued, “there was nothing negative to note about Beck’s attitude to the German regime.” It was different when the nominee was esteemed as both Francophile and politically active. Such was the case in 1884, when the St. William inspection needed a new religious inspector. The inspectoral assembly met on 20 March to select its three nominees. Eugen Engelmann of St. William was the overwhelming first choice, receiving fifty-six of sixty votes. Pastors Weltz and Bresch, the other two top vote-getters, obtained only thirty-five votes each.24 One month later, the Directory met and recommended Engelmann for the post. Not only was he the inspection’s clear choice, but he possessed the “scholarly, oratorical, and administrative skills that made for a good inspector.”25 That August, however, Statthalter Manteuffel shocked Lutheran circles by exercising his prerogative to name one of the other men on the recommendation list: Philipp Weltz of Baldenheim. The consistory of St. William formally protested the decision and articles on the uproar appeared in both the liberal Elsässer Journal and the government-friendly Straßburger 22 See the files concerning the appointments of Protestant ministers in ADBR 11 D 5; 43 D 46 and 47; 109 D 386 and 392; and 117 D 26a and 28. 23 Police President to District President of Lower Alsace, 27 Dec 1898, ADBR 240 D 176. 24 Since the inspectoral assemblies had to nominate three pastors for the vacancy, each delegate could vote for up to three individuals. 25 Kratz to the Ministry, 22 April 1884, ADBR 55 AL 2, II B 641.

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Post.26 Why did the government pass over Engelmann? Politics. In his report to the Ministry on the nomination, District President Back noted that while none of the three nominees were especially active politically, “Engelmann was known to be associated with the anti-German part of Strasbourg’s Protestant population.” Moreover, his election owed much to the active agitation of the “well-known chauvinist” (that is, French nationalist) Georges Frick. In short, because he believed that Engelmann’s appointment would neither advance the harmony between Alsatians and old Germans, nor promote local cooperation with the German regime, Back opposed the Directory’s recommendation. Of the remaining two men, Back opined, only Weltz had the proper standing in pastoral circles to merit appointment.27 One of the most blatant ways that the Reichsland administration sought to Germanize the faith communities’ image involved naming old Germans to lead the territory’s Catholic and Lutheran churches.28 With respect to the Catholic church, the government embarked on this policy soon after Manteuffel’s 1879 arrival in Strasbourg. Already in 1881, the Statthalter succeeded in naming the conciliatory (pro-German) Alsatian cleric, Pierre-Paul Stumpf, as coadjutor for Strasbourg’s aging Bishop Raess. Stumpf became titular bishop in 1887, but on his death in 1890, the government replaced him with the old German, Adolf Fritzen (1891–1918).29 The German government’s first opportunity to name a Lutheran president occurred in 1871, but, as we noted earlier, in order to placate local opinion it opted to let the Superior Consistory present its own candidate, the liberal Strasbourgeois, Kratz, who was appointed in 1872. When Kratz died in 1885, Manteuffel chose another Alsatian, Christian Friedrich Petri The internal government records make clear that Manteuffel selected Petri primarily because he fulfilled the Statthalter’s ideal of a good church president: he was pious (that is, conservative), knew the local church situation well, and had a solid legal background (Petri was a notary by profession). Furthermore,

ADBR 55 AL 2. District President Back to the Ministry, 6 May 1884, ADBR 55 AL 2. 28 Because of their different structures, similar opportunities did not exist with respect to the Jewish or Reformed communities. 29 In 1901, an old German, Willibrord Benzler, was consecrated as the bishop of Metz. Silverman, Reluctant Union, 97–102. For a broader discussion concerning the negotiation of national interests in episcopal appointments during the Wilhelmine era, see Erwin Gatz, “Kirchliche Personalpolitik und Nationalitätenprobleme im wilhelminischen Deutschland,” Archivum historiae pontificiae 18 (1980): 353 – 81. 26 27

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Petri’s receipt of the order of the Red Eagle in 1883 testified to his political reliability.30 The reference to Petri’s knowledge of local church conditions also reveals why the German authorities were reticent to name an old German to the Lutheran post. At the time of Kratz’s death, there were few old Germans with sufficient experience in the territorial church government. Only one old German, Alexander von der Goltz, sat in the Superior Consistory and Directory, and only a handful of old Germans held seats in the parish councils and consistories. By the turn of the century, this situation had changed. Not only were there many more old Germans in local church councils, but several old Germans sat in the Superior Consistory. Hence, when Petri raised the prospect of retirement in 1900, the assumption was that an old German would succeed him. Indeed, everyone expected the choice to fall on Otto Mayer, the professor of Public Law at Strasbourg and delegate for the Lützelstein inspection to the Superior Consistory since 1895. Mayer also married into the Alsatian Protestant milieu, having wed the daughter of Ludwig Adolf Stöber, a noted Reformed pastor in Mulhouse. Mayer, however, did not become president. By the time Petri submitted his resignation in November 1902, Mayer had already left Strasbourg for a more lucrative professorship in Leipzig.31 A group of Alsatian pastors in Colmar and Strasbourg put forth the name of Kreisdirektor (County Director) Friedrich Curtius for the vacancy, which indicated that Lutherans still expected their next president to be an old German.32 Curtius, the son of the noted Berlin archaeologist Ernst Curtius, spent his entire career as a civil servant in the Reichsland. Although he had not participated in the Reichsland’s Lutheran church government until then, Curtius was active in German cultural Protestant circles, which was evidenced most visibly through his occasional contributions to the main kulturprotestantisch newspaper, ADBR 133 AL 91. “Otto Mayer,” NBD 16:550; Erk Vokmar Heyen, “Otto Mayers Kirchenrecht und die Verfasssungsreform der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche in Elsaß-Lothringen und Polen,” Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte, Kanonistische Abteilung 65 (1979): 241– 46. Petri requested that his resignation take effect on 1 April 1903. Petri to Statthalter Hohenlohe-Langenburg, 26 Nov 1902, ADBR 133 AL 91. 32 Rudolf von Thadden, “Friedrich Curtius, Elsaß-Lothringen und das Kaiserreich,” in Das Vergangene und die Geschichte. Festschrift für Reinhard Wittram zum 70. Geburtstag, ed. idem, Gert v. Pistohlkors, and Hellmuth Weiss (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1973), 79 –104, here 87n49. Before arriving in Strasbourg as Kreisdirektor for Strasbourg-Land in 1901, Curtius had been Kreisdirektor in Colmar. 30 31

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Christliche Welt.33 The Ministry decided that the pastors’ suggestion was good and Curtius was nominated. Writing to Wilhelm II on 13 February 1903, Hohenlohe-Langenburg singled out Curtius as a skilled administrator with serious interest in religious matters and a deep knowledge of the land and its churches. The imperial decree appointing Curtius was signed on 6 March and the career civil servant assumed his new position on 1 April.34 Curtius’s appointment highlighted the symbolic link between the Reichsland’s leading Protestant community and the Protestant German Empire. Ironically, this same appointment called attention to the limits in the state’s ability to politicize Reichsland Protestantism via appointments. During his stint as Kreisdirektor (County director) in Colmar (1989 –1901), Curtius was asked to assist former Statthalter and Imperial Chancellor, Chlodwig zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, with the writing of his memoirs. Together with Schillingsfürst’s son, Alexander—who was then District President for Upper Alsace—Curtius took over the project after the elder statesman died in 1901 and published the two-volume work in 1906. Kaiser Wilhelm II was incensed by its appearance. He felt that certain passages betrayed state secrets and he demanded that the two editors be disciplined. Alexander was promptly sacked from his position in Colmar and Wilhelm demanded Curtius’s dismissal from the Lutheran presidency. As Hohenlohe-Langenburg cautiously explained to his superior, the law did not grant the state the power to remove the Lutheran President in Alsace-Lorraine for either political or religious reasons.35 Moreover, when it became known that the state wanted Curtius to step down, the Reichsland’s Lutherans urged him to stay on, arguing that his editorial activity was wholly unrelated to his work as head of the Lutheran church.36 Curtius remained in office, but he was persona non grata with the emperor. As a result, he was kept off the invitation list whenever 33 On cultural Protestantism (Kulturprotestantismus) in imperial Germany, see especially Friedrich W. Graf, “Kulturprotestantismus. Zur Begriffsgeschichte einer theologischen Chiffre,” Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte 27 (1984): 214 – 68; Hans Martin Müller, ed., Kulturprotestantismus. Beiträge zu einer Gestalt des modernen Christenthums (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus Gerd Mohn, 1992); and Hübingen, Kulturprotestantimus, 129 – 42. 34 Hohenlohe-Langenburg to Wilhelm II, GStA, Rep. 89, 2.2.1, Nr. 23216, 62– 63; ADBR 133 AL 91. 35 Thadden, “Friedrich Curtius,” 85 – 87; Hohenlohe-Langenburg to Wilhelm II, 11 June 1907, BAL RK 1988, 53ff. 36 Cf. “Eine Vertrauenskundgebung für Präsident Curtius,” KB 35/45 (10 Nov 1906): 268.

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the emperor was in Strasbourg, an action that many members of the Superior Consistory denounced in April 1907 as a denigration of the entire Lutheran church, albeit to no avail.37 Only in the fall of 1914 did Curtius resign to protest the state’s war-motivated decision to end permanently French-language services in the Reichsland’s “German language” zone.38 As Curtius’s successor, Statthalter Hans von Dallwitz chose the son of the former governmental commissioner to the church, Kreisdirektor Hans von der Goltz (the son of Alexander), thereby maintaining the old Germans’ hold on the position.39 The Reichsland administration’s direct interventions into the internal affairs of the Protestant churches deviated significantly from French precedents. Until 1870, the French state engaged in obstructive politics with respect to the Protestant churches. By convening the superior organs of church government and setting the agenda for their meetings, French authorities prevented the church assemblies from meeting (Reformed synods never convened before 1870, and the Lutheran General Consistory gathered only sporadically before 1852) or imposed stringent limits on what could be discussed, which made reforming the pastoral appointment process, for instance, even more difficult. But, because most of the bureaucrats within the Ministry for Religious Affairs were Catholic, the French state generally refrained from pushing specific religious policies on either the Reformed or the Lutheran Church.40 The predominantly Protestant German administration in Strasbourg felt no reason to maintain such reserve. The Superior President, Statthalter, and Ministry not only supervised, but often initiated the steps for shaping the Protestant churches’ affairs. The first signs of this activist attitude emerged during Möller’s tenure as Superior President. Möller’s assistant, Friedrich Althoff, who became infamous for his influence over German university life, led the negotiations for transferring the See “Die Entscheidung im Fall Curtius,” KB 36/18 (4 May 1907): 146 – 47. Curtius, Deutsche Briefe und Elsässische Erinnerungen (Frauenfeld: von Huber & Co., 1920), 245– 49. 39 In the summer of 1914, von der Goltz initially agreed to leave his position as Kreisdirektor for Strasbourg-Land to become the new head of the Oberschulrat. He was nominated to the Lutheran presidency on 24 Nov 1914 and officially appointed to it on 16 December. ADBR 87 AL 1912. 40 Encrevé, Protestants français, provides the most thorough account of Protestant church-state relations in France at mid-century. For the specifically Lutheran dimension of this picture, Robert Will’s essays remain valuable, especially, Will, “Monarchie de Juillet,” and “Second Empire I and II.” 37 38

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Protestant Seminary’s administrative functions to the St. Thomas Foundation, which was established in 1873.41 Similarly, after the Lutheran church established the requirements for ministerial candidates’ theological exam (1872) and drafted a new regulation for the venia concionandi (1874), the Superior Presidency pushed the Reformed consistories to adopt similar measures.42 These initial efforts also demonstrated the leading elements of the state’s policy towards the Protestant church: introducing practices (e.g., the state theology exams) already prevalent in the other German churches and preserving similarity in the churches’ internal policies and procedures in order to facilitate some future administrative union between them. Religious concerns figured especially prominently in the political visions of the Reichsland’s first Statthalter, General Edwin von Manteuffel. Although most studies of the Reichsland period focus on Manteuffel’s efforts to improve the relations between the Reichsland’s Catholics and the German regime,43 the pious Junker’s initiatives left a much greater mark on the Protestant, or at least, the Lutheran, community. As a committed, conservative Protestant, Manteuffel regarded the state’s oversight of the Protestant church as his personal responsibility that entailed protecting the conservative minority against the “godless” liberal majority. Hence, in 1881 he refused to confirm the nomination of a Lutheran pastor to rural Hatten and postponed the appointment of another to Münster because he was not satisfied that the (liberal) Directory’s choices met the (conservative) parishes’ religious and dogmatic needs.44 That same year, when the Superior Consistory failed 41 The Foundation’s responsibilities included such important tasks as supervising the Protestant Gymnasium, maintaining the Protestant “Stift,” providing scholarships to theology students, and paying the salaries for six of the full theology professors. Marie Althoff, Aus Friedrich Althoffs Straßburger Zeit. Erinnerungen für seine Freunde ( Jena: Diedrichs, 1914), 23 –25. Having the foundation, rather than the state, pay the faculty salaries later threatened the solvency of the entire foundation. The crisis was averted only by creating a state subsidy for the foundation in 1911. This subsidy was partially justified by the fact that the state paid the salary of all the professors when the Faculty of Catholic Theology opened in 1901. Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 5. On Althoff ’s work as head of university affairs in the Prussian Kultusministerium, see Bernhard von Brocke, “Hochschul- und Wissenschaftspolitik in Preußen und im Deutschen Kaiserreich 1882–1907: das ‘System Althoff ’,” in Bildungspolitik in Preußen zur Zeit des Kaiserreichs, ed. Peter Baumgart (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1980), 9 –118. 42 Albeit with mixed results, as we observed in Chapter 3. 43 Cf. Sachse, “Kirchenpolitik”; Silverman, Reluctant Union, 104 –105; Igersheim, L’Alsace des Notables, 52–59. 44 The discussion of the “Hatten case” occurred at the December 1882 Superior Consistory session, AS 37 (1881): 16, 88 – 89, 91–100.

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to renew the mandate of the conservative Christian Friedrich Petri, Manteuffel railed at the majority’s manifest lack of liberality.45 Indeed, appointing Petri as Kratz’s successor in 1885 served the Statthalter’s dual purpose of righting the wrong done to Petri and ensuring that a man with a “markedly Christian conviction in the positive sense” would lead the Lutheran church.46 Of course, Manteuffel was not the only Statthalter to make ecclesiastical appointments according to personal religious preferences. Early in 1901, the Ministry was prepared to recommend Georg Mertz (Bischweiler) as the new religious inspector for St. William. Mertz was the inspection’s and the Directory’s first choice, and his candidacy posed no political problems. At the last minute, however, Statthalter Hohenlohe-Langenburg directed the Ministry to arrange nomination papers for Georg Metzger (Strasbourg-Neudorf ). Metzger received the second-most votes at the inspectoral assembly (thirty-one to Mertz’s thirty-three), but more importantly, he shared the Statthalter’s interests in the activities of the Inner Mission and the Protestant League (Evangelischer Bund ). On this occasion, the lack of a strong consensus within the inspection for either Mertz or Metzger ensured that no objections to the Statthalter’s intervention arose.47 Manteuffel’s interests in ecclesiastical appointments also led him to promote changes in the actual nomination procedure for Lutheran pastors. Prior to his departure in 1880, Möller mandated that the Directory report on the church’s experience with the new (post-1872) appointment process. Although the report identified a host of problems, the Directory recommended only one modification: classifying parishes into two groups (A and B), such that only experienced pastors could apply to the B parishes.48 Manteuffel, however, proposed requiring that the candidates preach in the vacant parish before the inquest commission (Erhebungskommission) met, as was customary in many other German state churches. Manteuffel maintained that it would enable the

PR 14/50 (10 Dec 1881): 393 – 95. Draft of the report nominating Petri to the Lutheran presidency, ADBR 133 AL 91. 47 Directory to the Ministry, 6 December 1900, ADBR 172 AL 74; ADBR 55 AL 1 (3); ADBR 27 AL 549 A. On Hohenlohe-Langenburg and his personal ties to organized Protestantism, see Karl Weller, “Fürst zu Hohenlohe-Langenburg, Hermann, Kaiserlicher Statthalter von Elsaß-Lothringen,” in Württembergischen Nekrolog für das Jahr 1913 (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1916), 29 –50, esp. 34 and 44. 48 See Chapter 3, above. 45

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Directory to discern more clearly a congregation’s needs and wishes, and give the Directory a more secure basis for its appointments. Thus, he ordered the Ministry to put the issue on the agenda for the next Superior Consistory session.49 When the Superior Consistory met in March and December 1881, little support existed for the Statthalter’s recommendation. The delegates feared that “candidacy sermons” (Probepredigten) would only prolong the vacancy and open up new potential for chicanery.50 Still, Manteuffel persevered. In May 1883, he directed the Directory to permit candidacy sermons in a vacant parish and declare that a parish council could not bar a candidate from the pulpit, except under unusual circumstances.51 The Directory tried to refer the matter back to the Superior Consistory, but Manteuffel had Undersecretary Puttkamer inform the council on 5 August that “he did not need the Church to provide counsel on how to interpret the law.” The government decided that Möller’s earlier countenance of candidacy sermons in neighboring parishes could be extended to the vacant parish, and the Directory was to inform the church accordingly.52 The Directory discharged its duty, but not quite in the way the Statthalter desired. On 2 October 1883, it announced that if a parish wished, it could invite the officially-named candidates to give candidacy sermons.53 Manteuffel was furious, for he intended the sermons to be obligatory. But Puttkamer and State Secretary von Hofmann gingerly pointed out that strictly speaking the Directory fulfilled its obligation.54 Insofar as Superior Consistory members had mixed feelings about the measure, the ministers observed, the Directory was also within its rights to frame the announcement as it had.55 For its part, the Superior Consistory continued to have misgivings about the practice of candidacy sermons, but even after Manteuffel’s death in 1885, the Ministry blocked every effort to abolish it.56 ADBR 136 AL 12/36. AS 37 (1881– 82): 169 –71. 51 “Die Vorgänge wegen der Probepredigten,” ADBR 136 AL 12/38. 52 ADBR 136 AL 12/38. 53 AS 38 (1883 – 84): 93. 54 Manteuffel to the Ministry, 9 Nov 1883, ADBR 136 AL 12/38. 55 Memorandum Hofmann to Manteuffel, 4 December 1883, ADBR 136 AL 12/38. Nevertheless, in 1885, the Directory did clarify the rule, so that if a parish voted to hold candidacy sermons, all the official candidates had to be invited to preach (candidates could, though, decline the invitation). AS 39 (1884 – 85): 189 – 90. 56 AS 48 (1893 – 94): 389 – 91. 49 50

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Although Manteuffel’s interventions in Protestant church affairs were exceptional, they also reflected the German administration’s concern to promote the ecclesiastical integration of Alsace-Lorraine into the Empire. It was to occur in part through the gradual introduction of practices that were already or were becoming standard in the other state Protestant churches. In addition to the idea of candidacy sermons, the Ministry warmly endorsed the second theological exam in the 1880s. A few years later, it also suggested that Protestant churches levy a church tax to meet their financial needs. And when the Protestant churches successfully lobbied for pensions for their pastors, drawing on the procedures of the other Landeskirchen to buttress their position, the Ministry subsequently informed the Churches that, as elsewhere in Germany, pastors would have to accept mandatory retirement when no longer able to carry out their duties.57 Of even greater significance on a more symbolic level was the decision of the two Reichsland churches to join the Deutsche Evangelische Kirchenkonferenz in 1882. Founded in 1852, the “Eisenach Church Conference,” brought together representatives of the German church governments to discuss issues of mutual concern and counsel a common course of action. Although the resolutions passed by the Conference were not binding on the individual church governments, many of its decisions were indeed adopted and helped foster the public sense of a national Protestant community. By 1870, the Conference developed widely accepted standards for regulating mixed marriages as well as guidelines for new church design and construction. It published Germany’s first national Protestant paper, the Allgemeines Kirchenblatt für das evangelische Deutschland, and an admired revision of the Luther Bible. In terms of liturgy, the Conference developed a new series of pericopes, Bible selections on which pastors would preach, established the last Wednesday of the church year as a day of atonement and prayer (Buß- und Bettag), and, later, began work on a common German hymnal. The Conference also initiated the collection of annual statistics regarding religious practice in Protestant churches, a project in which even nonmember churches participated.58

A more substantive discussion of these developments appeared in Chapter 3. Besier, Religion Nation Kultur, 36; Kenneth Scott Latourette, Christianity in a Revolutionary Age, vol. 2, The Nineteenth Century in Europe: The Protestant and Eastern Churches (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1959), 86. 57 58

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The Reichsland’s Protestant churches were first invited to join the Eisenach Conference in 1872, when the invitation was extended through the Reichskanzleramt and the Superior Presidency. However, after discussing the matter with Heinrich Richter, who had just been named the governmental commissioner to the Directory and Superior Consistory, Möller advised Berlin that the time was not ready for such participation. Not only was anti-German sentiment still too strong, but the Reformed church was too disorganized for it to send a representative to the Conference.59 Ten years passed before the Conference renewed the offer. This time the Ministry strongly encouraged the two Churches to accept. In October 1882, the Directory announced that Inspector Ungerer would be the delegate attending the conference’s June 1882 meeting.60 The next month, the Reformed consistories followed suit and agreed that the consistory presidents would take turns representing the Church at the Conference.61 Ultimately, the Reichsland churches’ membership in the Conference was much more symbolic than substantive. Delegates from both churches routinely attended the sessions and both opted to support the creation of a standing executive committee for the Conference (Ausschuß) in 1903.62 But the churches signed on to few of the Conference’s other projects. They did annually gather the statistics on religious practice, but neither one adopted the new pericope series nor introduced the Buß- und Bettag into its calendar of holy days. Indeed, in this respect, the two churches exercised their rights as German territorial churches to maintain their independence and, thereby, their local traditions and particularities. The Lutheran Church Adapts Although the regime change triggered significant revisions to the institutions and practices of the Reichsland’s Protestant churches, state

59 The minutes for the May–June 1872 Conference session appear in GStA Rep. 76, III Sekt 1, Abt. XIV, vol. 3; ADBR 136 AL 1. 60 At the Superior Consistory session, President Kratz stressed the Conference’s statutes explicitly guaranteed each church its independence; AS 37 (1882– 83): 153 and 217–18. 61 Consistory President Tournier (Strasbourg) to the Ministry, 18 Nov 1882, ADBR 2G 482 F 41. 62 AS 58 (1903 – 04): 80 – 84; ADBR 147 AL P 7 (4).

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initiatives were not the only modifying forces for the two Protestant church governments and their public image after 1871. The winds of change were blowing within the Protestant community itself. Both Lutheran and Reformed Church leaders recognized that structural and procedural reforms were needed to function effectively as territorial churches (Landeskirchen). They realized that those changes would require (possibly protracted) negotiations with the state, as well as a careful balancing of theological and geographical interests affecting both the composition of the highest organs of church government and their ties to Strasbourg. While the Reichsland’s Protestant churches often acted in concert to advance their mutual interests, each endeavored to maintain its distinctiveness as a faith community, notwithstanding the wishes of the government and some immigrant Germans. When considering the Lutheran community, it is important to emphasize that the annexation altered the Lutheran church’s position and transformed it from a national to a solely regional institution. The annexation compelled a Germanization of Reichsland Protestantism, inasmuch as the territory reverted to the German tradition of the Landeskirche. Since most of France’s Lutheran population was located in the eastern departments, especially in Upper and Lower Alsace, and since the German authorities decided against imposing changes to the church’s overall structure, the average Lutheran in the Reichsland would scarcely have registered this shift. Nevertheless, the separation of Alsace-Lorraine from the rest of France sparked several adjustments to the organization of the highest organs of Lutheran church government, the Superior Consistory and the Directory. The public face of the Lutheran church changed with the composition of these bodies. The initial catalyst for change was the Treaty of Frankfurt’s provision to split off the Montbéliard and Paris inspections from the Strasbourg church, which reduced the size of the Superior Consistory by six delegates. The body was deprived of an additional member in 1872, when the Protestant Seminary was dissolved. In 1873, only nineteen men sat in the Superior Consistory (three delegates from each of the six remaining inspections, the president, and the governmental commissioner). Church leaders regarded that number as too small for the effective functioning of the council. Apart from resolving who was entitled to inherit the Seminary’s delegate, the only one way to increase the Superior Consistory’s membership without legal action was to create a new inspection. In 1873, the Superior Consistory resolved to move in precisely that direction and charged the Directory to study how

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to create a seventh district out of the existing St. Thomas and New Church inspections.63 For much of 1874, the Directory was occupied with this mission and asked each of the consistories in the two inspections to weigh in on the question. The consistories all endorsed the reform in principle. The reorganization would reduce the workload of the two Strasbourg-based religious inspectors, while also increasing the Superior Consistory’s membership to a more desirable size. But the consistories’ responses also revealed the practical hurdles the reform would have to overcome. St. Nicholas proposed uniting the city’s consistories into a single inspection. While this seemed to be beneficial for the city’s parishes and urban interests more generally, it would have been difficult to implement, since almost one-fifth of all Alsatian Lutherans lived in Strasbourg. Moreover, many of the rural consistories liked being linked with Strasbourg and did not want to sever that tie. Similarly, several rural and urban consistories insisted that the reorganization should not destroy traditional links between consistories (e.g., that which joined Old St. Peter, St. Aurelia and St. Thomas).64 By the time the Superior Consistory assembled in 1874, the Directory doubted that a seventh inspection could be created. Nonetheless, since five of the concerned consistories (New Church, St. William, and three rural consistories) were for a new inspection, the Directory was asked to develop a concrete proposal for debate in 1875.65 The Directory intended to organize an inspection that united five of the rural consistories to the west of Strasbourg. But Barr’s steadfast opposition to being split from St. Thomas—Barr was an ancient dependency of Strasbourg—dashed that plan. In the meantime, another plan emerged outside the normal church channels. Led by Georges Frick, a parish councilor at St. William and an activist in the Evangelical-Protestant Union, the consistories of St. William, Bischweiler, Brumath, Gerstheim and Sundhausen met and proposed to join together as the seventh inspection. The Directory was cool to the proposal, because it did not want to establish another Strasbourg-based inspection and because of the district’s odd geography, which extended both north and south of

63 AS 29 (1873 –74): 116 –27. By law, an inspection had to encompass at least five consistories; between New Church and St. Thomas there were eighteen, more than enough to permit a third inspection to be carved out of them. 64 Directory report for the 1874 Superior Consistory session, AS 30 (1874 –75): 39 – 44. 65 Ibid., 45 –55.

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Strasbourg (Figure 4.1). Nevertheless, the Directory presented it to the Superior Consistory without recommendation, because it was the only plan that satisfied the legal requirements and had the blessing of the concerned consistories.66 In 1875, the Superior Consistory resolved both of the outstanding membership issues. Since the Lutheran church no longer had a voice in the appointment of theology professors at the University of Strasbourg, it granted the Protestant Seminary’s delegate to the St. Thomas Foundation (as we saw previously).67 Regarding the proposed St. William inspection, the delegates realized that it was probably the only way to create a new inspection, but many expressed misgivings about this particular plan. On the one hand, some people objected that a religious association, rather than a church body developed the plan. On the other hand, each of these consistories had a pronounced liberal character, which conservatives feared would tilt the balance of power within the church too far in the liberal direction. Herein lay the explanation for the close final vote: ten for, eight against, with the governmental commissioner, Richter, abstaining.68 Although the conservative “party” lobbied the government to block the redistricting, in 1876 Möller advised Berlin to ratify the Superior Consistory’s decision. There was no cause for the state to overturn the decision, he argued. The Superior Consistory had proceeded in accordance with the existing laws and regulations; furthermore, in Alsace-Lorraine the government did not have the right of the summus episcopus. Thus, by imperial decree of April 13, the St. William inspection came into existence.69 The debates over the St. William inspection are useful for illuminating the Lutheran church’s public image and its concern with its theological orientation. During the French Second Empire as well as under Imperial German rule, liberals and conservatives competed to shape the church by electing their supporters to positions on the Superior Consistory and Directory. Well into 1880s, men holding liberal theological positions were in the majority in both bodies.70 As predicted, the creation of the St. William inspection did bolster the liberals’ influence after 1877 when 66 AS 31 (1875–76): 61– 62. Inspector Ungerer clearly opposed the project, and given his conservative religious views, Christian Friedrich Petri likely did as well. 67 Ibid., 11. 68 Ibid., 100 –104. 69 Möller to Berlin, 20 Dec 1875; Reichskanzleramt to Möller, 4 Feb 1876; Möller to Bismarck, 16 Feb 1876, ADBR 1049 W 1; AS 32 (1876): 6. 70 A complete list of Superior Consistory and Directory members appears in Appendix B.

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LORRAINE

Weissenburg

Saargemünd

nn rbro Weissenburg

Nie

Oberbronn

Lützelstein Ingweiler

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(all Lutheran communities in Lorraine belonged to this inspection)

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Vendenheim Wasselnheim Ittenheim

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l i Bisc a m hw ei

Saarunion Diemeringen

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Strasbourg New Church: New Church, Young St. Peter St. Thomas: St. Thomas, St. Nicholas, St. Aurelia, Old St. Peter St. William: St. William

Sundhausen Markirch Reichenweier

Colmar Andolsheim Münster

Colmar

UPPER ALSACE (Haut-Rhin) LEGEND Formerly part of New Church Formerly part of St. Thomas Border of inspection Border of district (Bezirk) Seat of inspection Consistorial seats

Figure 4.1

The creation of the St. William inspection.

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the delegates elected by the inspection and the inspection’s recommendations for religious inspector all held liberal views. Similarly, liberal forces in the New Church and St. Thomas inspections consistently beat back conservative challenges when new delegates were named, such as Charles Hiller in 1872 and Mayor Steinheil (Rothau) in 1881.71 Liberal curates generally prevailed, too, in the Strasbourg-based districts’ recommendations for religious inspectors. When Inspector Kromayer retired in 1898 due to poor health, conservatives in the New Church inspection rallied behind August Ernst Hertzog (Young St. Peter) and gave him 33 votes, only enough for fourth place, behind Theodor Höpffner (New Church, 35 votes) and two, liberal rural pastors (Heyler, 35 votes and Dietz, 34 votes).72 Although the orthodox Lutherans petitioned Hohenlohe-Langenburg to intervene, the law restricted his choice to the top three vote getters. Therefore, he confirmed the Directory’s preference: Höpffner.73 Six years earlier, however, when St. Thomas had to replace Karl Heintz, the Directory urged the Statthalter not to name another liberal, Karl Theodor Gerold, but rather, Michel Knittel, even though both received the same number of votes (thirty-three). While the Directory admitted that both men would make excellent religious inspectors, it felt that Gerold’s reputation as the head of the liberal “faction” might undermine his ability to be seen as an impartial administrator, particularly in the inspection’s conservative and orthodox parishes. The Ministry agreed and, in 1892, Knittel became the inspection’s first conservative leader.74 Since the Superior Consistory elected two of its members to serve in the Directory, its liberal leanings influenced the composition of the latter. The claims of church conservatives notwithstanding, the liberals

71 PR 5/16 (20 Apr 1872): 127; PR 14/43 (22 Oct 1881): 337. Just as with parish councilors, inspections customarily extended the mandates of their delegates unless they resigned or died. 72 Karl Desiré Kromayer, of Westhofen, had been appointed religious inspector in 1892 on Ungerer’s death. Unusually, the inspection failed to recommend a Strasbourg pastor in the absence of an acceptable prospect. Leblois and Kopp were too old, while most viewed Horning, Haerter, Hackenschmidt, and Hertzog as too conservative. Personnel file Kromayer, ADBR 172 AL 64. 73 Personnel file Theodor Höpffner, ADBR 172 AL 44; Wilhelm Horning et al. to Hohenlohe-Langenburg, 22 December 1898, ADBR 27 AL 549. 74 Personnel dossier Michel Knittel, ADBR 172 AL 61; ADBR 27 AL 549. The third person on the inspection’s list was Kromayer of St. Aurelia, another liberal and Inspector Kromayer’s brother. But he was elected primarily to fulfill the inspection’s obligation to have three names on the list.

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tended to use their majority position to ensure a balance of theological positions in the Directory, rather than to exercise liberal dominance. Thus, when the liberal Eduard Kratz was named Lutheran President in 1872, he was replaced as Superior Consistory delegate by a conservative, Christian Friedrich Petri. Eight years later, in the face of the appointment of Alexander von der Goltz, an energetic conservative, as governmental commissioner and fears that Statthalter Manteuffel would replace the ailing Kratz with a conservative, liberals decided to elect Eugen Boeckel (Strasbourg) to join Edouard Goguel on the Directory rather than renew Petri’s mandate. As we have seen, this liberal power play ultimately resulted in Petri’s appointment as Lutheran President, which in turn encouraged the Superior Consistory to continue electing liberals to fill both of its seats on the Directory until 1898. The election of Jean Höffel, a moderate conservative (and Landesausschuß deputy) from the Buchsweiler inspection, to the Superior Consistory in 1898 calls attention to a series of important changes that subtly, but significantly attenuated the liberal cast of the Lutheran church’s highest councils.75 With the maturation of a more moderate form of liberalism at the turn of the century that paid more attention to the subjective dimension of religious belief and practice, the acuity of intraconfessional antagonism began to subside. Typical of this new spirit were men like Inspectors Höpffner and Metzger, but even the acknowledged leader of the liberal camp, Gerold, was known to work closely with his conservative colleague at St. Nicholas, Inspector Knittel. As Albert Schweitzer, who served as vicar at St Nicholas between 1899 and 1913, recalled, “Mr. Knittel represented orthodoxy softened by pietism; Mr. Gerold was a liberal. But they fulfilled the duties of their office together in a truly brotherly temper. Everything was carried out in a spirit of harmony.”76 Equally important, the conservative position in the Superior Consistory was improving, due to changes outside of the traditional conservative strongholds of Buchsweiler, Lützelstein, and Weissenburg. In addition to Knittel’s appointment as religious inspector, the Faculty of Protestant Theology began naming more conservative theologians as delegates, first with Wilhelm Nowack in 1896, and then Paul Lobstein. Höffel was named to serve out the remainder of Emil Petri’s term, who resigned his offices in the Lutheran church upon being appointed as Undersecretary for Justice and Religious Affairs. 76 Schweitzer, Out of My Life, 27. See also, Strohl, Protestantisme, 411–12. 75

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Much more dramatic were the changes in the Directory’s makeup at the fin de siècle. Not only were the president and the governmental commissioner conservative, but now a conservative religious inspector entered the directorial ranks. Customarily, one of the Strasbourg religious inspectors held the inspector’s seat in the Directory and these men were all liberals. When Inspector Ungerer died in 1891, however, neither Inspector Heintz nor Inspector Weltz were viable options as successors. Heintz was ill (he died just a few months after Ungerer), and Weltz was a pastor in Baldenheim, sixty kilometers south of Strasbourg. When State Secretary Puttkamer asked the Directory who should succeed Ungerer, the four remaining members unanimously recommended Inspector Teutsch of Buchsweiler, “a moderate conservative” of a “conciliatory fashion.”77 Consequently, when Höffel was elected in 1898, four of the Directory’s five members counted as conservatives. The liberal position was reinforced in 1902 and 1903, when the Superior Consistory replaced Höffel with Charles Bergmann (Strasbourg) and when Friedrich Curtius succeeded Petri as president. When Inspector Teutsch retired in 1903, Statthalter Hohenlohe-Langenburg shored up the conservative contingent by naming the senior religious inspector, Martin Krencker of Lützelstein, to the vacancy. Then, in 1908, Höffel won a new mandate to the Directory in 1908, where he was joined in 1912 by Professor Nowack. As a result, when Hans von der Goltz succeeded Curtius in 1914, church conservatives did something that would have been unimaginable in 1870: they had “captured” the entire Directory.78 Overall, the involvement of Strasbourgeois in the decisions of the Lutheran church’s highest councils also increased after 1870, underscoring the city’s status as an ecclesiastical capital. The situation in the Directory, however, was anomalous. Because the Directory met regularly, it was customary that all its members live in Strasbourg. After 1870, improvements to the Reichsland’s transportation network made residency in Strasbourg less imperative, but the preference for Strasbourgeois in the Directory persisted. Starting in 1892, the religious inspector

Directory to the Ministry, 11 Jan 1892, ADBR 147 AL P. 7 (2). Neither the records of the Directory nor those of the Ministry explain why Krencker was chosen. Undersecretary Petri certainly knew that tradition would have called for naming either Inspector Höpffner, Knittel or Metzger; all three were solid candidates. The notion that the conservative Krencker was chosen to counterbalance the liberal Curtius is also problematic, for Knittel was also a conservative. 77

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on the Directory was no longer a resident of Strasbourg. After 1898 the Superior Consistory also delegated non-Strasbourgeois to serve in the Directory, Höffel (1898 –1902, 1908 –1918) and Theodor Renaud of Colmar (1906–08). Nevertheless, these developments did little to alter the Directory’s status as a Strasbourg institution. The Directory continued to meet in Strasbourg and, even if he was not a native of Strasbourg, the Lutheran President made the capital his home, normally in one of the properties belonging to the St. Thomas Foundation. With respect to the Superior Consistory, the trend was unmistakable. In 1872, only half of the membership (ten) lived in the capital. By 1896, that proportion had risen to 56 percent (fourteen of twenty-five), reaching the pre-war peak of 64 percent (sixteen) in 1910. The augmented number of Strasbourg residents serving in the Superior Consistory was, in part, the direct consequence of how the body’s membership expanded after 1870. The creation of a third Strasbourg-based inspection in 1876 and the decision to grant the Theological Faculty its own delegate to the council in 1885 worked to the advantage of those domiciled in Strasbourg.79 Nevertheless, as we have seen, political considerations resulted in a rural pastor’s appointment (Weltz) as St. William’s religious inspector in 1884. When Inspector Ungerer died in 1892, the absence of a suitable candidate among the Strasbourg pastors led to the appointment of someone outside of the city, Karl Desiré Kromayer of Westhofen. But these temporary shifts away from Strasbourg were more than compensated by the decision of the non-Strasbourg inspections to avail themselves of their legal right to name delegates who were not residents of the inspection, namely Strasbourgeois.80 During the Reichsland era, the rural inspections of Buchsweiler and Lützelstein were the most regular in naming at least one Strasbourgeois notable to represent the inspections’ interests, but after 1900, Weissenburg, too, adopted the practice.81 Lützelstein, for instance, selected prominent

79 As mentioned earlier, Inspector Weltz did not live in Strasbourg, and both Inspectors Riff and Metzger served suburban parishes (Ruprechtsau and Neudorf, respectively). 80 The only stipulation on the choice of the inspection’s delegate was that he be an official elector in the Lutheran church. Thus, when the German administration required all Protestant electors to be German citizens (the French had allowed resident aliens to be electors), the Directory was forced to annul the mandate of Lützelstein’s long-serving delegate, Paul Lehr, who was a Swiss citizen. ADBR 147 AL P. 7 (1). 81 In 1909, Weissenburg renewed Adolf Goetz’s mandate, although he left the inspection to serve as the Director of Direct Taxation. When Goetz was named to

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conservatives, like Jules Sengenwald, the head of Strasbourg’s Chamber of Commerce. The rural inspections also led the way in naming old Germans to the Superior Consistory. Lützelstein elected Strasbourg’s Mayor, Otto Back in 1892, and then Professor Otto Mayer in 1895 (thus both of its delegates), before the New Church selected Conservatory Professor Georg Roth in 1896 and St. Thomas opted for Professor Nowack in 1903.82 In 1914, St. William stood out as the only inspection that never named an old German to represent its interests in the Superior Consistory, just as Colmar remained the one inspection that elected delegates solely from the ranks of its residents. The years after 1871 witnessed not only a shift in the Superior Consistory’s geographical and theological makeup, but also a series of attempts to modify how it conducted business. Overall, these reforms sought to make the body function more efficiently, to modernize this most important institution of Lutheran government. Yet, these seemingly minor matters regarding internal procedure contained major questions about how the state exercised its oversight of the church. Discussions of institutional practice were not just internal affairs, but they generated considerable public attention toward the church. As the Reichsland period began, Superior Consistory sessions followed a logic dictated by both law and custom. The Decree-Law of 1852 stipulated that the body meet annually for a session not to exceed six days in the presence of the prefect of Bas-Rhin (or his representative). The government had to approve both the agenda (in advance) and the minutes. Normally, the Directory called the session for the fall (October or November), although from 1887 until 1909 most of the regular sessions were held in May and June. Each session began with a prayer, the reading of the agenda, the review and approval of any elections that had occurred between sessions, and the presentation of two major reports: the account of the Directory’s activities since the last Superior Consistory meeting, and the Directory’s summary of the religious inspectors’ annual reports. The body’s treatment of these two reports was typical of how most agenda items were handled. Namely, each report was sent to an ad hoc committee, which reviewed it and then sent its findings and any recommendations back to the plenum. A replace von der Goltz as the governmental commissioner, the inspection elected a second Strasbourgeois, C. E. Hoff of Ruprechtsau. 82 Colmar also named its first old-German delegate in 1892, the Schulrat at the District Presidency of Upper Alsace, Theodor Renaud.

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general debate on the report then ensued. Although no hard and fast rule existed, the five-member commission that reviewed the Directory’s report usually comprised one religious inspector and four laymen, but no Directory members could be elected to it. For all other committees, one’s personal knowledge or expertise mattered more than one’s status as pastor or layman. Individuals with financial and educational experience reviewed the budgets and affairs of the Protestant Gymnasium and St. Thomas Foundation. Where larger issues of church policy were at stake, such as the classification of parishes or the creation of a church tax, the lay voice prevailed in the committees, just as it did in the body as a whole (of the twenty-five members, at most eight were pastors).83 In fact, only the commissions charged to review religious books (e.g., hymnals, religious education manuals, liturgical collections) routinely had clerical majorities, when they included any laymen at all. The Superior Consistory first considered altering its internal procedures in the 1870s. To promote more efficient sessions, it hoped to establish some standing committees that could review items that regularly came before the council (e.g., religious books, the Protestant Gymnasium’s finances) in advance of the meetings. Möller, however, opposed this notion, observing that there was neither precedent nor a pressing need to justify it.84 Later on, when the Superior Consistory discussed complicated issues such as pastoral retirement, church taxes, and church reform, the state’s decision proved to be a major burden that the body evaded only by going into recess—sometimes for days at a time. The Ministry challenged the legality of this tactic in 1907, but President Curtius defended it successfully on the grounds that the law did not require the session’s six days to be consecutive.85 The Supreme Consistory also concerned itself with the publication of its proceedings. Prior to 1870, the French government regarded its obligation to approve the minutes as a formality. Consequently, the Directory normally printed them in the Recueil officiel relatively quickly, which enabled parish councils and consistories to inform themselves about the current agenda, and, if necessary, request that the Superior Consistory take up an issue at the next session. The German adminis-

83 In addition to the seven religious inspectors, the representative from the St. Thomas Foundation could also be an active minister, as was the case from 1892–1914 (Gerold of St. Nicholas). 84 ADBR 133 AL 93. 85 ADBR 133 AL 95, especially Ministry to Curtius, 7 Jan 1907.

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tration, however, preferred to scrutinize the minutes and verify that the Superior Consistory had not overstepped the bounds of its authority. This practice often seriously delayed the publication of the minutes, which hampered the parishes’ and consistories’ ability to communicate their concerns to their legal representatives. In 1875, for instance, the Progrès religieux noted that the minutes of the Fall 1874 session had only appeared at the end of July, and the Superior Consistory was scheduled to meet again that October.86 In 1878, Superior President Möller informed the Directory that it could not print sections from the 1877 proceedings that concerned the administration of the Protestant Gymnasium. It was a topic that had not been on the approved agenda for the session, but had arisen in the course of discussing the Directory’s general report—a situation that occurred frequently. Möller’s complaint wasn’t only with what he regarded as the body’s violation of the law—deliberating on matters that were not on the agenda. He was also responding to the fact that during the debates several members criticized the government in terms “that were not of the nature to be made public.” When the Superior Consistory convened that fall, it criticized Möller’s action both as an instance of censorship and as an attempt to limit the scope of deliberations. Even Professor Reuss, who was generally sympathetic to Möller’s regime, protested: “The Superior Consistory is not accustomed to being treated in this way. Even the Napoleonic dictatorship did not subject us to such measures.”87 In 1882, the government again decided to excise several passages from the published minutes that concerned theologians’ military obligations and pastoral appointments. When the Superior Consistory renewed its complaints, Undersecretary von Puttkamer suggested that the church adopt a different method for reporting on its actions. Instead of printing the proceedings in full, he suggested in 1884, the Superior Consistory should only publish “short summaries of the most important parts of the deliberations” (as was customary in the other German Protestant churches). The Superior Consistory carefully considered this recommendation, but opted not to adopt it. Despite dissatisfaction with the government’s exercise of its prerogative to oversee the Church’s activities, the majority felt that the democratic spirit of the Church’s

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PR 8/22 (7 Aug 1875): 250 –51. AS 33 (1877–78): 2; AS 34 (1878 –79): 27–39, 127–28, and 141– 46.

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organization was best served by publishing a complete, verbatim, version of the proceedings.88 After this airing of sentiments, tensions between church and state on the matter abated. The Ministry did not again censor portions of the Superior Consistory’s proceedings, but neither did it review them more promptly. The reports of the Superior Consistory sessions published in the regional religious press—the Progrès religieux, the Kirchenbote, and the Sonntagsblatt—were helpful alternatives, but since the Superior Consistory also met in closed sessions, the newspapers’ coverage was necessarily incomplete. The situation changed only after 1900, largely because of the press’s efforts. In 1906, drawing on recent developments in other German churches and a local desire for better information about what was going on in the Superior Consistory, the editors of four Strasbourgbased publications petitioned to be admitted to the Superior Consistory’s sessions. The Superior Consistory was not particularly favorable to the idea. Not only did it object to creating special benefits for the press, but it felt no need to open up its deliberations to the public in general, since, in contrast to the other German churches, it was not officially a state institution. After considerable debate, the members agreed that it would be beneficial to allow certain church members—vicars, pastors, parish councilors and consistory members, as well as theology professors—to attend its sessions.89 It endorsed a policy of “limited openness” (beschränkte Öffentlichkeit), to which the Ministry consented in 1908. Since the editors of the religious papers were pastors, this revision effectively gave the press what it wanted: access to the Superior Consistory’s activities, a point that Undersecretary Emil Petri himself acknowledged in approving it. Furthermore, since the government’s review of the proceedings was now meaningless, Petri announced that the Ministry would no longer require the Directory to request permission to publish them.90 The Superior Consistory also decided back in the 1880s to formalize its operating procedures. Since the impetus for this came from the old German, Alexander von der Goltz, it is tempting to brand it as another

AS 39 (1884 – 85): 7– 8, 65 – 66. The Directory initially proposed that all interested church members, including women, be allowed to attend Superior Consistory sessions. But ultimately, the right was extended only to clerics, laymen who served on church councils, and theology professors. 90 AS 62 (1907–08): 139 – 49, 221–24; ADBR 172 AL 264. 88 89

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attempt to Germanize the church. However, when von der Goltz raised the issue at the end of the 1884 Superior Consistory session, fourteen other members joined him in asking the Directory to prepare such a text.91 The document that the Directory produced, and the Superior Consistory endorsed in November 1885, was little more than a codification of existing practices. It specified that the body’s sessions began and ended with prayers, and that the President convened, opened, and closed the council’s meetings. It stipulated how the minutes were kept and what documents were to be included in the official proceedings and it required the Directory to prepare materials for each item on the official agenda and deliver them to the members before the beginning of each session. The bylaws also regulated the creation of (ad hoc) committees, set the rules of debate, and established procedures for internal elections. Because the Superior Consistory decided that the bylaws would have to be voted on in another session before they could take effect, the second reading was placed on the agenda for 1886. However, in reviewing the Superior Consistory’s proceedings for 1885, the Ministry decided that since the bylaws affected certain governmental prerogatives, they—and all subsequent amendments to them—would also require state approval. Thus, although the Superior Consistory approved the bylaws at the second reading in 1886, they took effect only after the Ministry endorsed the Superior Consistory’s resolutions from that 1886 session.92 The Superior Consistory made relatively few changes to the bylaws thereafter. Indeed, the fact that the Ministry insisted on authorizing all amendments worked to curb revisions. But this also meant that the body also lacked the flexibility to effect necessary change. For instance, the 1905 Law concerning the Reformed Synod (see below) annulled the requirement that the District President of Lower Alsace attend the Superior Consistory’s meetings. At its May 1906 meeting, the Superior Consistory resolved to alter the affected sections of the bylaws, even though the issue had not been placed on the agenda. Undersecretary Petri decided to overlook the matter, but cautioned President Curtius that the Superior Consistory could not pass resolutions on subjects that were not on the approved agenda.93 Petri made good on his threat two

91 92 93

AS 39 (1884 – 85): 176 –77. AS 40 (1885 – 86): 174 –75; AS 41 (1896 – 87): 49 –54; ADBR 133 AL 94. AS 61 (1906 – 08): 2– 4; Petri to Curtius, 20 April 1907, ADBR 172 AL 264.

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years later, when the Superior Consistory sought to renumber certain paragraphs in the bylaws without placing the issue on the agenda. Although the manner was rather trivial, the Undersecretary promptly informed Curtius that the Ministry would not act on the revisions; however, the Directory was free to place the subject on the agenda for the next session.94 As the Supreme Consistory evolved into a more modern, rationalized institution, it resurrected a practice that served to highlight its image as a religious, even Lutheran body. Prior to 1870, it had been customary for the Superior Consistory to commence its regular meeting with a formal religious service at the St. Thomas church. Amidst all the upheavals of the transition to German rule, this practice had fallen by the wayside. However, when the Superior Consistory concluded its debate on the new bylaws in 1885, August Küss, a conservative delegate from Lützelstein, took advantage of the opportunity and moved that this special worship service be reinstated. After all, he observed, “The resolution of 25 October 1853 establishing the practice was technically still in effect.” The minutes report that the body agreed to allow the Directory to decide how to handle this request.95 President Petri waited a year and revived the custom in 1887, with Inspector Bastian of Weissenburg giving the sermon. Furthermore, just as in the past, Bastian’s sermon—and those of the speakers in subsequent years—was printed for circulation to the general public, reminding the faithful of the religious dimension of the church government’s work in Strasbourg.96 The Travails of the Reformed Church The changes to Alsace-Lorraine’s political and ecclesiastical landscape after 1870 also provoked alterations in the Reformed church’s organization. Its challenges, however, differed from those facing the Lutherans. Thanks to their decentralized system of government, the Reformed consistories were less troubled by the problem of state intervention in their internal affairs. With a smaller number of members, the Reformed church also felt less keenly the need to develop more

Petri to Curtius, 15 Jan 1909, ADBR 172 AL 264. AS 40 (1885): 175. 96 AS 42 (1887): 2–3. The sermons were published with J. H. Ed. Heitz, the Lutheran church’s official printer. 94 95

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efficient and bureaucratic measures for handling church business than its Lutheran counterpart. Instead, the basic problem for the Reformed church during the Reichsland period was maintaining its image as an autonomous religious community. Not only did the German administration tend to ignore the interests of the Calvinist community when setting state church policy, but it repeatedly promoted the idea of a Protestant union in Alsace-Lorraine at the expense of the Reformed church. Consequently, the movement to create a Reformed synod for Alsace-Lorraine was revived and resulted in a significant victory with the establishment of a Reformed Synod in 1905 by virtue of a new church law, the first passed for the Reichsland since 1870. Throughout the nineteenth century, Reformed Protestantism constituted only a very small part of the Protestant community in what became the Reichsland. On the eve of the Franco-Prussian War, for instance, there were only 39,000 Calvinists as opposed to some 212,000 Lutherans, five Reformed, but thirty-eight Lutheran consistories.97 The system of consistorial autonomy outlined in the Organic Articles and the Decree-Law of 1852 enabled the eastern consistories to maintain their local ecclesiastical traditions that were rooted in varying mixtures of Huguenot, German, and Swiss Reformed practices. Under French rule, the five Reformed consistories in Bischwiller, Metz, Mulhouse, Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines (Markirch), and Strasbourg had little need to worry about their more numerous and better organized Lutheran neighbors. Beyond the Vosges mountains, most Protestants were Calvinist, which meant that Calvinist interests were well represented (if not always satisfied) in Parisian governmental circles.98 Although the French government opposed the calling of a national synod, after 1852 there existed a body in Paris—the conseil central (central council)—that could offer counsel to the French government on Calvinist ecclesiastical matters, based on information gathered from the several consistories. After 1871, the Reformed consistories of Alsace-Lorraine found themelves in altogether different circumstances. Although they were now part of the national confessional community, this did not offer the territory’s Calvinists the tangible benefits that the ties to French Calvinism had, for religious policy in Imperial Germany was conducted at the regional, “C.E.,” “Die kirchliche Zustände in Elsaß und Deutsch-Lothringen,” Zeitschrift für Protestantismus und Kirche 61 (1871): 349 –361, here 359 – 61. 98 On the relations between the Calvinists and the French state during the Second Empire, the standard work is Encrevé, Protestants français, esp. 507– 97 and 701– 810. 97

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rather than the national level. Indeed, annexation not only reinforced the Reformed Church’s status as a minority (even if recognized) faith, but it also tended to marginalize the Church more generally. At one level, the Reformed Church’s declining stature flowed directly from its organization and limited membership. In setting Protestant church policy, the German administration paid the most attention to the Lutherans’ needs. They were more numerous and it was easier to negotiate with them, due to the Lutheran church’s hierarchical structure and the Directory’s presence in Strasbourg. The Calvinists, by contrast, lacked any sort of common representation. As noted in Chapter One, Möller neither felt it necessary to create a successor to the conseil central in the Reichsland, nor valued the convocation of a regional synod (even as foreseen in extant French law). An agreement with the Reformed church entailed bargaining with all five Reformed consistories and was rather unwieldy. Möller considered the Reformed church to be highly “disorganized,” a label he employed in 1872 to explain why the church was not in a position to send a representative delegate to attend the Eisenach church conference.99 The Reformed church also lacked a significant presence in the capital itself. Of course, one of the consistories was based in Strasbourg, and the parish there did have two pastors. But the main centers of Reformed Protestantism lay well outside of Strasbourg, in Mulhouse and Metz and, to a lesser degree, in and around Bischweiler. For most of the 1870s and 1880s, Strasbourg’s Reformed community was small and prone to frequent changes in leadership, which undermined further its ability to make a difference in the capital. Another problem for the Reformed Church was the paucity of substantive distinctions between it and the Lutheran church. Parishioners moved freely from one church to another. The training for ministers was equivalent in both churches. Moreover, the Reformed church often resorted to calling Lutherans to fill its ministerial vacancies, a practice that became even more widespread after 1871 when French Calvinists were excluded from serving in the Reichsland’s Reformed parishes.100 Karl Fuchs, Gustav Kopp, and Eugen Stern, for example,

99 Eisenach Conference Proceedings, May-June 1872, GStA Rep 76, III Sekt. 1, Abt. XIV, vol. 3, 28 and 122. 100 In keeping with the terms of the Organic Articles, only German citizens could be pastors or priests in the Reichsland. However, on 30 August 1873, Möller reaffirmed

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all served in Reformed parishes prior to arriving in Strasbourg, and Karl Piepenbring left the Lutheran parish of Fouday in 1880 to take over the French-language position at Strasbourg’s Reformed church. The conclusion that German officials drew was significant. Since the division between Reformed and Lutheran church was largely artificial, they were justified in treating the churches as similarly as possible. When developing new regulations for preparation to ministry in 1872, thus, Möller asked the Reformed consistories to endorse the rules that the Lutheran church had agreed upon, “for he wanted to create one system for both recognized Protestant churches.” Not only did this tack seem consonant with the previous practices of the French, but it was in step with the ecclesiastical model prevalent in much of Prussia, neighboring Baden, and the Bavarian Palatinate: a united Protestant church. In fact, in contrast to Michaelis’s contention, the government’s efforts to encourage some sort of administrative union did not begin in earnest with Fabri, but rather with Möller.101 Illustrative both of the German administration’s stance and the Reformed church’s difficult position were the negotiations over the new regulations for preparation to the ministry in 1872. Möller was so intent on having a single set of rules for the two Protestant churches that he paid little mind to the Calvinists’ requests for modest amendments to the Lutheran-inspired proposal.102 The Strasbourg consistory, for instance, agreed to endorse the project, provided that “an additional article is drafted that gives the Reformed church the same rights in the process as the Lutheran church had.”103 Only when Möller asked Berlin for advice on how the regulations were to be enacted was the tactic derailed. The Reichskanzleramt authorized Möller to release the new regulations, but counseled him to draw up separate texts for the two churches. Since this required Möller’s office to circulate the project for the Reformed church’s candidates once more among the five consistories, the Lutheran regulations appeared in October 1872, but the Reformed version only in January 1873.104

the previous (French) practice which, under special circumstances, permitted hiring Swiss ministers. Dursy, Staatskirchenrecht, 2:150. 101 Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 77–79. 102 Möller to the Reformed consistories, 31 July 1872, ADBR 136 AL 12/39. 103 KS PBK 1: 329 (6 Aug 1872), ADBR 173 AL 9. 104 ADBR 136 AL 12/39.

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Similarly, on 17 November 1873, Möller decided to revoke the electoral rights of foreigners who had been residents in a Protestant parish for at least three years.105 The primary rationale was political. The Germans wanted to exclude French Protestants, especially Alsatians who retained their French citizenship, from positions of influence in the churches that were now German. Yet, in its zeal to treat the two Protestant churches the same, Möller’s administration overlooked the very different roles that foreigners played in the two churches’ affairs. As the Consistory of Strasbourg pointed out in a petition dated 24 December 1873, foreigners—primarily Swiss nationals—were not only electors, but they frequently held seats on Reformed parish councils and consistories, especially in and around Mulhouse.106 In the face of the concerted protests in the Reformed consistories, Möller relented, and announced on 8 January that resident foreigners could remain on the electoral registers of Reformed parishes.107 Part of the problem after 1871 was that the Reformed church did not need the same for bureaucracy and regulation that its Lutheran counterpart did. Consequently, when the Lutherans proposed adopting reforms that the government believed should also apply to the Reformed church, they were essentially implemented fait accompli. They had little opportunity to provide substantive input into the new ordinances and regulations. Because they generally agreed with the new system of preparation for the ministry, the Reformed consistories did not make much of a fuss about procedures in 1872. In fact, writing to Möller later that year, Consistory President Maeder of Strasbourg referred to the regulations as a “prized gift” that would be of “great benefit for us.”108 Two years later, however, the consistories rebuffed the Theological Faculty’s recommendation, which was strongly supported by Möller’s government, that the two Protestant churches form a joint commission to administer the venia concionandi (right to preach). The Strasbourg consistory’s response, “that it did not deem the matter particularly urgent,” is telling. Obviously, it asserted the consistory’s belief that the more intimate relations within the Reformed commu-

105 AS 27 (1872–73): 286. The measure rescinded a provision of the ministerial decree of 10 September 1852. 106 KS PBK 1:353 – 54, ADBR 173 AL 9. 107 Ibid., 54. Lutheran efforts to achieve a similar reversal, however, were rejected, cf. AS 32 (1877): 86 and 173 –74 and AS 33 (1878): 8 – 9. 108 Maeder to Möller, 8 Nov 1872, ADBR 136 AL 12/39.

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nity made such a commission superfluous, a sentiment that the other consistories expressed as well. But given that the consistory was regularly asked to endorse policies established by or for Lutherans, it also expressed a sense of frustration with the state’s lack of concern for the Reformed church’s particular needs and interests.109 After 1879, the problems multiplied within the Reformed church as well as between it and the government. On the one hand, the consistories found it harder and harder to reach a consensus among themselves on administrative matters. When the Eisenach conference invited the Reformed church to send a representative in 1882, for instance, the consistories negotiated for six months on how to select its single delegate. Even then, the solution that was finally adopted—the consistories would take turns in representing the church at Eisenach—did not come from the consistories, but from the Ministry.110 Similarly, although the consistories admitted the need for more concerted action to deal with the shortage of candidates for the ministry in the early 1880s, there was little support for Metz’s suggestion in 1883 to establish an administrative council in Strasbourg that could carry out such activity. The Strasbourg consistory, for example, supported the concept in principle, but felt that “too many practical difficulties stood in the way of its realization.”111 On the other hand, the Ministry not only disregarded, but at times openly ignored the wishes of the Reformed consistories. As the Strasbourg consistory noted in a resolution of 16 December 1884, “it [all too] often happens that the Ministry decides on general ecclesiastical regulations [for the Protestant faiths] in conjunction with the Lutheran authorities, but within asking the counsel of the Reformed authorities.”112 Starting in 1885, the Ministry’s disdain for the Reformed church reached such a height that the Reformed consistories in Alsace felt compelled to defend themselves. Triggering the consistories’ ire were two ministerial actions: the 1885 proposal that the Metz consistory apply to join the Lutheran church and the negotiations over the second state theology exam. Common to both cases was the Ministry’s effort to move KS PBK 1: 361– 62 (4 Aug 1874), ADBR 173 AL 9. KS PBK, vol. 2, 5 Dec 1882, ADBR 173 AL 9. Mulhouse provided the first delegate, then Metz, Bischweiler, Strasbourg, and Markirch. Tournier to the Ministry, 18 Nov 1882, ADBR 2G 482 F 41; Piepenbring to the Ministry, 16 May 1887, ADBR 173 AL 17. 111 KS PBK, 2:91– 92 (6 Feb 1883), ADBR 173 AL 9. 112 Ibid., 129. 109 110

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the Reichsland’s churches towards some sort of union, in which the Reformed Church would be, at best, the junior partner. Nevertheless, the underlying motivations were distinct. The root of the Ministry’s attitude towards Metz was the dramatic modification in the size and confessional composition of Lorraine’s Protestant population, due to the steady immigration of old-German Protestants after 1871.113 Not only did Protestant communities spring up where none had existed before, but in established communities like Metz, old Germans rapidly outnumbered the native Lorrainers. In addition, most of these immigrants identified themselves as Lutheran or Lutheran-Evangelical, not Reformed or Calvinist. They joined Reformed parishes only because that was normally the sole option available in Lorraine.114 In short, the Ministry determined that since Lorraine was becoming Lutheran, the Metz consistory should be moved from the Reformed to the Lutheran church, as opposed to the alternative of creating a new Lutheran inspection or consistory for Lorraine. Indeed, District President Hans Hammerstein-Loxten later confided to consistory president Braun, “It was in the government’s interest that there is only one Protestant church in the Reichsland.”115 At its session of 8 September 1885, Metz unanimously decided not to endorse the Ministry’s proposal. But, in recognition of the powerful forces behind the idea—including (soon to be State Secretary) Puttkamer and Hammerstein-Loxten—the consistory announced that it would be open to discussing the question at a later date.116 Meanwhile, in Strasbourg the Ministry again neglected to involve the Reformed consistories meaningfully in the formation of another

113 A more extensive treatment of these developments appears in François Roth, La Lorraine annexée: Étude sur la Présidence de Lorraine dans l’Empire allemand (1871–1918) (Nancy: Université de Nancy II, 1976), 139 – 43. 114 Prior to 1870 there were Lutheran parishes in Lorraine only in the regions bordering Lower Alsace (attached to the Inspection of either Lützelstein or Weissenburg [Niederbronn consistory]). To meet the needs of the new Lutheran communities that were emerging in Lorraine, the government created the consistory of Saargemünd in 1876 (Lützelstein Inspection). When the orthodox Lutheran mission in Metz was recognized as an official Lutheran parish in 1897, it was attached to the Saargemünd consistory. Bopp, Evangelische Gemeinden, 216 –21. 115 Piepenbring mentioned this in a letter to the newly named Undersecretary for Justice and Religious Affairs, Hoseus, 26 Feb 1895, ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 116 The Metz consistory reported on these developments to the other consistories later in 1885, as related in the Strasbourg consistory’s minutes for 24 November 1885, ADBR 173 AL 9, vol. 2, 141– 42. A second communication from Metz on this point was read at the meeting of 2 Mar 1886, ibid., 146 – 47.

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major policy issue, namely, the introduction of a second theological exam. Although the Superior Consistory submitted a draft for the new regulations to the Ministry in 1885, the Ministry turned to the Reformed Consistories for comment only after the negotiations with the Lutheran church were completed in February 1887.117 Adding insult to injury, the Ministry allowed the Reformed consistories only two months to respond, a clear sign that it expected them to accept the proposal as it stood. As in 1872, the consistories generally approved of the changes to the procedures and the new exam; this time, however, they resented both the Ministry’s modus operandi and certain elements of the new regulations itself.118 As noted in the previous chapter, the Ministry chose not to create distinct regulations for the two churches this time. More critically, it initially intended for Calvinist candidates to be examined by an all-Lutheran commission for the second exam. The Ministry modified its position when it issued the new regulation on 29 June 1887, allowing a Reformed pastor to replace one Lutheran pastor on the second exam commission when Calvinist candidates were being considered. But Puttkamer refused to accord the Reformed Church a permanent presence on the commission, as Strasbourg and Metz had demanded. Metz was appeased, though, with the inclusion of language that made each consistory, rather than Strasbourg, responsible for its candidates’ exam dossiers. Exasperated by it all, Strasbourg’s Karl Piepenbring used the one vehicle of protest open to him: he turned down the Ministry’s invitation to serve as the Calvinist delegate to the second exam commission.119 More than anything else, the Ministry’s cavalier attitude toward the Reformed church and its organization convinced the Alsatian consistories that if they remained divided, then they would lack an effective means of collective action and would indeed fall. As President Grimm of Bischweiler later wrote to Piepenbring, “It is unquestionable that our isolation and division is a major factor in explaining why our resolutions are so ineffective with respect to both the government ADBR 173 AL 41. Copies of the resolutions sent to the Ministry from each of the consistories appear in ADBR 173 AL 41. 119 Piepenbring to Puttkamer, ibid. The following year, the Ministry continued on this path toward conformity, and forced the Reformed consistories to accept new regulations on vicars’ service and ordination that it neither wanted nor had a hand in formulating. Correspondence between Piepenbring and Puttkamer, 7 Sep 1888, 26 Nov 1888, and 13 March 1889, ibid. 117

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and the Lutheran church.”120 Indeed, following the second theological exam debacle, the consistories began to sort out what kind of action to take, and launched a discourse that involved most of the church’s clerical and lay leaders. By mid-1892 they had reached a consensus: the consistories would ask the government to convene a synod. Not only would this approach restore a traditional institution of Reformed ecclesiology, but it was, tactically speaking, a measure that had good chances for success. While the French government had never convened them, the Organic Articles did contain provisions for regional synods, provided at least five consistories were at hand. On 17 October 1892, delegates from the four Alsatian consistories—Metz refused to participate—met in Strasbourg to plan for the convocation of a constitutive synod. The organizing committee wanted to invite all the consistories’ members to participate in the synod, which they regarded as a body that would develop uniform policies for matters that the consistories had in common. The synod’s resolutions, however, would not be binding until adopted by the individual consistories. Lastly, to oversee the synod’s business between sessions, the organizing committee proposed establishing a standing executive committee (Synodalausschuß ), consisting of two representatives from each consistory (one pastor, one layman).121 On 31 October 1892, Max Frey sent the organizing committee’s proposal to the Ministry, and requested that the Ministry authorize such a synod’s convocation. At Justice and Religious Affairs, Ministerialrat Dursy and Hildebrand both scrutinized the organizing committee’s plans and found them questionable in several respects. They were troubled by the vague definition of the synod’s and its executive committee’s powers and purview. They felt that, for a body with largely advisory functions, the proposed membership was excessive. Problematic, too, was the fact that the Calvinists’ intentions exceeded what the law currently allowed. Whereas Möller used such assessments to kill the synodal movement, the Ministry now saw fit to keep the dialogue going. On 2 June 1893, it informed Frey that the government was not inclined to call a constitutive synod. However, since there were exactly five Reformed consistories in Alsace-Lorraine, there was nothing legally in the way of Grimm to Piepenbring, 19 May 1892, ADBR 173 AL 9. “Entwurf einer Synodalordnung der Reformierten Kirche,” sent to the Ministry by the committee’s chairman, Max Frey (Mulhouse) on 31 Oct 1892; ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 120 121

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the church asking the state to convoke a regional synod, as provided for in the Organic Articles.122 The Alsatian consistories reacted quickly to the government’s statement. By the end of the summer, all four had passed resolutions asking the government to organize a regional synod. As Max Frey observed in his letter to the Ministry of 31 August, “the consistories hoped that they would soon see the convocation of the regional synod that the Ministry itself had proposed.”123 Moreover, to force the Ministry’s hand, the consistories postponed acting on the state’s request that it standardize the practice of granting the venia concionandi. In its resolution of 22 August, for instance, Strasbourg noted that “while they were not opposed to the concept [reform of the venia] in principle, its implementation would be extremely problematic as long as the Reformed church lacked a central administrative organ . . . [thus] it seemed necessary that the consistories postpone discussion of the government’s suggestion until a synod could meet.”124 Throughout 1893 and into 1894, the Alsatian Calvinists continued to pressure the Ministry to make good on its promise. Members of the consistories met with civil servants in the Division of Justice and Religious Affairs. The consistories also sent resolutions to the Ministry, asking when they could expect formal preparations for the synod to begin.125 Since the internal records of the Ministry revealed no legal obstacles to bring the synod to life, there must have been political and practical concerns. Of the former, the most salient was the ongoing problem in Metz. On 14 February 1894 the consistory leadership—President Braun and Secretary Haas—strong armed the opposition in Metz and several other parishes to pass a resolution calling for the consistory to join the Lutheran church. Ultimately, this gambit was unsuccessful. The Orthodox Lutherans objected to the notion on principle, while liberals and pietists lamented the tactics employed to bring the union about.126 However, by putting the issue on the table, pro-union forces in Metz believed that they had scuttled the entire synodal movement. After all, only four of the consistories requested that a regional synod be convened.127 The Ministry, however, read the situation differently, ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). ADBR 173 AL 41. 124 Ibid. 125 ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 126 Metz’s request was treated most fully in the Superior Consistory sessions of 1894 and 1895, AS 49 (1894 – 95): 40 – 45, 107–16 and AS 50 (1895 – 96): 4 – 6. 127 Hammerstein-Loxten to the Ministry, 5 November 1894, ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 122 123

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and determined that the law required only that there be five consistories available for the synod, not that all five consent to form the body.128 Thus, preparations could continue for a synod, even if Metz kept its distance, as Puttkamer himself recommended in comments to Haas in late 1894: “The Metz consistory does not need to be represented in the Reformed Synod.”129 The different views on the requirements to call a synod revealed that there was no precedent. Indeed, because the French government had never convened a synod before 1870, the Ministry had to resolve ambiguities in the Organic Articles and the Decree-Law before it could satisfy the Alsatian consistories’ petition. In particular, the Ministry had to decide how representatives would be chosen and how the synod would convene. With respect to the delegations, the quandary arose from the Decree-Law’s total silence on the topic of synods. Did the formal recognition of the parish in 1852 mean that the parish also gained a right to be represented in the synod? Or, would the synod receive delegations only from the consistories, as the Organic Articles provided? Drawing on the French example for calling a national synod on 29 November 1871, Ministerialrat Hildebrand argued for the latter position. Dursy, however, argued in favor of the former interpretation, largely for practical reasons. A synod of ten members (two per consistory), he observed—eight if one assumed Metz’s nonparticipation—would be of little value. In fact, as long as Metz stayed away, parish-based representation would produce a synod of at most twenty-eight members, which was still quite manageable. On the other point, Hildebrand was concerned that the Organic Articles stipulated that the “government” alone had the power to call a synod. This would mean involving the Emperor, since German jurists consistently interpreted this word to mean the head of state. While accepting the validity of his colleague’s gloss, Dursy stressed that the point was moot for a relevant precedent had already been set. Similar language existed with respect to the Superior Consistory, but the Ministry (and before it, the Superior President) organized those sessions for years without any complaints from Berlin.130

128 Internal memoranda of Hildebrand (16 Nov 1893) and Dursy (1 Dec 1893), ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 129 These comments, too, had been passed on to Piepenbring, who expressed them in his letter to Hoseus of 26 Feb 1895, ADBR 33 AL 95 (96). 130 ADBR 133 AL 95 (96).

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As summer wound down in 1894, the Division for Justice and Religious Affairs effectively rallied around Dursy’s arguments. On 6 Dursy drafted a letter to Max Frey, and invited the consistories to select delegates for a synod and agree on an agenda for the first session that would require the government’s approval. Before either Hildebrand or Puttkamer signed this letter, however, the three district presidents were asked about the issue of delegation and the larger political question: Was it was desirable to organize a synod at all?131 The district presidents of Lower and Upper Alsace, Freyberg and Jordan, backed the consistories’ request. As Jordan remarked, “Given that current social and religious trends make a tighter organization of the Reformed consistories and community especially desirable, there is [little] reason to oppose this measure. Hammerstein-Loxten opposed the convocation, but noted that if it did take place, the delegates should be parish-based, which Jordan had also advanced, while Freyberg argued for representation by consistory.132 Based on these opinions, Puttkamer approved the synodal project. He confirmed Dursy’s decision to subject the Synod’s sessions to the same types of restrictions applied to the Superior Consistory. Meeting dates and agendas would require governmental approval. Synods could last no longer than six days and would have to be conducted in the presence of a governmental representative (the District President of Lower Alsace or his representative). Finally, no synod resolution could be published or executed until it received ministerial sanction. On a more practical note, Puttkamer instructed Dursy to advise Max Frey to limit the agenda for the first synod session to two topics: the elaboration of bylaws and how to conduct the synod’s business between sessions. The letter informing Max Frey that the Ministry had decided to grant the consistories’ request for a synod finally went out on 17 December 1894, a nice Christmas present to the Reichsland’s Reformed community.133 The Alsatian consistories moved quickly so that a synod could meet that spring. Representatives of the four consistories gathered in Strasbourg on 15 January 1895 to set the agenda and pick a date for the session. On 16 March, President Grimm of Bischweiler informed the Ministry of the consistories’ intentions. They wanted to gather on 16

131 132 133

Ibid. Ibid. Ibid., and ADBR 173 AL 9.

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and 17 April, in Strasbourg, and in addition to the two topics raised in the Ministry’s letter of 17 December, the consistories hoped to discuss the situation in Metz and, at last, deliberate on a uniform policy for the venia.134 The Ministry approved the proposal, but warned Grimm that it would not allow the Synod to pass any resolution on the Metz question. It also reminded the consistories that resolutions on the bylaws and the venia would require state approval before they could take effect. Finally, the Ministry pointed out that even if Metz opted not to send representatives to Strasbourg the consistory was technically a member of the Synod and would have to receive an invitation to participate in its sessions.135 In the Synod, the Reformed church in Alsace-Lorraine finally had an institution capable of representing the church as a whole to the public at large. It also located the expression of a corporate Reformed identity in Strasbourg, which gained additional weight when Karl Piepenbring was chosen as Synodal president in 1898.136 Equally important, over the course of the Synod’s first sessions, the delegates strove to accentuate the distinctiveness of the Reformed Church’s institutional profile. The bylaws adopted in the inaugural session, for instance, defined the Synod as a coordinating body. It did not have the right to legislate on all matters concerning the church, like the Superior Consistory, but only on issues—such as the preparation of theology students for ministry or a church tax—for which a single, uniform action on the church’s part was required. In this respect, the Synod chose not to follow the letter of the law concerning the regional synods, and opted instead to uphold the consistories’ traditional autonomy in the areas of discipline, liturgy, and doctrine. The bylaws also required electing five members to an executive committee, the Synodalvorstand, which would handle the synod’s affairs in between sessions. In contrast to the Lutheran Directory, the Synod’s executive committee had no authority particular to itself. The bylaws also specified more fluid representation on the Reformed committee. It had to include at least one representative from each consistory, as well as at least two pastors and two laymen. But beyond that, the Synod Copy of Grimm to the Ministry in ADBR 173 AL 9. ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 136 In 1913, Albert Kuntz of Mulhouse became the third president. When Piepenbring retired in 1914, however, Strasbourg’s parish council called Kuntz to the vacancy, thereby maintaining the connection between Strasbourg and the Synodal presidency. When Kuntz retired in 1935, his successor, Charles Bartholomé of Thann, was likewise called to Strasbourg. Bopp, Evangelischen Gemeinden, 335 and 347. 134 135

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was free to elect whom it wished. Therefore, there could be either a lay or a clerical majority on the committee. The synod could even choose a layman as president, although this never came to pass.137 The Synod’s efforts to fashion an awareness of the Reformed church and not just Reformed consistories in Alsace-Lorraine carried over into subsequent sessions. In one of its first official actions, for example, the executive committee decided to publish accounts of the Synod sessions, its resolutions, and relevant governmental correspondence in a newsletter, the Mitteilungen des Synodalvorstandes. While similar in concept to the Lutherans’ Amtliche Sammlung, the Synod’s Mitteilungen were palpably different. Its coverage of the Synod meetings were limited to summary statements and texts of resolutions passed, which meant that the newsletter was not subject to governmental censorship. Since it focused on the Synod’s affairs, and not those of the individual consistories, the Mitteilungen were also brief and appeared only once or twice a year.138 In 1896, the Synod continued its consciousness-raising activities by further innovating and establishing the office of church visitor (Visitator). Like the Lutheran religious inspector, the visitor was a pastor charged with visiting each parish in his district at least once every three years. The primary purpose of these visits was to improve the Synod’s knowledge of the religious state of affairs in the Church. Accompanied by the president and a layman of the consistory where the parish was located, the visitor was expected to inquire into how the parish was run, the state of parish life more generally, and how pastors conducted their religious education. Following each visit, the visitor was required to submit a report to the Synodalvorstand, which would decide which sections of the report could be communicated to the entire body. In spite of similar outward appearances, the visitor was not just a Reformed religious inspector with a different name. The visitors lacked the disciplinary and ecclesial authority present in the Lutheran office. That is, visitors could not sanction local priests, nor did they install them in office (these remained prerogatives of the consistory and its president). The Synod 137 The full proceedings of the first session appear in ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). On 28 May 1895, the Ministry announced that it could not formally approve the first three of the bylaws, which touched on the synod’s composition (Articles 1 and 2) and the executive committee’s ability to call special sessions (Article 3), because these matters lay outside the body’s prerogatives. Provisionally, however, the Ministry would allow the Synod to act as if Articles 1 and 2 had also taken effect, since they simply reiterated the current modus operandi. Ibid. 138 MSV 1 (1896).

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also opted to organize the visitation districts according to existing political boundaries, rather than consistorial borders. A visitor from Upper Alsace, Pastor Ernwein of Thann, was selected as the first visitor for Lower Alsace, while a pastor from Lower Alsace, Strasbourg’s Eduard Stricker, served as the first visitor for Upper Alsace. Lastly, because the visitors were not vested with any real power, the state neither appointed nor confirmed them.139 Only in one detail was this image of a unified Reformed church in Alsace-Lorraine imperfect. The Consistory of Metz still refused to have anything to do with the Synod. Yet, as the nineteenth century came to a close, Metz’s position was becoming untenable. The Superior Consistory remained hostile to its request for union. As State Secretary, Puttkamer was able to prevent the Division for Justice and Religious Affairs, led by the Alsatian Emil Petri since 1898, from pressing Metz to participate in the Synod’s activities. He also upheld the consistory’s right to bar its parishes from sending, on their own initiative, delegates to the Synodal sessions. Nevertheless, once the Ministry convened the regional Synod, it declared that henceforth it would correspond with the consistories only through the Synod and its executive committee. In short, even if Metz chose to ignore the Synod, the Synod was now the Reformed church’s legal representative and the Ministry would not undermine its work or its authority. In 1901, the tide shifted. Not only did the Superior Consistory definitively reject Metz’s ideas on union, but both of its supporters in the territorial administration left office. Hammerstein-Loxten departed to become Prussian interior minister in May, and Puttkamer was forced into retirement two months later.140 With Hammerstein-Loxten and Puttkamer gone, Synod President Piepenbring began courting the Division of Justice and Religious Affairs to pressure Metz into joining the Synod. In February 1902, Undersecretary Petri decided that the time had come to act. On 25 February he informed the new District President, Graf von Zeppelin-Aschhausen, that while the Metz consistory’s special situation was legal, it could not be tolerated further.

139 Synod Proceedings, 28 –29 April 1896, ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). Nevertheless, the Ministry did have to approve the Synod’s resolution that established the office and duties of the visitor. 140 SP (No. 419) 9 May 1901; Kurt Eissele, “Fürst Hermann zu Hohenlohe-Langenburg als Statthalter im Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen 1894 –1907 (Diss.: Universität Tübingen, 1950), 70 –73.

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Consistory President Braun was “invited” to have the consistory take up the matter of participating in the Synod’s activities.141 Petri also let Piepenbring know what he had done, and the Synod lauded both Petri’s and Piepenbring’s efforts when it met in April.142 That fall, Metz capitulated. At the consistory session of 19 November 1902, Metz resolved to join the Synod, provided that three conditions were met. First, the Synod was to declare that it would respect the special (“unified”) character of many of Lorraine’s “Reformed” communities. Second, the Synod would allow individual parishes in the consistory to bear the title “Evangelical parish” instead of “Reformed parish” if they so desired. Third, the Synod was to support drafting a law that would provide more equitable representation of the consistories in the Synod.143 When the Synod assembled in April 1903, the executive committee endorsed all three stipulations. After all, Piepenbring observed, “the Synod had already pledged to respect the traditions of the individual consistories.” He also pointed out that changing the existing mode of selecting delegates was unavoidable if Metz joined the Synod. During the debate, several delegates hoped that the question of representation could be resolved by means other than altering the existing laws. In the end, however, the membership recognized that the greater good lay in gaining Metz’s participation, and it accepted Metz’s demands in toto.144 The Ministry assented to all of Metz’s requests, save for that concerning the use of the term “Evangelical Parish.”145 In so doing, the Ministry committed itself to a major policy shift: for the first time since 1871, it agreed to amend part of the existing ecclesiastical legislation. In fact, as the Ministry, the Synod’s executive committee, and Metz all acknowledged, Metz’s wishes could only be satisfied via the legislative process. Even its requests for the delimitation of the synod’s prerogatives conflicted with the existing laws. Petri did much more than just agree to write a law to cover the Church’s needs. To counter lingering suspicions of what might happen once revision of the church laws began—the Letter Petri to Zeppelin-Aschhausen, ADBR 1049 W 2. Synod Proceedings, 27 April 1903, ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 143 ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 144 Synod Proceedings for 1903, ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 145 On 7 March 1903 Petri informed Braun that the Ministry opposed this appellation and would tolerate it only where it was already in use. Petri’s main objection stemmed from the fact that the phrase created problems for Lorraine’s formally constituted Lutheran parishes and missions. ADBR 1049 W 2. 141 142

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Fabri affair’s legacy—he invited the Synod to propose language for the legislation that the Ministry would consider adopting.146 In mid-October 1903, the Synod’s executive committee produced a first draft of the new synodal statutes (Synodalordnung). The fact that this text differed only in minor ways from the bill that the Ministry ultimately submitted to the Landesausschuß bespeaks the overwhelming consensus within the Church and the Ministry regarding the legislation. The proposed Synodalordung confirmed existing practices and gave them full legal sanction. It recognized the executive committee and the visitors. It also formally stated that the Synod had only the power to “debate and pass resolutions on the church’s general affairs.” As Metz wished, the Synod expressly excluded from its prerogatives the right to approve books for religious education and services, as well as the power to legislate on liturgical and disciplinary matters. As it was before, these remained the province of the individual consistories. The question concerning the means of representation was a bit more difficult to resolve. In principle, the delegates accepted Metz’s proposition that representation should vary in accordance with the consistory’s size. But Metz’s specific proposal would have drastically reduced the delegations from the smaller consistories (Bischweiler, Strasbourg, and Markirch), making it unacceptable. In the end, the Synod compromised. Each consistory would be guaranteed at least two delegates (one lay, one clerical), with two additional delegates granted to consistories with between 4,000 – 6,000 members. Consistories with more than 6,000 members (Metz and Mulhouse) would gain two additional delegates for every additional 6,000 parishioners.147 The only really novel part of the Synod’s proposal was language in Article 2 that formally empowered the Synod to approve and release regulations on matters of a purely internal nature on its own authority. When the proposed legislation was sent to Berlin in 1905, the Prussian Kultusminister pointed out that this clause could be a source of future church-state conflict. He recommended either eliminating it or providing a precise enumeration of the matters in question. Statthalter Hohenlohe-Langenburg, however, assured Chancellor von Bülow that since the religious situation in Alsace-Lorraine was different than in ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). MSV 9 (November 1904): 33 –38. The Statthalter would establish the initial size of the consistorial delegations in the law, but the Synod could propose changes to those numbers every five years, if the results of the quinquennial census warranted it. 146 147

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Prussia, such amendments were unnecessary, and the clause was left as it was.148 The Synod considered other innovations, but ultimately rejected them. For instance, as the executive committee prepared the first draft, it raised the question of eliminating the need for the Synod to meet in the presence of a governmental representative. “On at least one occasion,” Piepenbring wrote to the Ministry, “this has proven onerous to the Synod; moreover, many Protestants feel that this practice is incompatible with the dignity of the church.” But Petri was unwilling to renounce this state prerogative, so this executive committee retained it in the proposal as Article 4.149 During the course of the April 1904 session, one of the delegates from Metz also proposed making the professor of Reformed dogma at Strasbourg a member ex officio. Although several members admitted the benefits of fostering closer ties between Church and Faculty in this way, the body decided not to endorse the motion since the Reformed church played no role in the professor’s appointment. Indeed, he was not even required to join one of the territory’s Reformed parishes. As a compromise, Eduard Stricker (Strasbourg) suggested that one of the larger consistories name the professor as one its delegates, which duly happened after the law took effect.150 With the close of the June 1904 Synod session, the substantive negotiations over the language for the new Synodalordnung and its directives ended. As Petri prepared to bring the legislation to the Bundesrat and Landesausschuß, he succeeded in protecting it from amendments by outside parties. When the other divisions of the Reichsland government reviewed the proposal later that summer, he foiled attempts by both the University Curator and the Oberschulrat to insert their pet projects into the bill.151 The Ministry likewise managed to overcome the minor objections that imperial authorities in Berlin raised early in 1905, enabling Kaiser Wilhelm II to submit the bill to the Bundesrat for a first reading on 1 February 1905. The Alsatian Landesausschuß was less

ADBR 133 95 (96). ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 150 Synod Proceedings, April 1904, ADBR 147 AL P. 7 (4). Later, the Curator for the University of Strasbourg also lobbied for giving the professor a seat in the Synod, but the Division for Justice and Religious Affairs conceded that, on this point, the Synod was justified in its position. Undated Religious Affairs Division memorandum (ca. August 1904) of Ministerialrat Hildebrand, ADBR 133 AL 94 (95). 151 Oberschulrat Albrecht wanted the Synod to have the same powers as the Superior Consistory to approve religious books, but this would have violated one of Metz’s conditions for joining the synod. 148 149

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inclined to leave the legislation untouched. Although the Reichsland’s Protestants long feared pursuing new church laws for precisely this reason, the form of the delegation’s intervention was altogether positive. During the bill’s first reading, Protestant deputies from Upper Alsace moved to strike Article 4, and they were supported in this effort by the chamber’s Catholic majority. Then, when the government tried to have the Landesausschuß reconsider this decision on the grounds that eliminating Article 4 would create a difference in how the state supervised the two Protestant churches, Strasbourg’s Mayor Back attached a rider to the bill that likewise freed the Superior Consistory from meeting in the presence of a governmental representative. In this form, the Landesausschuß approved the new Synodalordnung.152 Conceding that the Reichsland government really did not need this prerogative to oversee the churches—the right to approve their agenda and resolutions sufficed—Statthalter Hohenlohe-Langenburg sent the amended legislation back to Berlin for a third and final reading in the Bundesrat, which passed it on 31 May 1905.153 Finally, on 21 June 1905, the Kaiser signed the bill into law. The dream of a Reformed Synod that represented the entire Reichsland was now a reality.154 The promulgation of the new Synodalordnung in 1905 was a landmark event for the Reformed Church and Reichsland Protestantism. After trying for thirty years, the Reformed Church obtained an institution to represent the community’s collective interests vis-à-vis state and society. They acquired a body whose very existence fostered public consciousness of a Reformed Church instead of mere Reformed consistories in Alsace-Lorraine. Furthermore, by promoting centralization and bureaucratization, the new Synodal Law helped transform the Reformed Church into a more modern, urban organization. Equally significant, was that the 1905 law broke the “Fabri curse,” which long prevented any sort of ecclesial reform in the territory’s Protestant churches. Through their actions in 1904– 05, Ministry and Parliament demonstrated that they could act responsibly in the area of Protestant church law. The state may not have been open to major changes in the basic structures of church-state relations, as the discussion of Article 4 revealed, but it

152 153 154

AS 66 (1911): 44. ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). MSV 10 (February 1906).

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was willing both to entertain reforms that reflected the current needs of the church and the state and engage, from the outset, the churches in their realization. It is this latter point that deserves emphasis, especially in light of the historiographical tradition regarding church and state in modern Europe and, more specifically, imperial Germany. Taking events like the German Kulturkampf or the French Law of Separation, which was also passed in 1905, as examples, scholars have long framed the story of churchstate relations at the end of the long nineteenth century in terms of conflict, namely, between the Catholic Church and the modern secular State.155 The history of Protestant church-state relations in Strasbourg, however, suggests that this perspective is too narrow, and obscures other important facets of the picture. Protestant church authorities also had to struggle with the state to defend and pursue their interests, even if these collisions were rarely as spectacular as the Catholics’. Indeed, because of their greater reliance on the state—whether in England, the Netherlands, or Germany—Protestant churches often had an even harder time adapting church institutions and structures to meet the changing social, cultural, and political environment.156 Similarly, the tensions regarding the development of Protestant ecclesiastical policy in Alsace-Lorraine call attention to the fact that in the age of the emergent nation-state, Protestants could be just as defensive of local identities and traditions as Catholics—even in an ostensibly Protestant state like imperial Germany.157 Above all, the history of the Reichsland’s Lutheran and Reformed Churches’ experience with the German administration reveals the need to broaden our understanding of late nineteenth-century church-state conflicts. Although they arose, often enough, out of disputes over the

155 On the situation in France in 1905, see Maurice Larkin, Church and State after the Dreyfus Affair: The Separation Issue in France (London: Macmillan, 1974). 156 Useful here are Gerald Parsons, ed., Religion in Victorian Britain, vol. 2, Controversies (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1989), esp. 88–165; Michael J. Wintle, Pillars of Piety: Religion in the Netherlands in the Nineteenth Century, 1813 –1901 (Hull: Hull University Press, 1987); and Besier, Religion Nation Kultur, 62–123. 157 Gerhard Besier raises this point in his discussion of Prussian church politics following Prussia’s post-1866 expansion, but the Protestant dimension to the broader question of nationality in Imperial Germany has received much less attention. Besier, Preussische Kirchenpolitik, 43 – 59 and 340 – 425. Useful for the consideration of the nationality problem are the essays in Peter Baumgart and Richard Dietrich, eds., Expansion und Integration. Zur Eingliederung neugewonnener Gebiete in den preussischen Staat (Cologne: Böhlau, 1984).

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state’s use of its police powers—or even efforts to extend that authority—antagonisms also emerged from the state’s efforts to promote the churches’ mission. Far from a sign of the state’s increasing secularization, the culture wars—at least in Alsace-Lorraine and Imperial Germany—reflected the state’s ongoing and positive concern with religious communities’ contributions to both state and society. Indeed, through its negotiations with the Protestant churches over matters of internal procedure and policy, discussions that profoundly influenced how individuals interacted with pastors and participated in formal religious life, the state validated the churches’ status as legitimate, public institutions. It helped focus the churches’ institutional identity and, especially in centers like Strasbourg, strengthened their position as agents in the construction of urban culture.

CHAPTER FIVE

THE WORSHIPPING COMMUNITY “The great majority of our working classes avoid the church,” Georg Metzger observed in his report on the St. William Inspection for 1913. Similarly, religious interest and churchly attachments are almost wholly absent among the social elite—capitalists, intellectuals, senior civil servants. . . . There are some parishes that can still boast of active participation in Sunday services, and others have a solid core of regular participants, but for the most part an astonishing number of people these days stay away from the church on Sundays, and do so without any particular reason.1

And yet, the inspector’s description could have been made by any number of European churchmen during the second half of the nineteenth century. Well before the turn of the century, ministers had been grumbling about declining interest in church life, especially in the European big cities. Whether in London or Berlin, in Amsterdam or Paris, the number of people attending Sunday services regularly was ebbing noticeably. Whole segments of the population—men above all—made it to services only rarely, if they showed up at all.2 Parents made less of an effort to have their children baptized. In France and in Germany after 1875, where civil marriage was obligatory, an ever larger number of couples decided not to have a minister bless their unions.3 For over a century, such statements and trends have formed the crux of arguments in favor of a secular, urban modernity. While churchmen bemoaned their shrinking congregations, they blamed the trend on

SWIR 1913. It has become commonplace to label the higher level of women’s participation in church affairs as a “feminization” of religion. See here especially, McLeod, Piety and Poverty, 149–73; and idem, “Weibliche Frömmigkeit—männlicher Unglaube? Religion und Kirchen im bürgerlichen 19. Jahrhundert,” in Bürgerinnen und Bürger: Geschlechtsverhältnisse im 19. Jahrhundert, ed. Ute Frevert (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1988), 134–56. 3 On religious trends in urban Europe, the essays in Elm and Loock, Seelsorge und Diakonie and McLeod, European Religion in the Age of Great Cities remain useful points of departure. Lucian Hölscher, ed., Datenatlas zur religiösen Geographie, represents the most extensive effort to quantify church-oriented piety (Kirchlichkeit) in modern Europe. 1 2

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urban growth, the tavern, and the modern Zeitgeist; sociologists like Ferdinand Tönnies and Max Weber concluded that this departure from the churches’ ritual offerings was just another sign of the churches’ demise as meaningful institutions in European social and cultural life. Although scholars have subjected the secularization thesis overall to withering criticism in recent years, its indictment of “traditional” religion remains influential. Cognizant of the statistical evidence that demonstrates a clear downward trend in official religious practice over time, revisionists like Callum Brown and even Norbert Busch contend that these numbers do not tell the whole, or even the most important part of the story. To understand religion’s place in the modern world, they argue, we should look not at religious services and church rites, but rather at the new fields of activity—religious associations, newspapers, and devotions like the cult of the Sacred Heart—as well as the new modalities for propagating religious ideas in modern society.4 In this way, the revisionists, too, have essentially declared the old religion dead.5 This chapter, the first of three devoted to forms of religious cultural practice in German Strasbourg, proceeds from a different logic. Instead of dismissing worship and church-based piety as irrelevant and moribund, it asserts that they remained important for shaping religious identities and notions of religious community in the urban environment. The clergy’s Jeremiads and the sociologists’ prognostications notwithstanding, as late as 1914 substantial numbers of urban dwellers still maintained ties with official religious communities. Inspector Metzger himself admitted in 1910, “that on feast days, there has been no remarkable drop in church attendance.”6 Men and women may not have attended services as assiduously as ministers felt they

4 McLeod, Secularisation, 3 –12; Brown, Death of Christian Britain; Busch, Katholische Frömmigkeit. This lack of interest in “traditional” religion is, in fact, typical of the entire German school of “milieu studies,” as summarized in AKZGM, “Konfession und Cleavages im 19. Jahrhundert. Ein Erklärungsmodell zur regionalen Entstehung des katholischen Milieus in Deutschland,” Historisches Jahrbuch 120 (2000): 358–95. On the diffusion of Christianity outside of church networks, see especially Cox, English Churches, 93–95. 5 But even less adamantly revisionist studies, such as Yves-Marie Hilaire’s groundbreaking, Une chrétienté au XIXe siècle. La vie religieuse des populations du diocèse d’Arras (1840 – 1914) (Lille: Publications de l’Université de Lille III, 1977), and Werner K. Blessing, Staat und Kirche in der Gesellschaft. Institutionelle Autorität und mentaler Wandel in Bayern während des 19. Jahrhunderts (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1982), provide little sense of what it was like to attend (Catholic) services during the nineteenth century. 6 SWIR 1910.

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should, and they may have observed certain rites, like confirmation and first communion, more out of a sense of social obligation than personal conviction, but by partaking in such ceremonies, they stayed in contact with the churches over the course of their lives. This meant that they directly took part in the process of realizing religious community. Moreover, through the ritual process, the liturgy’s organization and, especially, the sermon’s content, this physical act of community formation was overlaid with powerful symbols and narratives about the community and the meaning of community membership.7 At the same time, the evidence from Strasbourg reveals that the liturgical and ritual dimension of community life displayed considerable innovation and dynamism during the final decades of the long nineteenth century. Although urbanization created obstacles for members of certain social groups to attend services at the customary times, parishes sought to attract the faithful by holding liturgies at alternative hours. The churches also advanced new temporal claims in this period. They introduced new feasts and organized special services to commemorate major historical events. Groups like the Evangelical Society even organized missions that drew hundreds of Protestants into the city’s churches to hear preachers like Elias Schrenk and receive communion. Above all, pastors endeavored to create new worship experiences. They experimented with alternative conceptions of liturgical space, rethought ritual practice, and even made accommodations to modern technology in order to make worship both more contemporary (zeitgemäß) and more Alsatian. Marking Time and Defining Religious Community “Our generation has no time” (Unsre Zeit hat keine Zeit). The Professor of Reformed dogma at the University of Strasbourg, Julius Smend, expounds on one of the most notable consequences of modernity under this title in the February 1910 issue of the Monatschrift für Gottesdienst

7 On ritual and narrative identity see the pioneering works of Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (Chicago: Aldine, 1966); and idem, Dramas, Fields and Metaphors (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1974); as well as Catherine Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992); and Margaret D. Somers, “The Narrative Constitution of Identity: A Relational and Network Approach,” Theory and Society 23 (1994): 605–49.

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und kirchliche Kunst (Monthly Journal for Worship and Liturgical Arts).8 He contends that modern man no longer finds the occasion to nurture mind and soul, but the hustle and bustle of everyday life also threatens those spheres of activity—namely, worship—where a certain calm and measured reflection were essential. When he finds time to come to church at all, the modern man wants everything to be brief: prayers, hymns, and, above all, the sermon. “[Keep it] short, short. That is the greatest wisdom.”9 As Smend aptly recognizes, time was indeed a major factor bearing on the vitality of religious culture, and not just in urban Strasbourg. Over the course of the nineteenth century, new social, economic, and cultural conditions undermined the organized churches’ temporal claims, especially Sundays as “sacred time.” But it would be a mistake to view those developments as evidence for the victory of secularization. To accommodate their increasingly hurried congregations, Protestant parishes in Strasbourg adjusted service schedules. Parishes moved to sacralize time in new ways in conjunction with higher church authorities. These efforts created additional opportunities to bring the faithful into the churches. They also enabled the churches to reassert notions of confessional specificity in the religiously pluralist urban environment. Claiming time for religious purposes was already well established by the time that German rule and urbanization commenced in Strasbourg. For the Christian communities, Sunday was the primary day for worship, although, throughout the year, additional days were designated for ritual purposes. Indeed, since the Reformation, Catholics and Protestants differentiated themselves by their list of holy days. Lutherans and Calvinists organized regular services on very few days apart from Sunday: namely, Good Friday, Ascension Thursday and Christmas. Strasbourg’s Lutheran parishes also routinely held a liturgy on New Year’s Eve, which served in part to commemorate those who had died during the previous year. Catholics, too, privileged Ascension Thursday and Christmas, but also the Mondays after Pentecost and Easter, Corpus Christi (a Friday), the Feast of the Assumption of Mary

8 Smend coedited the journal with his Strasbourg colleague, Friedrich Spitta. On the importance of both men and their journal for the fin de siècle liturgical revival within German Protestantism, see Konrad Klek, Erlebnis Gottesdienst. Die liturgischen Reformbestrebungen um die Jahrhundertwende unter Führung von Friedrich Spitta und Julius Smend (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996). 9 Julius Smend, “Unsre Zeit hat keine Zeit” MGkK 15 (1910): 37–39.

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(15 August), and All Saints Day. According to the Napoleonic ecclesiastical legislation, however, the power to name holy days and declare them as public days of rest lay with the state. Napoleon’s regime established only three such legal holidays, Ascension, All Saints, and Christmas, and his grand-nephew Louis Napoleon added only one more, Assumption.10 Although the state created these days of rest for citizens to receive spiritual nourishment, local and confessional considerations determined how the churches advanced their specific claims on this time. In Strasbourg, for instance, the main Sunday service for all three Christian communities was in the morning. The city’s Catholic parishes held masses throughout the morning, with the principal service (“Hochamt”) occurring at 9:00 (the Cathedral’s high mass, however, normally began at 9:40).11 The Protestant parishes usually only had a morning service (the “Amtpredigt”) that commenced at 9:30 (St. Nicholas-German began at 9:15 so that the French-language parish could hold its service at 11:00), but during the summer months, parishes like New Church and Old St. Peter also offered an early service at 7:00. Nevertheless, the Lutheran claim on Sunday was not exhausted with the Amtpredigt, since there was also an afternoon liturgy at 3:00. Nor was the time marked as “sacred” restricted in Strasbourg to the announced times for services. Indeed, each parish in the city used the distinctive tones of its bells to call the faithful to worship, and their ringing began a full fifteen minutes before the first notes on the organ sounded.12 During the week, the church bells in the city’s Protestant parishes rang less regularly. Only New Church and the two St. Peter parishes offered weekday prayer services throughout the year, but during Advent and Lent the other parishes also used weekday time for special devotional liturgies.13 One of the consequences of the Catholic church’s special status in nineteenth-century France was that the official list of state holidays

10 Ferdinand Geigel, Das französische und reichsländische Staatskirchenrecht Elsaß-Lothringens (Strasbourg: Karl J. Trübner, 1884), 49n1. 11 J. Wendling, ed., Pfarr- und Vereinskalender für die Katholiken Strassburgs auf das Jahr 1910 (Strasbourg: Le Roux, 1910), 28–37. 12 Strasbourg Pastoralgesellschaft, ed., Kirchlicher Wegweiser in Straßburg oder Aeußere Ordnungen der evangelischen Kirche Augsb. Konfession in der Stadt Strasbourg (Strasbourg: Straßburger Druckerei und Verlagsanstalt, 1895), 1. 13 Traditionally, the New Church also held a service on Tuesday afternoons, but after the destruction of the New Church in August 1870, this practice was not resumed until 1878.

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included two feasts—Assumption and All Saints—that had no particular meaning for Protestants. Initially, Lutheran and Calvinist officials made no special demands on this time. By the 1830s, however, Lutheran leaders realized that in order to reinforce the connection between public holidays and religious time, a Protestant encoding of the Catholic feasts was desirable. In 1840, the General Consistory named 1 November as Reformation Day. Not only would every parish have to hold services on this day, but they would all hold a special collection to support the construction of new Lutheran churches. For each year, the Directory also designated a common sermon text for this service, which parishes announced to the congregation in advance.14 With respect to the Feast of the Assumption, Protestants were able to take a different tack. Coincidentally, 15 August was also the French national holiday (Napoleon I’s birthday), so parishes could meet their obligation to hold a service on that day by offering a civil-religious ceremony for the state, which differentiated it from the Catholics’ liturgy for the Virgin Mary.15 After 1870, these practices for marking religious time were increasingly called into question. From the clergy’s perspective, the most problematic trend was the declining participation in Sunday services. Already in 1874, for instance, Inspector Ungerer opined that the number of people in Strasbourg who “failed to take part in worship” was reaching “calamitous” proportions.16 Inspector Heintz at St. Thomas did not share his colleague’s sense of impending doom, but in 1877 he too conceded that “in recent years attendance levels have generally dropped more than they have risen.”17 The inspectors were also quick to explain their changed priorities. Few of the immigrant Germans, Heintz noted in 1877, visited the churches at all. Far from models of piety, “most were quite indifferent to the churches.” Economic and social changes were also having an effect on attendance, even in the 1870s. As Ungerer observed, Sunday mornings were no longer days of rest for

14 Announcement of 8 October 1840, RO 1 (1840): 1. The collections began only in 1853, whereas the decision to use the proceeds for building new churches dated from 1856. RO 8 (1851): 165, and RO 13 (1856): 149–52. 15 RO 9 (1851–52): 101–02. On Louis-Napoleon’s decision to “Bonapartize” his new regime by reestablishing 15 August as the national holiday in 1852, see Sudhir Hazareesingh, “‘A Common Sentiment of National Glory’: Civic Festivities and French Collective Sentiment under the Second Empire,” JMH 76 (2004): 280–311, esp. 280–81. 16 NCIR 1873. 17 STIR 1876.

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all workers, and Sunday afternoons were more and more “profaned” (entweiht) by the pursuit of pleasure and sociability.18 Urban growth and the development of robust transportation networks in Alsace only multiplied the number of extra-ecclesial options for spending the Sunday and holiday hours. In good weather, the gardens of the Orangerie and the public amusements on the Contades beckoned. On less pleasant days, the taverns were convenient locales for discussions over a glass of good Alsatian beer. Many of the city’s voluntary associations held their meetings on Sunday afternoons. They also organized their outings—bicycling trips through the Vosges, hiking in the Black Forest—for the “day of rest.” The concert hall and theater, too, did a nice business on Sundays, as did, in the last years of peace, the first movie theaters.19 Given the degree and nature of sociocultural change in German Strasbourg, it is perhaps most remarkable that even as late as 1914 the churches still had considerable success in claiming Sunday and holidays as “sacred.” In fact, the only area in which the Protestants churches proved entirely uncompetitive was the Lutheran custom of afternoon services. With the notable exception of the conservative Young St. Peter congregations, the city’s parishes watched the number of people coming to worship at three in the afternoon plummet, to the point that, in 1898, one of the city pastors in the St. Thomas inspection proposed that several parishes come together for a common service. Inspector Knittel doubted that even this would have much effect, “for the time when families come to church twice on Sundays appears to have passed.”20 Otherwise, many families were still coming at least once, on Sunday mornings. Despite the pessimism of the early and middle 1870s, in subsequent years the religious inspectors’ reports paint the picture of good attendance at the principal service. This was especially true of feast days and other special occasions, as Inspector Metzger related in 1910: “Many of the [pastors] emphasized the high levels of participation in the great festive services. . . . On Christmas, Easter, Pentecost and

NCIR 1876. Vogler, Histoire culturelle, 348–53; Wahl and Richez, L’Alsace, 148–55. In 1920, Wahl and Richez point out, Strasbourg already had about a dozen cinemas. 20 Cf. STIR 1896 (Knittel), 4–5; NCIR 1900 (on the situation in Young St. Peter); STIR 1898, 4. 18 19

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on Good Friday above all, the churches are full, when not overfilled.”21 Moreover, at the turn of the century, several pastors remarked that even on “normal” Sundays, the faithful seemed more numerous than previously. In 1905, Inspector Höpffner observed, “In contrast to the stereotypical complaints about the decline of churchly sentiment in our day, it should be stressed once more, that the levels of participation in public worship in Strasbourg have been on the rise now for a number of years.” Likewise, Robert Will averred in 1913 that “in Strasbourg, we cannot complain about having empty churches.”22 Although the Protestant clergy continued to obtain sizable congregations for their sermons, the makeup of their congregations was changing. Churchgoers during the Reichsland period were most likely to be female and middle-class. Members of the old-Strasbourg bourgeoisie and the families of middle- and lower-ranking civil servants were especially prominent among the churchgoing population. By contrast, men, and younger men in particular, were rarely found at church. As noted at the beginning of the chapter, members of the highest and lowest levels of society were almost entirely absent. University professors and senior civil servants were as likely as the urban poor to stay clear of the churches unless special circumstances—a wedding, a funeral, or the need for charitable assistance—required their presence.23 Strasbourg’s congregations also tended to separate clearly into two distinct groups: the regulars, who were especially numerous at places like Young St. Peter; and the “irregulars,” namely, parishioners, who only occasionally made their way to church. Strasbourg’s Protestant clergy were well aware of the challenges that urbanization posed to the notion of sacred time. While little could be done substantively to counteract the erosion of interest for Sunday afternoon services, Protestant leaders did shore up the position of the Sunday morning liturgy. Even before the annexation, domestic responsibilities made it difficult for certain segments of the Protestant population to worship in the morning. The decision to hold the main service at 9:30 (9:15 in summertime) itself reflected this situation. It was late enough to permit wives and domestics to do early morning chores and serve breakfast before church, but not so late that the family SWIR 1910. NCIR 1905, 3–4; SWIR 1910. 23 See, among others, STIR 1880, 11; SWIR 1901, 14 –15 and 1902, 25–26; NCIR 1895, 1. 21 22

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couldn’t eat lunch together afterward by noon or twelve-thirty. Nevertheless, even this arrangement was impractical for many, especially on Sundays when the service exceeded the usual seventy-five minutes. In these cases, the faithful had no other option than to worship in the afternoon or, during the summer, early in the morning.24 The underlying problem was that changes in labor conditions were rapidly making attending church a social privilege that was possible only for the members of the “better classes.” By the 1870s the absence of strict laws governing economic activity on Sundays and other public holidays resulted in an ever larger number of people having to work on the day of rest. On both sides of the Rhine, taverns and shops were open for business on Sunday mornings, which kept their employees and clients out of the churches. Clerks and lower level civil servants were also expected to work a few hours on Sunday mornings, although many of these businesses and offices closed for an hour and a half so that the men could worship with their families.25 Strasbourg’s Protestant leaders did not leave these threats unchallenged. Starting in the 1880s, they joined the empire-wide calls for new legislation prohibiting most forms of work and economic activity on Sundays and legal holidays. In 1882, the Alsatian Pastoral Conference became one of the first Reichsland groups to establish a committee for promoting the cause of Sunday rest (Sonntagsruhe).26 Three years later, the Alsatian Protestant and Catholic communities waged separate petition campaigns, urging Bismarck to support the Sabbatarian legislation that the Center and Social Democratic parties advocated in the Reichstag. 1886 also witnessed the creation of a special (Protestant) association to lobby for these legislative reforms in Strasbourg.27 Only after Bismarck’s fall from grace in 1890 did the movement gain a partial victory. On 1 June 1891, an amended version of the

SG PBKR, 2:247–48 (3 Mar 1890); SPJ PBKR 3:46 (11 Oct 1892); PB-SPG, vol. 4 (1 Aug 1898), ADBR 172 AL 292; PBK, 8:364 (28 Jan 1901), AMS TN 104. 25 In order to make it easier for these men to attend church, several parishes decided in the late 1880s and early 1890s to postpone the Amtpredigt by fifteen minutes. Cf. SPJ PBKR 3:45 and 53–54 (11 Oct and 17 Dec 1892). See also the discussions of the Pastoral Society, esp. that of 28 Jan 1907, PB-SPG, 5:53–54, ECAAL. 26 ASPC 8 (1882): 167–68. On the broader campaign in the Empire, see Andreas Mattner, Sonn- und Feiertagsrecht (Cologne: Carl Heymanns, 1988), 4; and von Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch, 318–21. 27 KB 15/19 (1 May 1886). Protestant leaders in Alsace-Lorraine approached their Catholic peers about collaborating on this cause, but these overtures were firmly rebuffed. 24

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imperial Gewerbeordnung (industrial code) took effect, with which the Reichstag intended to ban all labor during the hours of the main Sunday morning services. Yet, the law also allowed businesses to be open for a maximum of five hours on Sunday, with the specific regulations to be established by local ordinance.28 In Strasbourg, the city council initially intended to permit four hours of business activity on Sunday, from 7:30 to 9:00 and from 11:00 to 1:30. However, pressured by the Chamber of Commerce to approve a longer, uninterrupted block of time, the Council established business hours on Sunday from 8:00 to 12:30, contending that individuals who wanted to go to church could still do so in the afternoon. This decision flabbergasted Strasbourg’s Protestant and Catholic leaders, since it blatantly ignored the legislators’ intent. In its 1892 petition to the Ministry to block the new statute, the Pastoral Society observed: “the [9:30 service] has always been the focus of community life; the early morning, afternoon, and evening services are not in the least equivalent.” The Society also condemned the city council’s action for social reasons: It is intolerable that when one part of the population goes through the streets dressed for work, another part—the better classes—is making its way to church in its finest clothes. From a moral standpoint, this situation . . . can have only negative consequences, for it promotes the notion that the church is only for the rich, not the poor and lesser folk. [Indeed], by this action, the city is only driving people into the arms of the Social Democrats.29

The Ministry was sympathetic to this and other petitions, but it was powerless to reverse the Strasbourg council’s decision. In the final analysis, the law only encouraged a cessation of Sunday work for morning worship; therefore, the city was within its rights to implement the legislation as it had.30 While Strasbourg’s Christian community sought to protect the traditional Sunday morning service, individual Protestant parishes tried to accommodate their members’ schedules better by altering the hours for other liturgies. These first innovations affected the weekday services.

28 Mattner, Sonn- und Feiertagsrecht, 2; Ministry of Alsace-Lorraine to Directory, 28 June 1892, ADBR 172 AL 143. 29 “Gesuch der Strassburger Pastoral-Gesellschaft . . . bezüglich Abänderung des Ortsstatuts über die Sonntagruhe,” ADBR 133 AL 50. 30 Nevertheless, as the thick dossier of materials in ADBR 133 AL 50 reveals, the Christian churches repeatedly sought to have the statute changed.

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In 1869, Old St. Peter decided to shift the Wednesday devotion to the evening, since “the poor, artisans, workers, and domestics” were not free at either three or four o’clock in the afternoon.31 Similarly, in light of the declining attendance at its Tuesday afternoon and early morning services during holy week, the New Church consistory tried holding them in the evening at eight o’clock.32 For its Lenten weekday services in 1884, Young St. Peter too opted for an evening hour, with generally good results.33 During the 1890s, parishes expanded their efforts to create alternative worship opportunities by moving them to new times. Rather than preparing for the next day’s communion service (usually called “confession” [Beichte]) during the afternoon, in 1893 St. Thomas began holding it in the evening, which parishes like New Church and Young St. Peter later emulated. Three years later, Eduard Stricker organized ecumenical (Lutheran and Reformed) services late on Saturday afternoons at the Reformed Church, which in 1905 were replaced by a regular, Calvinist service at five o’clock on Sundays. Several parishes sought to find a more satisfactory time for the Sunday afternoon liturgy, albeit with mixed results. New Church and St. Aurelia both tried switching to five o’clock, and St. Thomas eight o’clock, but by 1912 the former pair had reverted to three, and St. Thomas settled on five o’clock. Much more successful, was the use of the seven o’clock morning hour during the summer, a practice that New Church and Old St. Peter, as well as suburban Neudorf and Ruprechtsau adopted and maintained for a number of years.34 Although the ministerial corps believed strongly that the church had an obligation to make itself accessible to the faithful, parishes and individual pastors did not always agree on what accommodations were really desirable. Indeed, two of Strasbourg’s most liberal parishes, St. William and St. Nicholas, never once tried to update their service

SPV PBK, vol. 1 (6 Apr 1869). PBK, 7:205 and 286–88 (24 Sep 1877 and 5 Jan 1880), AMS TN 103. 33 However, when it was his turn to hold the service, the orthodox Lutheran pastor, Wilhelm Horning, stubbornly insisted on worshipping at the traditional afternoon time. SPJ PBKR, vol. 2, 1884, passim. 34 RK PBKR, resolutions of 27 Oct 1895 and 9 Jan 1905, ADBR 173 AL 60; SPV PBK, 3:251 (21 Sep 1909); AMS TN 135, 104, 29 Nov 1889, 17 Mar 1890, and 16 Jun 1890; SA PBK, vol. 2 (28 Nov 1898 and 23 Feb 1899); Wegweiser in die Kirche und die Innere Mission in Strassburg für neu zugezogene evangelische Glaubensgenossen (Strasbourg: n.d. [1912? or 1913?]), 3–4. 31 32

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schedules. Wilhelm Horning, the orthodox curate at Young St. Peter, also staunchly resisted all attempts at reform. Horning’s positions were rooted partly in his love of tradition, but above all in an awareness that reforms carried real costs. While the early morning and later evening hours were attractive to workers and employees, they were not suitable for the people who were most assiduous in attending such services: single women and old parishioners. In effect, parishes were ignoring the needs of committed Christians to attract an audience that, so far, wasn’t showing up. Consequently, Horning announced in 1884 that he would uphold “the time-tested traditions” of his father and not participate in the parish council’s experiments.35 The final decades of the long nineteenth-century also opened opportunities for marking sacred time in new ways. Strasbourg’s Protestant communities pursued them avidly, regarding them valuable chances to bring the faithful into the churches and to nurture their sense of Protestant identity. A case in point was the new approach to holy days. With the transfer of Alsace-Lorraine to German control, the Protestant churches were no longer obliged to hold services on 15 August and 1 November (although both days remained public holidays). In 1872, the Directory recommended that Reformation Day be observed on 31 October or, where that was not possible, on the Sunday closest to it.36 However, since 31 October was not a holiday, several parishes—most notably Strasbourg’s New Church—still opted to celebrate the feast on 1 November. To promote a greater sense of intrachurch unity, the Directory decided to regularize the situation in 1887 and declared that Reformation Day would be celebrated in every parish on the Sunday following 31 October.37 The churches’ commemoration of the head of state’s birthday ceased altogether until 1883, when Kaiser Wilhelm I decreed its restoration. Since it was not required that each parish have its own service, Strasbourg’s Protestant clergy arranged to hold a single liturgy for the entire city at the New Church.38

35 Wilhelm Horning, Erwünschtes und Erkämpftes, Section 4 of Köstliche Mühe und Arbeit in Amt, Gemeinde und Kirche zu Strassburg (Strasbourg: privately printed, 1913), 68–72. 36 AS 27 (1872): 63. 37 Correspondence between the Directory and the religious inspectors concerning Reformation Day, ADBR 172 AL 268. In years when 29 or 30 October fell on a Sunday, the Directory often named that day Reformation Sunday. 38 Memorandum from the Ministry, 136 AL 7/20; AS 37 (1883): 237–38. The first city-wide service took place on 22 March 1886, ADBR 136 AL 7/21 and Circular

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Still, the official recognition of two exclusively Catholic holidays and no Protestant feasts rankled the Reichsland’s Protestant population. Prompted by a petition from the rural Dettweiler consistory in 1884, the Directory acted. “In a region where the law is based on the freedom of conscience and where all religions are equal,” it wrote to the Ministry, “the feast days of one church should not be forced upon the members of the other [recognized churches], as is [currently] the case.” The Directory therefore requested that either the Assumption of Mary and All Saints be dropped from the list of legal holidays or, at the very least, that Good Friday enjoy the same protection.”39 The Lutherans seriously doubted that the government would endorse the first option. It would needlessly upset the Catholic population; moreover, both days were recognized as legal holidays in much of the Empire. But it had high hopes for the second, since elsewhere in the Empire Good Friday was a day of rest. After two years of internal discussion, the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine agreed to draft a law that would add not only Good Friday, but also Easter and Pentecost Mondays and St. Stephen’s Day (26 December) to the list of holidays. The proposal granted the Protestant’s wishes with respect to Good Friday. It also harmonized the Reichsland’s holiday list with those prevailing in the rest of the Empire, which was desirable from both an economic and a legal standpoint.40 The Landesausschuß and the Bundesrat duly backed the bill, although the Landesausschuß struck St. Stephen’s day from the proposal, since many churches did not observe it. Then on 19 October 1887 the emperor signed the bill into law and gave the Protestants their victory.41 Or so it appeared. While Protestants were now free to attend services on Good Friday, newspapers and local officials throughout AlsaceLorraine reported that Catholics refused to observe Good Friday as a day of rest. They held markets, worked in fields, and hung their laundry, even in Strasbourg.42 When Lutheran and Reformed officials inquired into the matter, they learned that the three new holidays did not have from the Directory to Strasbourg’s Lutheran pastors, 2 Mar 1886, SG PBKR, vol. 2 (2 Mar 1888). 39 As reported to the Superior Consistory on 28 Nov 1884, AS 29 (1884–85): 19. 40 “Gesetzentwurf und Begründung, betr. die gesetzlichen Feiertage,” dated 15 Jan 1887, BAL RK 146/7, 17–19. 41 Report from Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst to Kaiser Wilhelm, 15 Oct 1887, GStA Rep 89, Nr. 23543, No. 26024. 42 Cf. Reports in KB 17/14 (7 April 1888): 111, and 18/17 (27 May 1889): 135.

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the same status as the others. It was a state holiday, but not in the sense of the business codes. To appease the Protestant community, the Ministry decreed on 16 August 1892 that in communities where a Protestant or a shared (Protestant-Catholic) church stood, Good Friday would be treated as a full legal holiday. But this didn’t completely solve the problem either. Hence, on 11 November, the Directory asked the government to make Good Friday a full legal holiday de jure. The current policy, President Petri wrote, “discriminated against the Protestants . . . and this distinction is especially apparent to those living in a pluralistic community, which certainly does not help the cause of . . . interconfessional peace.” Sympathetic as the Ministry was, the Reichsland’s complicated legal and political situation prevented the desired resolution. Good Friday remained a holiday, even if only in parts of Alsace.43 Despite its shortcomings, the 1887 holiday law represented an important victory for the Protestant churches: the purportedly “secular state” had just sanctioned a new Protestant claim on time. The legalization of Good Friday was also noteworthy in that it strengthened the sense of “festive” sacred time, that is, when Protestants in Strasbourg were most frequently coming to the churches. Although it was rather difficult to create new, recurring feasts during the week, the Lutheran and Reformed churches could try to attract the faithful by elevating additional Sundays to the status of feast days, and by holding special religious events on an ad hoc basis during the week. Of the two territorial churches, only the Lutheran Church did much with the first strategy. At the urging of the Pastoral Conference, the Superior Consistory voted in 1886 to celebrate the first Sunday after Epiphany (6 January) as Mission Sunday, thereby promoting local awareness of the church and its world-wide activities on behalf of the gospel.44 Then, in 1899, the Superior Consistory endorsed the Evangelical Society’s proposal to designate Trinity Sunday (the First Sunday after Pentecost) as the “Feast of the Inner Mission.”45 Although both of these new feasts promoted the cause of intraProtestant solidarity, neither the Reichsland’s Lutheran, nor Reformed Church expressed much interest in expanding festive time to highlight ties to the greater German Protestant community. They both rejected ADBR 1049 W 1. Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 140–43; AS 40 (1885–86): 21, 98, and 110. 45 AS 54 (1899–1900): 201–02; AS 55 (1900): 125–26; PB-SPG, vol. 4, ADBR 172 AL 292. 43 44

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proposals from the Eisenach Conference and the Prussian Oberkirchenrat to create a special day of repentance (Bußtag).46 Nor did they endorse calls to establish a new service to honor of the dead (Totenfest). “A Totenfest,” one pastor remarked at the 1884 Pastoral Conference, “would only have merit if one read masses for the dead, as in the Catholic Church. Thus it is totally unnecessary to reintroduce it in the Protestant churches.”47 The most prominent tack for extending the sense of festive time and, simultaneously, reinforcing a sense of Protestant community, was the designation of one-time commemorative feasts. The final decades of the nineteenth century were especially well suited to such a strategy, for they were strewn with major anniversaries of crucial events in Protestant history. By holding special liturgies and stimulating people to attend church on those days (normally Sundays), the churches forged links between the past and present. They reminded the faithful about Protestantism and its history. They also provoked their modern-day despisers—Catholics, socialists, atheists—with evidence that the Protestant community was still alive and strong. The foremost example was the great Luther commemoration in 1883, the 400th anniversary of the reformer’s birth. In the months leading up to 11 November, the religious newspapers published numerous articles on Luther and his legacy. Children in Protestant schools were released on 9 November (a Friday), and presented with a special booklet on Luther. Lutheran parishes throughout the Reichsland were also charged with holding services on both 10 and 11 November. In Strasbourg, a single city-wide liturgy was held at the New Church on the tenth that a commission with representatives from each parish and theological orientation within the church planned.48 In subsequent years, the churches called attention to many other significant events from their past. The Reformed consistory paid its respects to Huldreich Zwingli in 1884, and marked the 200th anniversary of

46 KS PBK, 2:96–97 (4 June 1883), ADBR 173 AL 9; Directory to Oberkirchenrat, January 1892, ADBR 172 AL 268. Nevertheless, because the garrison communities in Alsace-Lorraine followed Prussian military service guidelines, they did observe the Bußtag. “Corps-Befehl” of 13 April 1893, AMS, GK 59/18. 47 ASPC 8 (1884): 366. On the “Totenfest” and the fin de siècle liturgical movement, see especially Hans Ihme, “Zur Einführung eines Totenfestes im Elsaß,” MGkK 16 (1911): 329–32. 48 “Diary of the New Church,” 10 Nov 1883, AMS, TN 110; ADBR 172 AL 268; PR 16/45 (10 Nov 1883): 360.

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the Edict of Nantes’ revocation one year later. In 1894, the Lutherans celebrated the three hundredth birthday of Gustavus Adolphus, and joined many other Lutheran churches throughout Germany by marking the anniversary of the noted hymnist Paul Gerhardt’s birth in 1906. This historicization of festive time also served to highlight particularly Alsatian dimensions of the Protestant past. In 1891 the Directory announced that Reformation Day would be dedicated to honoring “Strasbourg’s Reformer,” Martin Bucer. Similarly, in 1909, Reformed and Lutheran parishes paid tribute to John Calvin, who had ministered in Strasbourg between 1538 and 1541.49 In 1902, the two territorial churches also held special events to mark the hundredth anniversary of the Organic Articles that both reestablished Protestantism in France and made the two Protestant churches Catholicism’s legal equals. Individual parishes, too, got involved in this process of extending festive time for the benefit of their particular communities. They called attention to key moments in their past history, such as the Reformed Church’s celebration of one hundred years of legal existence in Strasbourg in 1890,50 and St. Nicholas’s and New Church’s respective commemorations of the one hundredth anniversaries of Johann Friedrich Bruch’s (1892) and Franz Haerter’s (1797) births. Congregations also celebrated events that evidenced their current vitality as religious communities. Parishes held special services to mark the installation of new pastors and parish councilors. The New Church marked the completion of its new church with an elaborate and lengthy service (three and one half hours) on 4 October 1877.51 But other city communities also organized festive liturgies to mark the successful creation of new ritual space: the restoration of Young St. Peter in 1901 (following the Catholics’ departure to their own building); the Reformed Church’s new bell tower in 1905; and the dedication of the church on the St. Martin’s bridge for the conservative, French-language free church in 1906.52 In addition, parishes allowed their churches to be used for functions organized by other Protestant groups in the city. Many of these events, 49 ADBR 173 AL 61, 4 Jun and 4 Sep 1883; ADBR 173 AL 49 (on the Reformed church’s part in the Luther and Bucer commemorations); ADBR 173 AL 63; and on the Calvin observance: ADBR AL 173 AL 9, 3:28 (16 Mar 1909); and AS 63 (1909): 362–64. 50 Zur Erinnerung an das Jubelfest der reformirten Kirche zu Straßburg am 15. Juni 1890 (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1890). 51 “Faits du Temple Neuf,” TN. 52 ADBR 173 AL 61 (sessions for 1905); Inauguration de l’Église Libre.

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such as the annual meetings of the Bible Society and the Liberal Protestant Union, were designed for a limited audience. Others, were open to the entire Protestant community. Of the latter, the most spectacular were the Protestant missions conducted between 1889 and 1908 by the famed evangelist Elias Schrenk.53 These events were exceptional not only for their length—they typically lasted between seven and fourteen days—but also for their success in drawing crowds, even on work days. Gustav Kopp, a pietist minister at the New Church, recorded that Schrenk’s first mission in 1889 was “unusually well attended.” Initially, he was to hold the Bible studies at the Evangelical Society’s quarters and evening sermons at the Reformed Church, “but so many people attended that they had to move the former to the Reformed Church and the latter to the New Church.”54 Writing about the “Schrenk phenomenon” for the Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche in 1897, Paul Grünberg reported that at the evangelist’s 1896 visit, over 2,500 people from Strasbourg and the surrounding areas participated in the final worship service.55 Ritual Space and Community Identity Elias Schrenk’s ability to fill a big space like the New Church in the middle of the week and pastors’ reports of standing-room crowds on feast days like Good Friday and Christmas after the turn of the century suggests that there was ample cultural capital in Protestant worship. Although men and women may not have been as willing to spend their free hours in the church or meeting house as they once had been, many would still put in the occasional appearance. This raises an important question. What kind of experience did Protestants have on these Sundays, holidays, and weekdays? What kind of cultural practice was worship? Although we think mainly about the form and content of the liturgical narrative for understanding worship as cultural practice, the space in which these events took place is equally important. Thus, we turn now to matters of liturgical space, especially as it emerged in rebuilding Strasbourg’s New Church between 1871 and 1877. The 53 Altogether, Schrenk held five missions in Strasbourg. Hermann Klemm, Elias Schrenk: Der Weg eines Evangelisten (Wuppertal: R. Brockhaus, 1961), 341– 42 and 628 – 41. 54 “Diary of the New Church,” AMS TN 110, 91– 92. 55 Paul Grünberg, “Die Evangelisationsvorträge des Predigers Elias Schrenk. Eine kirchliche Studie,” Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 7 (1897): 265 – 88, here 266 – 67.

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new structure was the first church in Strasbourg built expressly for Protestant worship since the French Revolution, which makes it an excellent prism for examining Protestant ideas about ritual space at the end of the nineteenth century.56 At the same time, church leaders made decisions about the liturgical environment and experience for individual Protestants participating in services. The space articulated ideas about the community and community membership that did not always coexist harmoniously with the narratives about religious community offered by the liturgists. The destruction of the New Church during the bombardment of 1870 greatly afflicted Strasbourg’s Lutheran community. It deprived the parish’s four pastors and their congregations, which included many of the city’s wealthiest and most prestigious families, of a house of worship and forced them to gather in Old St. Peter at less convenient times. Furthermore, it laid waste to a prominent symbol of the Lutheran Church. The former Dominican church served since 1681 as the Lutheran equivalent to Strasbourg’s famed cathedral, where city-wide ceremonies, such as the 1830 commemoration of the Augsburg Confession, took place. However, this cloud had a silver lining. Since the Reformation, Lutherans had complained that their churches’ interiors, which were built for Catholic worship, were ill-suited for Protestant purposes. Acoustic conditions were poor, especially for services dominated by the spoken word. Pulpits were not located in order to see the preacher. Similarly, the interior pillars obstructed the views of the altar and made large parts of the nave—as well as the entire chancel area—unusable.57 Although it was possible to rebuild the ruined church as it had been, the New Church consistory decided in April 1871 that

56 The Reformed community erected the first Protestant church in Strasbourg in 1790. However, to pacify both Catholic and Lutheran public opinion, the parish was not allowed to make the building look like a church from the exterior. In particular, it could have neither bells nor a bell tower. Zur Erinnerung an das Jubelfest, 14. 57 The Lutherans in Old and Young St. Peter did not have to worry about the “wasted” chancel space. Under the 1681 agreement for sharing the churches (the simultaneum), Catholics worshipped in the chancel and Lutherans in the nave. Similarly, at St. Aurelia, the decision to reorient and renovate the church in the eighteenth century resulted in the elimination of a separate chancel space. Koch and Lienhard, Protestants d’Alsace, 80; Johann Georg Heinemann, Die Kirche St. Aurelien in Straßburg. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte unserer Vaterstadt (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1865).

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it would avail itself of the opportunity to erect an entirely new building that was more faithful to the principles of Protestant worship.58 Once the consistory resolved to build a new church, it appointed a commission to oversee the entire process. One of the commission’s most important early recommendations was to hold a public design competition for the church, and by announcing the overall design parameters, it began to articulate its ideas on Protestant worship space. From this perspective, the most important points in the “Programme du Concours” were numbers five, six and fifteen.59 The first section reminded the architects to plan a structure that “completely satisfied” the needs of Protestant worship, particularly, those for the interior space so that “whether the pastor spoke from the pulpit or at the altar, he could be seen and heard from every part of the church.” The next paragraph further specified that the altar was to be placed centrally and near the pulpit, but “not in a chancel, which is unnecessary for Protestant worship.” In short, the “Protestant” definition of space occurred through both positive and negative measures. The consistory sought to underscore key elements of Protestant liturgical theology, namely the importance of both word (pulpit) and sacrament (altar) in the architecture. It also rejected elements that were clearly considered to be Catholic, such as the use of a chancel (a type of specifically priestly space), and the permissibility of poor sight lines to altar and pulpit that would play to popular superstitions about the “magical” nature of the communion rite.60 In point fifteen, the consistory stated that architects could select any architectural style for their projects as long as they did not forget “that they were designing a Protestant church.” This provision was significant, if not ingenuous. It bespoke the theological position that there

58 “Faits du Temple Neuf,” entry for 17 April 1871, TN. Wilcken usefully points out that reconstructing the old church was a valid option, see Architektur, 247. But his discussion of the decision-making process leaves one with the impression that the Consistory had to lobby the new German authorities for the “right” to proceed with an entirely new design, which was not the case at all. The government, and the municipality of Strasbourg in particular, did enjoy certain supervisory rights over the construction of the new church, but ultimately the decision to erect or rebuild—and how—lay with church authorities. 59 “Programme du Concours ouvert pour la reconstruction du Temple-Neuf à Strasbourg,” [Strasbourg, 1871], BNUS M1162; “Faits du Temple Neuf,” TN. 60 René Bornert, La Réforme protestante du culte à Strasbourg au XVIe siècle (1523 –1598): Approche sociologique et interprétation théologique (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1981), 486 – 89; and Koch and Lienhard, Protestants d’Alsace, 80 – 81.

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wasn’t anything particularly Protestant (or Catholic) about any given style—Gothic, Baroque, Romanesque, etc. Instead, what counted was how the specific design satisfied the needs of Protestant worship. In this respect, the consistory anticipated ideas about Protestant church architecture advanced by individuals such as Emil Sulze, Julius Smend, and the New Church’s own Ernst Eichler toward the end of the century. Writing in Smend’s Monatschrift in 1898 ( just before his arrival in Strasbourg), Eichler argues that “the gospel ideals of interiority and warmth were better represented by a comfortable room than by an uncomfortable, if also magnificent church.” Thus, it is better to erect “simple, plain ‘community houses’ (Gemeindehäuser) than Gothic and Romanesque cathedrals and ‘mini-cathedrals’ (Dömlein).”61 Nevertheless, the consistory’s categorical refusal of a chancel effectively disadvantaged projects in a Gothic style. In this respect, the consistory departed from the norms prevailing in northern Europe. The old-German state churches adopted the 1861 “Eisenach Regulations” as guidelines for new Protestant church construction and they specifically identified the Gothic style as the preferred architectural idiom.”62 Altogether, thirty-five architects submitted entries that ran the gamut stylistically from Romanesque and Byzantine to Renaissance and, yes, even Gothic. However, it was a group of Romanesque entries, four from Parisian and one from an Alsatian firm, that gained the jury’s favor. The Romanesque basilica was “contemporary with the origins of Christianity” and was “easily adapted to the simple and austere forms of Protestant worship,” jury member Jules Sengenwald later explained. Moreover, “the proximity of Strasbourg’s Cathedral to the New Church site would have crushed any rival [Gothic] architectural effort.” The competition’s top prize went to one of the Parisian firms (Bernard Motte et Fournade), but since none of the winning projects was executable as submitted, the consistory commissioned the fourth61 Eichler, “Sind unsere Kirchen noch Zeitgemäß,” ZGkK 3 (1898): 68 – 81, here 76 and 79; Sulze, Die Reform der evangelischen Landeskirchen nach den Grundsätzen des neueren Protestantismus (Berlin: C. A. Schwetscke und Sohn, 1906), 211– 246; on Smend and the debates over Protestant church architecture at the turn of the century, see Klek, Erlebnis Gottesdienst, esp. 73–78. 62 The text of the Eisenach Regulations appears in Emil Sulze, “Ratschläge für den Bau evangelischer Kirchen,” ZGkK 4 (1899): 335 – 47. On the Eisenach “movement,” see Eva-Maria Seng, Der Kirchenbau im 19. Jahrhundert. Die Eisenacher Bewegung (Tübingen: Wasmuth, 1995). In Britain, too, the Gothic had come to be defined as the ideal style for Christian architecture. Horton Davies, Worship and Theology in England, vol. 4, From Newman to Martineau, 1850 –1900 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962), 42 – 64.

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place winner, Émile Salomon of Strasbourg, to draft a new plan based on the winning design, which the consistory approved early in 1873.63 Constructed out of red sandstone from the nearby Vosges mountains, Salomon’s New Church (Figure 5.1) took the form of a long rectangular basilica, whose nave was divided into a central and two side sections. The pulpit was placed on the east wall of the church, at the end of the central axis; the altar stood directly in front (and underneath) of the pulpit (Figure 5.2).64 Although questions about the (external) architectural style dominated the public discussion, the organization of the church’s interior space was ultimately more important, for it would determine how the new building satisfied the needs of Protestant worship. Here too, the consistory set forth a number of requirements that the projects had to satisfy. It is a telling list that illuminates the New Church leadership’s understanding of church and ritual space. To begin with, the list of additional requirements—beyond the matter of altar and pulpit placement—reveal that the consistory was trying to accomplish two, somewhat contradictory goals in the new church. On the one hand, the rebuilt New Church was to serve as a parish church, which meant that it must provide appropriate spaces not just for worship, but also for other types of parish activities. On the other hand, the new structure would have to function like the old New Church as the city’s “Lutheran cathedral,” which necessitated a certain magnificence and size. These concerns played themselves out most directly in discussions of church capacity. The interior space had to be large enough not only for the New Church congregation, but also for large assemblies of the city’s Protestant community, such as the 1883 Luther commemoration or the annual services to mark the Emperor’s birthday. The guidelines specified in point eight that the structure must have seats for at least two thousand people, although some of these could be located in side galleries or balconies (as was the case at St. William). This figure for minimum capacity is interesting in that it was actually insufficient for the parish’s needs. Between 1866 and 1914, the combined size of the 63 Jules Sengenwald, Exposé des faits relatifs à la reconstruction du Temple-Neuf presenté dans sa séance du 29 novembre 1875 (Strasbourg: G. Fischbach, 1876), 7–15; “Le concours pour la reconstruction du Temple-Neuf à Strasbourg,” PR 5/8 (24 Feb 1872): 58 – 63; Announcements register (Proklamationsbuch, hereafter “Announcements”) TN, 2 Feb 1873, ADBR 2G 482 E 74. 64 The church was 27 m wide; the central nave filled almost 65% of it (17.5 m). Strassburg und seine Bauten, 392– 94.

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Figure 5.1 Émile Solomon’s New Church (1877) (reprinted from Album von Strassburg: 50 Tafeln in Helio nach photographischen Originalaufnahmen [Strasbourg: J. Manias, 1914]).

Figure 5.2 The rebuilt New Church. Cross-section (left) and foundation (right) views (reprinted from Strassburg und seine Bauten).

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New Church’s four personal congregations varied between 4,400 and 5,000 parishioners, so the guidelines for the new church would be able to seat less than half of the members at one time. But the consistory really wasn’t worried by this technicality. With two thousand places, the new New Church would be the largest Protestant church in Strasbourg until the Protestant military church was completed in 1897.65 By comparison, Old St. Peter, which hosted the New Church community from late 1870 until 1877, could only hold around 1,000; even St. Thomas was limited to about 950 people.66 In fact, it would be more accurate to argue that the plans for a monumental church resulted in a structure that was actually too large for most parish purposes. Apart from feast days, as the pastors and elders well knew, the church was rarely full, which had important consequences for the ritual experience. It was difficult for the liturgist to develop a sense of community and warmth among the congregation, when the assembled faithful—even when three or four hundred strong—sat dispersed and isolated in a space designed for some two thousand. A second provision relating to the organization of the nave called for twenty “conveniently placed” stalls for the pastors and elders, that is, a set of reserved seats close to the pulpit and altar. These special places for the two groups of parishioners was part of a well-established custom in Strasbourg that did not reflect the men’s social status as much as their official parish responsibilities. It also calls attention to the fact that the nave was a highly structured space. Parishes adopted a variety of strategies for separating the elders and pastors, which, in turn, affected how parishioners understood their relationship to the entire community. The arrangements at St. Thomas and Young St. Peter are a case in point. In the former church, the seats for the two groups were located on the right side of the church, between the pulpit and altar, as indicated in Figure 5.3. The location gave the pastors convenient access to both centers of liturgical activity, while the lateral position of the bloc of seats integrated them into the congregation as a whole, deemphasizing their special status. By contrast, the seats at the front of Young St. Peter, facing the congregation, accentuated the elders’ and pastors’ unique position in the parish. While pastors and 65 According to its architect, Louis Müller, the Protestant Garnisonkirche (today St. Paul) had 2,111 seats, plus room for another 800 –1000 people to stand. Strassburg und seine Bauten, 403. 66 “Kirchlicher Jahresbericht pro 1888/1889 über die evangelische GarnisonGemeinde Straßburg i.E.,” AMS GK 6/1.

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congregation

congregation

altar

congr.

pastors and elders

congregation

congr.

altar

elders

pulpit

pastors

congregation

congregation

congregation

pulpit

congregation congregation congregation

St. Thomas

Figure 5.3

congregation

Young St. Peter

The organization of interior space at St. Thomas and Young St. Peter (data from ST and SPJ).

elders sat together at St. Thomas, they were seated apart at Young St. Peter, with the pastors sitting stage right of pulpit and altar. This arrangement was appropriate for this most conservative of Strasbourg’s Lutheran parishes. Yet, it also presented certain inconveniences, since it was obvious to all when a pastor or elder was absent.67 The Protestant parishes’ efforts to organize the nave, however, extended well beyond reserving a few places for parish officials. It also involved determining who could sit where, which not only affected how people worshipped but, as we will see, the notions of parish community. Parishes did this, in part, by requiring that men and women (and children) sit in different sections of the church.68 They also allowed parishioners to secure specific places for themselves by paying a small annual or lifetime fee. As the New Church neared completion in 1877, the consistory found itself having to weigh in on the issue of seating arrangements. At the 12 March session, President Leblois announced that several parishioners had expressed a desire to rent seats in the new church and wished to know “if the consistory intended to rein-

67 The seating plans for the two churches appear in ST and SPJ; see also Koch and Lienhard, Protestants d’Alsace, 9. 68 On the more widespread practice of separating men and women in Christian churches, see the interesting remarks by Iso Müller, “Frauen rechts, Männer links. Historische Platzverteilung in der Kirche,” Schweizerisches Archiv für Volkskunde 57 (1961): 65 – 81.

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troduce the practice or declare all the places free.” Two members, Pastor Haerter and Dr. Schneiter, argued to end the practice, because there should not be “distinctions between rich and poor.” Schneiter then went further and proposed that “men and women be allowed to sit mixed together in the pews.” Both innovations met with resistance in the consistory. Kopp remarked that the mixing of the sexes “went against our Alsatian customs.” Indeed, this division was so strongly anchored in local traditions that none of Strasbourg’s parishes strove to eliminate it during the Reichsland period. As Wilhelm Horning of Young St. Peter noted in the “Congregation Handbook” he distributed among his parishioners, “Although it is beautiful and pleasing when the holy family sits together in the house of God, the mixing of the sexes often brings with it much wholesomeness. Nothing should disturb the devotions in the church.”69 Opinions were more divided concerning the rental of places in the churches. Several parishioners and many of the pastors felt that since the practice ran contrary to Christian principles of fellowship and social unity it should be abolished.70 Others, among them Georg Flach, pointed out that there was a financial issue to consider. Renting places enabled the parish to meet certain expenses, such as heating and lighting, for which no other funds were available. Leblois held the question over until the session of 28 May 1877, when the consistory agreed to continue renting a portion of the church’s seats. Jules Sengenwald suggested an annual rent of ten francs per place, but on the objection that that sum was too high for women, the consistory agreed to charge women only six francs each year for their places.71 The New Church’s discussions over pew rents in 1877 call attention to the complexity and broader social ramifications of this practice. Many church leaders regarded the custom as a necessary evil, designed to help the parish meet its expenses. They viewed these rentals as a sort of tax on richer parishioners, “who bear the costs of heating to the benefit of all . . . rich and poor,” rather than as a form of privilege per se.72

69 PBK, 7: 197– 98 (12 Mar 1877), AMS TN 103; [W. Horning, ed.], Der Straßburger evang.-luth. Gemeinde-Anzeiger (Strasbourg: privately printed, n.d. [circa 1892]), 27. 70 On this point, see also Friedrich Spitta, “Der evangelische Gottesdienst und die christliche Brüderlichkeit,” MGkK 6 (1901): 33 –38, esp. 35–36. 71 PBK, 7: 205 (28 May 1877), AMS TN 103. 72 SG PBKR, 1: 307– 08 (18 Nov 1872). Horning’s Gemeinde-Anzeiger also announces that “a number of seats in the church . . . are available for rent. The funds are used again for worship purposes. It is a small tax for the wealthy [Es ist eine kleine Steuer

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Yet, when we look at the parishes’ actual seating regulations (Stuhlordnungen) a different type of picture emerges. First, at the same time that parishes insisted that one did not have to pay to sit in church, most set aside more reserved than they did free places. At one end of the spectrum was St. William that set aside only about 200 places for rent. At the other end were Old and Young St. Peter, where over half of the seats were rentable. Old St. Peter had only 159 “free” places against 479 rented, whereas Young St. Peter “limited” the total number of rented seats to 600.73 Second, there were clear benefits associated with renting a place. The reserved pews were normally situated in places of honor—near the pulpit, altar, or pastors—or they permitted a better visual or auditory experience in the church. For instance, in Young St. Peter, the free seats were located at the back and at the sides of the nave. On feast days, those with rented seats did not have to worry about standing or being squeezed together in one of the free pews. Parishes also viewed the leased place as a type of personal property. Several parishes (e.g., St. Aurelia and St. Thomas) affixed plaques to them and effectively allowed parents to will them to their descendants.74 Renters in St. William even received keys to their boxes, which meant that others could not use them when unoccupied. Indeed, parishes normally prevented people from occupying these seats, even if they were still vacant after the start of the service, which suggested that all were not equal in the house of God.75 So how much did it cost to rent a seat in one of Strasbourg’s churches? Here, too, the situation varied considerably from parish to parish. The amount paid for reserving a seat reflected two factors: the length of the privilege and the renter’s gender. New Church and St. William, for example, had annual rents that resulted in considerably higher rates than what prevailed at parishes, such as the two St. Peters, where multiple-year and lifetime arrangements existed. Most parishes also charged more for reserving a spot in the men’s section than they

für Begüterte].” Significantly, Horning refuses, literally, to “say a word” about the custom’s merits. Gemeinde-Anzeiger, 27. 73 Unfortunately, none of the records from the period provide good estimations of total seating capacity. St. William likely held upwards of 650, and Young St. Peter at least 750 people. SG PBKR, 1: 307– 08 (18 Nov 1872); SPJ, “Stuhlordnung of 29 Sep 1862”; AMS SPVP 56. 74 Cf. SPJ PBKR, 3:22–23 (8 Dec 1890). 75 Cf. SW PBKR, 4:290ff. (6 Dec 1912); SA PBK, vol. 2 (28 Nov 1898); ST PBK, vol. 1 (5 Feb 1896).

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did for one in the women’s pews. With its annual rent of 10 fr for men and 7 fr for women, New Church’s rental fees were the highest in Strasbourg. By contrast, St. William, which also charged annual fees, required only 3 fr (2.40 M.) in 1872 for some of the men’s places, and 2 fr (1.60 M.) for the others and all of the women’s seats.76 The pew fees at the St. Peters were much lower. Young St. Peter offered a ten year “lease” for 7.5 fr (6 M.), whereas the same period would have required an investment of 100 fr at New Church and 20 –30 fr at St. William. For just a little more, Young St. Peter’s parishioners could obtain a seat for life (12.5 fr/10 M.), which only slightly exceeded the rate prevailing at Old St. Peter (10 fr/8 M.).77 However modest the fees were in some instances, many pastors and laypeople continued to criticize the custom. But only two parishes, Old St. Peter and St. William, succeeded in abolishing the practice of “selling seats” outright before 1914. In both cases, social considerations played a significant role in the final decision. Eliminating signs of social division in the church was essential, as Julius Weirich (St. William) contended in 1909, both to “foster a feeling of solidarity among the members of the congregation” and “to counteract the ever increasing sense of distrust toward the church [among the lower classes].” Equally important, the fact that the number of people who chose to rent seats was declining meant that the reform wouldn’t negatively affect parish finances. In 1895 Old St. Peter, which was located in one of the poorest sections of the city, became the first parish to make the shift. St. William, which also had a substantial number of less well off parishioners debated the question regularly beginning in 1905, but only at the end of 1912 did it resolve to terminate the practice and allow “Christians to choose any place [they wished] in the church.”78 The seating regulations, lastly, reveal that even before 1870 Strasbourg’s Protestant churches had already undergone a notable degree

76 These rates were raised in 1892 to the uniform level of 4 M. SW PBKR, 1:307 (18 Nov 1872) and 2: 280–81 (9 Mar 1892). 77 SPJ PBKR, 2:150–51 (27 Jan 1888); Horning, Gemeinde-Anzeiger, 27; SPV PBK, 3:52–54 (19 Feb 1895). To get a sense of what these sums represented in real terms, the data on residential rates are helpful: in 1900 the average annual rent on a one-bedroom, unfinished flat was 62,80 M. Volkszählung von 1. Dezember 1905, BSSS, no. 8, xvi. 78 ASP PBK, 3:52–54 (19 Feb 1895); SG PBKR, vol. 4, passim. Already on 13 Jan 1911, the parish council decided to stop renting new seats and allowed people to occupy a reserved place if its “owner” was not there by the time the bells had stopped ringing. The formal abolition was voted on 6 December 1912.

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of feminization. As noted, each of the parishes separated men and women in the nave, thereby establishing certain spaces in the church as “male” and “female.” Not only did parishes make it easier for women to rent seats, but they set aside a much greater number of places for them. Young St. Peter’s 1861 Stuhlordnung, for instance, set aside 400 rentable seats for women, but only 200 for men. At Old St. Peter, there were 407 reserved women’s seats, against only 172 for men. St. William had the fewest places for women, only 108, but this was still twenty more than were available for men. While these arrangements certainly reflected gendered patterns in church life, they also marked much of the worship space as female. This, too, had important social ramifications, as we can see from the situation at Old St. Peter. The parish set aside some thirteen benches for the general (non-renting) public, and significantly they were all located behind blocks of at least six women’s pews. In other words, as a function of the placement of the free pews, their occupants were simultaneously tagged as marginal and feminine.79 Although the nave served as the principal site of a parish’s worship service, it was far from the sole site of liturgical and parochial action in a Protestant church. These additional spatial requirements also found expression in the design specifications for the rebuilt New Church. For starters, the consistory stipulated that there be a space in front of the altar “where eighty people can comfortably gather.” This place is where the communion service would transpire, and again, the detail is telling. Whereas the capacity requirements for the full nave made provision for what the church would need on special occasions, here the consistory made allowances for normal circumstances. When larger numbers of people were present for the communion service on, for example, Easter, the pastors would either invite people to the communion space in groups or have the faithful form a queue through the nave. The consistory also wanted the architects to design a side chapel that would seat around 150 people, giving the New Church a space analogous to the Zorn Chapel at Young St. Peter and the St. Blasius chapel at St. Thomas. As the competition guidelines indicated, the chapel’s primary function was to provide a smaller space for liturgical activity, above all, weekday devotions and preparation liturgies for communion. In the chapel’s more intimate environment, the structural

79

AMS, SPVP 56; SPJ, “Stuhlordnung.”

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and social divisions of the nave vanished, which enabled the pastor to develop more persuasively the sense of worship as communal action. During the lengthy periods of rebuilding and renovation, parishes with chapels could utilize that space for services that would otherwise be held elsewhere. For instance, after the completion of the New Church’s chapel in late 1876, the parish transferred some of the smaller services to it from Old St. Peter, as well as the entire set of parish confirmations in the spring of 1877. Likewise, Young St. Peter kept most of its weekday and Sunday afternoon liturgies in the Zorn Chapel while the restoration of the main church was underway between 1898 and 1901; only for the main Sunday service did it use another church’s space (namely, the New Church).80 A third type of specialized space that the New Church needed was a sacristy. Whereas the nave and chapel were sites for ritual activity, the sacristy provided a place for the parish to conduct its business. Sessions of the consistories and parish councils occurred there. So too did most parish elections. In Lutheran parishes, the Directory required that each church secure its electoral registers, the minutes of parish council and consistory meetings, and the records of the religious rites performed by the parish’s pastors in this room.81 Furthermore, in keeping with the notion that the church was a form of community center, parish associations, such as the women’s service groups and the deaconates, frequently used the sacristy as their regular meeting place. As with many ambitious building projects, the work on the New Church ran over budget, which had become all too clear by the end of 1875. To make up some of the deficit, the parish launched a special subscription campaign the following year. This brought in enough funds to finish the main church, including a special platform for “the execution of pieces of religious music” and a loft containing a majestic Merklin organ (the organ in the old New Church, a Silbermann, had been one of the “most imposing” in the region).82 One major structural element, however, could not be completed: the bell tower. Only through the subsequent largesse of Jules Sengenwald, a long-time

80 “Faits du Temple Neuf,” entries for 1876 –77, TN; TN Announcements for 1877, ADBR 2G 482 E 75; SPJ PBKR, 3:130 –33 (sessions of 10 and 18 Oct 1898). 81 Directorial Regulation of 8 Nov 1843, RO 2:167. 82 Sengenwald, Exposé des faits. On the New Church’s new organ, see Myriam Geyer, La Vie musicale à Strasbourg sous l’Empire allemand (1871–1918) (Strasbourg: Publications de la Société Savante d’Alsace, 1999), 239.

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parish elder and president of the city’s chamber of commerce, was the parish finally able to erect the tower, which was dedicated in a special service in 1888.83 Of course, religious services were not held in the tower itself. But such structures and the bells they housed figured significantly in how individuals related to the churches and the activities that occurred in them. After all, the bell tower helped to define the church as a church, a specifically religious structure. Hence, not just the New Church, but also the Reformed parish believed that their buildings were “incomplete” as long as they lacked one. In the latter case, the transition to German rule eliminated one of the long-standing obstacles to rectifying this situation, namely the opposition of French and Catholic authorities. But it did little to ameliorate the other issue: money. Nevertheless, by the end of the century, the Reformed parish was able to launch a major fundraising drive for the bell tower, the completion of which was celebrated on 17 December 1905.84 Bells also served critical symbolic and communicational functions. They signaled that a religious service would soon take place, was in progress, or had just ended. The idiosyncrasies of each parish’s collection of bells also enabled parishes to invest the act of ringing with a range of specific meanings. At the most basic level, because there was little overlap in the tonal quality (pitch and color), of the city’s bells one could differentiate between the peals of the various churches. For instance, the main bell at St. Thomas rang B-flat. Old St. Peter’s three bells sounded an F minor chord, whereas the new bells at New Church produced a D-major chord. In addition, churches used different combinations of bells to indicate different kinds of events.85 During the services, parishes like St. Aurelia and Young St. Peter rang one of the smaller bells while the minister recited the Lord’s prayer, so that parishioners who could not attend the service might still feel connected to the community.86 New Church rang all three bells only to announce

83 Thurm- und Glockenweihe der Neuen Kirche zu Straßburg 15. Juli 1888 (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1888). However, in 1877 the family of Franz Haerter had given the parish a “small” bell (350 kg) that was mounted to a small platform and placed on the main church floor. “Faits,” entry for 1 Feb 1877, TN. 84 RK PBKR, sessions of 1905, ADBR 173 AL 61. 85 Koch and Lienhard, Protestants d’Alsace, 77; Excerpt from TN PBK for 20 Mar 1889, ADBR 172 AL 246. 86 This practice took root in the 1850s in conjunction with the creation of a (facultative) Agende (liturgical plan) for the Lutheran church. RO 9 (1851–52): 157–74, esp. 160;

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the main service on Sundays and feast days. For weekday services and prayer meetings, the parish sounded just the smallest bell (which rang an A). Secular uses for the bells, such as a fire alarm or storm signal, were also taken into account at parishes like New Church that reserved the use of the middle-sized bell (with a pitch of F-sharp) by itself for such instances.87 The specific messages about ritual life, which the bells could convey, obviously depended on the parishioners’ ability to hear them. This was one drawback of the post-1870 urban expansion. As Strasbourg’s residents moved to new parts of the old city, and then, into the Neustadt, they frequently could no longer hear the call of their parish’s bells. The transfer of services from one church to another, however, created a similar problem. In fact, during the Reichsland period, every inner city church had to share space with another congregation. Many of these arrangements were short-term dislocations that resulted from the need to make extensive repairs to or update the physical plant by introducing gas heating or electric lighting, modernizations that made the church more comfortable and permitted its more extensive use, for instance, in the evening. To minimize the disruptions, parish councils scheduled renovations during the summer months, when attendance was normally lower. When possible, parish councils made arrangements to share space at a nearby church. In these instances, the two congregations worshipped together and the ministers from the two churches took turns leading the services and preaching. Thus, when St. Thomas closed for a period in 1882, it advised its parishioners to attend services across the river at St. Nicholas. Conversely, when St. Nicholas needed to make repairs in 1887, the German-language parish went to St. Thomas and the French-language parish went to the Reformed church.88 When St. William suspended services in 1897,

and RO 12 (1855–56): 34–36. The New Church’s pietist ministers stove to introduce the custom, but in the face of determined resistance from liberal pastors and laity never won consistorial approval to do so. St. William resolved to begin the practice only on the eve of the war (17 Dec 1913). Excerpt from TN PBK, 20 Mar 1889, ADBR 172 AL 246; TN PBK, 26 Apr and 3 July 1906; SG PBKR, 5: 35. 87 PBK TN for 20 Mar 1889, ADBR 172 AL 246. On the circumstances under which civilian authorities could require churches to ring bells see, “Denkschrift über den Gebrauch der Glocken,” 4 Nov 1882, BAL RK 146/2, 877–89; District President of Lower Alsace to the Mayors of Lower Alsace, 6 July 1883, ADBR 117 D 49; and Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine to the Directory and the Reformed Consistories, 9 Mar 1888, 136 AL 7/21. 88 PR 17/7 (14 Jun 1884): 191; PR 20/32 (6 Aug 1877): 254.

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it was less fortunate, for none of the other Protestant churches were particularly close. As Julius Redslob reported: [The pastors] advised the parishioners to attend services at St. Nicholas. The residents of our section of the city, however, are of such a conservative nature that they cannot bring themselves to satisfy their religious needs in another church. Only now and then did I see one of my parishioners at St. Nicholas. Most of the others either held prayer services at home or refrained from attending church [for the period] altogether.89

While these interim cohabitations disadvantaged some parishioners, they did provide parishes with valuable opportunities to demonstrate the virtues of Christian love and collegiality. Pastors, even those with different theological proclivities, worked hand in hand to assure the needs of both congregations during the transitional period. In this sense, the fact that the French Lutheran parish of St. Nicholas held services at the Reformed church in 1887 and that the Reformed congregation went to Lutheran Old St. Peter in 1905, while the bell tower was being completed, is particularly noteworthy. For one, it reveals that the two confessional communities had comparable worship styles. But it also shows that, at least on a temporary basis, the two state churches were willing to assist each other, even if—temporarily—it compromised confessional identity. Such fusions also tended to boost attendance at the host parish, which made for a more positive worship experience for all present. When longer-term sharing of space was necessary, different types of arrangements were made for the host and the guest congregation to retain their sense of identity. The Reichsland period experienced three instances of such cohabitations: the New Church’s use of Old St. Peter between 1870 and 1877; Young St. Peter’s stint at the New Church (1898 –1901), and the Protestant military parish’s presence first at St. Thomas (1870) and then also at Old St. Peter (1884) until its own building was erected in 1897. They were not ideal circumstances for the guest, nor for the host. The main problem for the visiting community was negotiating a schedule of services around that of the host parish, which was not always particularly convenient. According to the deal struck with Old St. Peter, for instance, New Church had to wait until eleven o’clock to hold its main Sunday service and until four o’clock to begin the afternoon liturgy. On feasts such as Christmas and 89

SWIR 1897.

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Good Friday, the church wasn’t available for the New Church services until noon and then again at 4:30 that afternoon.90 Compounding the problem, Old St. Peter was also quite far from the New Church site. As Inspector Ungerer lamented in 1874, “Old St. Peter is so distant from the former New Church and the hours for religious services so inconvenient, that too many of our parishioners have accustomed themselves to attending services at other churches.”91 Because Young St. Peter was only a few blocks away from New Church (indeed, New Church had hoped to worship there in 1870), its parishioners were less affected by the change in location. But they, too, had to adjust their schedules and come to the church on Sunday mornings at eight-thirty, and in the afternoons at five.92 Moreover, on feast days, the guest pastors frequently had to curtail parts of the service, usually the sermon, in order to fit everything in during the time available. In the case of the garrison community’s cohabitations at St. Thomas and Old St. Peter, the brunt of the burden fell on the host congregations.93 Pressured by civil and military authorities to accept the soldiers, the churches experienced the entire situation as a form of occupation. The military chaplains used the Prussian military church liturgy that created a very different type of ritual and experience than what was normally found in one of Strasbourg’s Lutheran churches. The military commanders presumed that they could use the host church’s facilities largely at will. For instance, in 1879 the garrison community requested permission to ring one of the larger church bells during the Lord’s Prayer, with St. Thomas paying the attendant expenses. At its session of 17 December, the consistory replied that the military could indeed ring a bell, but it had to be the small bell (as was customary there) and the military would have to pay the associated costs.94 The military commanders were also difficult with respect to temporal arrangements. They resented the fact that their services could not begin until eleven in the morning (noon on feast days), and complained loudly whenever civilian services rang long. In 1885, the garrison commander even pushed St. Thomas and Old St. Peter to allow an earlier start

“Faits du Temple Neuf,” remarks for late 1870 and early 1871, TN. NCIR 1874, 10 –11. 92 NCIR 1900. 93 A copy of the contract signed with Old St. Peter in 1888 appears in ADBR 172 AL 239. 94 ST PBK, 17 Dec 1879. 90 91

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time on feast days (eleven-thirty) that resulted in the parishes making a partial concession. The military got its way on Christmas, Pentecost and Ascension, but the parish held firm vis-à-vis Good Friday and Easter, when the substantial number of communicants made it hopeless to think of finishing earlier than was already the case.95 The civilian pastors, too, grumbled at other inconveniences arising from the military’s presence. They had to find different times or locations for the youths’ liturgies ( Jugendgottesdienste).96 The time in between morning services was also no longer available for the occasional baptism. It was with considerable relief that both St. Thomas and Old St. Peter greeted the dedication of the Protestant military church on 9 May 1897.97 At last, the civilian pastors were free to organize time and space as they saw fit in their construction of the parish’s worship activities. Tradition and Innovation in Liturgical Practice On 10 December 1899, Julius Smend took over the Sunday morning service at Strasbourg’s Reformed church for Eduard Stricker, the pastor for the parish’s German-speaking congregation. This in itself was hardly unusual, as the talented preacher (and the faculty’s lone Reformed professor) had frequently assisted Stricker after coming to Strasbourg in 1893. Yet, the service that Smend led was atypical in two respects. On the one hand, the parish designated that Sunday as the day to introduce the Alsatian Pastoral Conference’s new hymnal into the community. Indeed, the parish’s decision chose to celebrate this important event required that Smend give the liturgy for the second Sunday in Advent a palpably festive character. On the other hand, Stricker was so pleased with Smend’s service and his sermon on the new songbook that he printed an account of the celebration—with complete texts of the prayers, sermon, hymns—in the parish newsletter.98 Although Stricker circulated this information largely to facilitate the new hymnal’s acceptance, by documenting the event he also left a rare record of this type of cultural activity. Analyzing this service affords us the opportunity to obtain a richer sense of the Protestant worship experience in late

95 96 97 98

SPV PBK vol. 2, 13 May 1884; ST PBK, 18 Mar and 11 June 1885. ST PBK, 27 Oct 1870. A lengthy description of the ceremony appeared in SP 374 (10 May 1897). Mitteilungen der Reformirten Gemeinde zu Straßburg, 12 (Weihnachten, 1899).

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nineteenth-century Strasbourg and to assess it as a form of cultural activity. It also provides a convenient perspective to examine how ideas on worship and liturgy were evolving during the Reichsland period, a story that was intimately connected with Julius Smend and the appearance of a new Alsatian hymnal. Although Smend was one of the leading advocates of liturgical reform at the turn of the century, a cause he promoted not just through his lectures and numerous publications, but also through the creation (with Friedrich Spitta) of a new forum for the discussion of liturgical theory and practice, the Monatschrift für Gottesdienst und kirchliche Kunst,99 the general structure of the service he planned for the Reformed church in 1899 was characteristic of prevailing Protestant practices in the Reichsland. It commenced with an organ prelude, which was followed by a congregational hymn and the pastor’s greeting. The altar service continued with the minister proclaiming words of God’s grace, to which the congregation responded: “Glory to God in the highest” (Ehre sei Gott in der Höhe). Next came the opening prayer (collect), a reading from the Scripture, followed by a second congregational hymn. At this point, the center of ritual activity switched to the pulpit, where the pastor read the sermon text and delivered the sermon. At the conclusion of the sermon, the congregation sang once more and the minister returned to the altar to offer the general intercessions (Fürbitte) and recite the Lord’s Prayer. The service then concluded with a final congregational hymn, the pastor’s benediction, and an organ postlude.100 Several aspects of Smend’s “program” warrant attention. First and foremost, Protestant worship strove to involve all who were present in the ritual event by framing it in the form of a dialogue. The congregation did not just sit through services, as was true of most Catholic ceremonies, it actively participated in the liturgical action. Traditionally, the primary means by which the Protestant parishioners engaged in this dialogue was by singing hymns, which also transformed the group of individuals into a collective. But Alsatian congregations also provided responses to the altar liturgy’s various elements, a practice that gained

Cf. Klek, Erlebnis Gottesdienst, passim. On the worship traditions in the Lutheran church, see especially Robert Will, Der Gottesdienst der Kirche Augsburger Konfession in Elsass und Lothringen (Strasbourg: Éditions Oberlin, 1948). When Smend led this service, Will had just assumed a position at St. William, where he remained until joining the Theology Faculty in the 1920s. 99

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in importance as a result of the liturgical discussions and confessional revivals of the 1840s and 1850s.101 Second, Smend had a relatively free hand in planning the specific contours of the ritual dialogue, as did all the Reichsland’s Protestant ministers. In contrast to most of the German state churches, neither the Lutheran, nor the Reformed Church had an official, required service order (Agende), although many of the Lutheran parishes used the order endorsed by the Superior Consistory in 1858 as a general guide. Nor did ministers have to draw their prayers from a specific, approved collection (Liturgie or Kirchenbuch).102 Strasbourg’s Lutheran pastors most frequently turned to the Württemberg Kirchenbuch for such texts, while Calvinists availed themselves of collections like the evangelisch-reformierte Liturgie from Canton Bern. But nothing prevented ministers from composing their own prayers, as Louis Leblois did for his section of the New Church’s dedication service in 1877.103 Calvinist pastors in Alsace-Lorraine even enjoyed the liberty to select appropriate scripture readings and sermon texts for their services, since the consistories never followed the Lutheran example of designating specific texts (pericopes) for the entire church year. Smend, for instance, opted to use an Old Testament text, Isaiah 40:1–5, as the basis of his sermon. While this choice was fully appropriate for the Advent season (Handel included it in the “Advent section” of his Messiah as “Comfort Ye, my people . . . Every Valley”), it stood out against the prevailing practices in other Protestant churches, whose pericopes contained only a handful of Old Testament passages.104

101 Indeed, the recommendation of restoring the “response” to the altar liturgy was one of the more controversial proposals advanced by the General (Superior) Consistory’s liturgy commission in 1852. Strohl, Protestantisme, 384–88. 102 On the controversies surrounding the binding liturgies in old Germany, which led to such actions as the expulsion of pastors Carl Jatho and Christoph Schrempf, see Spitta, Der Entwurf der preußischen Agende. Liturgische Betrachtungen über die Form der Gemeindegottesdienste (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1893); Klek, Erlebnis Gottesdienst, 38–43; Besier, Religion Nation Kultur, 121–24; and Hans Martin Müller, “Persönliches Glaubenszeugnis und das Bekenntnis der Kirche. ‘Der Fall Schrempf ’,” in Der deutsche Protestantismus um 1900, ed. idem and Friedrich Wilhelm Graf (Gütersloh: Chr. Kaiser, 1996), 223 –37. 103 Einweihung der Neuen Kirche zu Straßburg am 4. Oktober 1877 (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1877), 15–22. 104 Of the six pericope cycles established by the Alsatian Lutheran church, only one included Old Testament texts; moreover, only in 1897 did the Eisenach Conference establish a series consisting entirely of Old Testament passages. Report to the Superior Consistory on the new Eisenach pericopes, AS 52 (1897): 201.

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Far from being invariable or even stagnant, liturgical conditions in Protestant Alsace-Lorraine were quite dynamic. Through the selection of individual elements as well as particular hymns, prayers and scripture, pastors could construct altar liturgies that reflected their own theological leanings. Pietist pastors, for instance, routinely included a communal confession of sins and a statement of absolution before the collect.105 At Young St. Peter, and in many other orthodox Lutheran communities, the congregation typically sang its responses during the altar service, which was often performed antiphonally with the pastor and the congregation alternating.106 Conservative ministers also often included a confession of faith (or hymn that expressed similar sentiments) in the pre-sermon liturgy, whereas liberal pastors only did so on special occasions, such as Easter or Sundays when youth were confirmed. This points to another characteristic of Protestant ritual practice in Alsace-Lorraine. The Sunday morning service functioned as the archetypical form of worship. It was simplified and shortened to create liturgies at other times and days in the week. The altar service on Sunday afternoons often only consisted of a brief prayer, and the pastor might discuss elements of church history or the catechism instead of a formal sermon. Conversely, on feast days and on special occasions, the standard pieces might be extended or made more elaborate and additional pieces added. For instance, on Christmas, Good Friday, Easter and Pentecost, the facultative Lutheran Agende called for a communion liturgy to be added after the sermon. The liturgy for the dedication of the New Church in 1877 was even more elaborate. The “main service” was preceded by a special dedication ceremony, with a procession of church and government notables, a short anthem sung by the choir hired to heighten the service’s festive quality, and the religious inspector’s dedicatory address (the inspector, Ungerer, was also one of the church’s pastors). But the customary elements also underwent alteration. The preand post-sermon altar services were abbreviated to give the presiders, Louis Leblois and Gustav Haerter respectively, opportunities to speak at some length to the community. Furthermore, just as in the dedication section, the rest of the service employed a choir to give celebratory

105 Cf. PBK 8:100 – 02 (5 Jan 1888), AMS TN 104, when Pastor Leblois and several liberal elders complained that Gustav Kopp and Gustav Haerter still included a confession of sin and absolution when they held the Amtpredigt. 106 Cf. NCIR 1884–86, 6–7; see also Young St. Peter’s responses to the Directory’s 1886 inquiries into the state of church music, ADBR 172 AL 277.

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responses to the minister’s words (following the collect and sermon). On this particular day, congregational singing was limited to two instances, but on both occasions (pre- and post-sermon) the assembly sang texts that had been penned specifically for the service.107 For the Reformed church’s hymnal service, Smend followed the normal plan for Sunday mornings fairly closely. Like the New Church, he employed a choir for the day’s special character, namely, the parish’s own choir that was founded a few years earlier.108 Smend’s utilization of the choir was also distinct. Rather than “speaking” for the congregation as occurred in the New Church service, the choir’s contributions underscored the assembly’s discursive contributions. It offered a prelude to set up the opening hymn, and then sang a “Halleluiah” (to an old-Strasbourg melody) after the congregation had responded to the collect with “Amen.” Smend’s decision to include a scripture reading in addition to the sermon text should also be understood as a type of liturgical enrichment, since most morning liturgies only had the latter. This particular choice, Psalm 24, was doubly appropriate. With its message of making ready to receive Yahweh, the text played to the Advent theme of preparation. The selection also spoke to the day’s special focus, the new hymnal, since the Psalms constituted the Hebrew community’s first religious song book.109 Even at this structural level, we can see Smend the practical theologian and advocate of liturgical renewal at work. For Smend, Spitta, and other leaders in the fin de siècle liturgical reform movement, worship was an opportunity for the community to gather for the purpose of encountering God (in word and sacrament) and celebrating their faith. Worship was to be understood as a practice through which community was enacted and represented (darstellendes Handeln). This was why the “liturgists” contended that worship had certain advantages over individual devotion, which set them apart from many cultural Protes-

107 Einweihung der Neuen Kirche. I have discussed this liturgy in greater detail in “Building Religious Community: Worship Space and Experience in Strasburg [sic] after the Franco-Prussian War,” in Smith, Protestants, Catholics and Jews, 267–96, esp. 277– 96. 108 The parish council records do not reveal when the choir was established, but it was in existence by 1890, since it participated in the parish’s jubilee celebrations that year. 109 In contemporary lectionaries, Psalm 24 is read on either the first or fourth Sunday of Advent (depending on the liturgical cycle and church). During the opening decades of the Reformation, German translations of the Hebrew psalms also provided the texts for many of the first Protestant hymns. Bornert, La Réforme Protestante, 470–80.

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tants.110 As “demonstrative practice,” Protestant worship (Gottesdienst) was also distinct from other types of religious-cultural action.111 In other words, worship was a time for rejoicing and for (re-)constructing community, not instruction, moralizing, or polemic.112 To revitalize the Protestant community, reformers insisted that pastors devote more of their energy to the liturgy and ritual. With this in mind, they encouraged their colleagues to take advantage of the myriad possible forms that worship could take. They urged pastors to avail themselves of a wider variety of invocations, prayers, and hymns to overcome the frequently heard complaints that services were “monotonous and boring.”113 They emphasized the importance of weaving the parts of the service into a more coherent whole. Above all, theologians like Smend and Spitta called on their colleagues to pay greater attention to the sermon, whose tone and length all too frequently prevented the service from achieving its fundamental purpose.114 To understand how Smend realized many of these reformist ideals in the context of a service dedicated to the new Alsatian hymnal, a few remarks on the interplay between form and content in his liturgy are crucial. As we’ve noted, Protestant worship is organized as a dialogue, albeit one that has a clear, narrative structure. The liturgist scripts the narrative through his choice and arrangement of liturgical texts. Equally important are the presence and participation of the congregation in the dialogue, which not only affirms the sentiments presented by the minister, but emplots itself into the narrative.115 On this particular Sunday, Smend strove to construct a narrative arc that both celebrated the new hymnal and characterized the collection as a special community

Klek, Erlebnis Gottesdienst, 57–61. Smend, Vorträge und Aufsätze zur Liturgik, Hymnologie und Kirchenmusik (Gütersloh: C. Bertelsmann, 1925): 9 –10; see also the earlier summation of his liturgical principles in, Smend, Der Evangelische Gottesdienst, Eine Liturgik nach Evangelischen Grundsätzen (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprehcht, 1904). 112 Smend, Evangelische Gottesdienst, 24 –27. 113 Spitta, “Die Grundformen des evang. Gottesdienstes,” MGkK 10 (1905): 203–08, here 203. 114 The problem of the sermon was, in fact, a long standing one. Compare, Emil Nied, “Wahre und falsche Actualität in den Predigten,” ASPC 7 (1873): 333 –35; the 1905 Pastoral Conference discussion of Karl Braun’s and Karl Hackenschmidt’s talks on the topic “Schwierigkeiten und Erfordnisse der modernen Predigt,” ASPC 12 (1905): 98–107, 114 –51; and Smend, “Noch einmal Gottesdienst und Predigt,” MGkK 1902 (7): 294 –97. 115 Cf. Rainer Volp, Liturgik: Die Kunst, Gott zu feiern (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, 1994), 818. 110

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treasure. In concrete terms, Smend achieved this goal by means of two devices. First, he relied heavily on hymns to structure the entire service. Altogether, Smend used four Advent hymns in his liturgy and, appropriately, none had been in the old 1850 Conference hymnal.116 After the choral prelude, the congregation paid tribute to song’s importance for worship by singing all seven verses of the opening hymn, “Gott sei Dank durch alle Welt.” Then, following the opening prayer, Smend had the assembly sing verse four of a second hymn, “Mit Ernst o Menschen Kinder,” in place of a spoken response—thus demonstrating how one could use alternative texts, such as hymns, to create more innovative altar liturgies.117 To connect the service before and after the sermon with the sermon, Smend used the third hymn, “Mach hoch die Tür.” The congregation sang three of its stanzas while he proceeded to the pulpit, then Smend recited a fourth verse immediately after he read the sermon text, whereas the fifth and final stanza was sung by all once Smend finished his remarks. And as was customary, Smend preceded the final blessing with one last hymn, the last verse of “Fröhlich soll mein Herz springen.” The second tack that Smend employed to celebrate the hymnal was to make it the focus of the sermon, that is, the centerpiece of the service’s narrative structure. At this juncture, the preceding references to community and songbook were brought together in terms of one another. In the spirit of Advent, the pre-sermon liturgy asked the congregation to identify with the plight of the ancient Hebrews, who suffered and yearned for the promised Savior. The text of the choral anthem launched this narrative with two scriptural passages. They include the final lines of Psalm 14, where the Psalmist asks “who will bring Israel salvation?” and the first two verses of Zachariah’s prophecy of Jesus’ birth (Luke 1:68– 69). The congregational hymn echoed these sentiments, but calls on the singers to regard these long past events as part of their personal history. In the first stanza, for instance, the congregation sings: “Thanks be to God through every land, who has always kept his Word and who has sent us sinners [emphasis added] comfort 116 All four hymns, however, were to be found in the orthodox Lutheran hymnal, Das Gesangbuch für Christen Augsburgischer Konfession (1868), and one, “Mach Hoch die Tür,” was added to the Conference hymnal in the supplement that was published in 1880. For a further discussion of Protestant songbooks in Alsace-Lorraine, see the final part of this section. 117 Smend, “Neue, und doch alte Wege zur Belebung unsres Gottesdienstes,” MGkK 15 (1910): 1–5.

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and counsel.”118 Stanza four forces an even more personal identification with those feelings by shifting from the first person plural to the singular: “Be welcome, O my Redeemer! . . . Create a path also to my heart.” Smend developed these themes in his greeting, which was composed of scriptural passages such as: “See, the Lord Yahweh is coming with power” (Is 40: 10); “Lord show me your ways and teach me your paths” (Ps 25:4–5)”; “Give me the comfort of your aid . . . you will not despise a broken and contrite heart” (Ps 51:12–17). In the response, the congregation had another opportunity to affirm—as individuals—its need for assistance and invite Jesus to come to their aid: “Come into my heart, and make it into your crib. Then will [my] heart and lips ever be thankful to you.” In the collect, Smend emerged as a spokesman for the community. He offers thanks for the gift of the Holy Spirit and expresses hope that the Lord’s word will bring the community rich fruit. Once more, Smend reminded the congregation that it is very much like the people of Israel. He closed the prayer with the words: “Dear Lord God, awaken us, so that we are ready to receive your Son with joy and serve him with a clean heart when he comes.” This association was heightened by the first scripture reading, Psalm 24, immediately following the collect, which reminds the Hebrews of Yahweh’s greatness and calls on them to prepare themselves to receive “the King of glory” who is “Yahweh Sabaoth.” At this point, the congregation endorsed the reading’s message with a simple “Amen” and the choir expressed the community’s joy by singing “Halleluiah. Praise the Lord!” But, once the choir finished, the congregation commenced the three stanzas of “Mach hoch die Tür,” which reiterates many of the Psalmist’s sentiments: “Raise the door, open the gates wide, the Lord is coming in Glory! He is a King . . . a redeemer, who brings salvation and life to all. Therefore rejoice, and sing with joy: Praise be my God, My Creator. . . .” Smend’s goal was simple and reflected his own general ideas about what a sermon should achieve. He wished to talk with the community about the new hymnal, to explain why its release was a major event, and why Alsatian Protestants should be thankful for it. But this discussion occurred through an elaboration of the existing narrative. Smend’s text, Isaiah 40:1–5, reasserts the image of the Hebrew community

118 On the use of the first person plural to foster the sense of communal belonging, see Volp, Liturgik, 1036–38.

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suffering in captivity, but which the Lord later delivered—as promised. He then portrays Israel as a people of song, who collected their “best works, old and new” upon their return to Jerusalem, created the Psalter, and made singing a central part of their religious rituals. It was the Hebrew’s example, Smend asserts, that the Reformers strove to follow. Smend reminds his audience about the key role that the Psalms (in translation) played in the development of a specifically Protestant church music, particularly in Strasbourg. The professor recalls, too, that during his stay in the city Calvin came to esteem this “new” idea of congregational song that provided the impetus to publish his own version of the Psalter for Geneva. Having developed music and singing as important themes for a religious community’s ritual life, both in the days of ancient Egypt and during the Reformation, Smend shifts his attention to the present. He suggests that while the current (Conference) songbook did what it could to get the faithful to sing about sin and grace, it was deeply flawed. In “preparing the way for the Lord,” the editors were too eager to “fill in the valleys” and “make the crooked straight.” They polished and refined both texts and melodies to the point that they lost their power. Moreover, “they overlooked [read: excluded] many of the best hymns and generally underappreciated the poet’s skill . . . in expressing the idea of humankind’s sins and misery and God’s eternal mercy.” Smend then admonishes his audience to see for themselves how the new hymnal restored these treasures of Protestant hymnody and exposed anew the truths they proclaimed about sin and salvation. “When you recognize this,” he continued, “then make this new energy your own and be thankful for [the new hymnal].” At this point, Smend pushed to bring his remarks to a close. He stressed that Christ’s self-sacrifice for the good of humanity was not just a core concept of the Christian faith, but also the key to the most profound of Protestant hymns. And thus, he urged the congregation “to take the new hymnal home as the best Christmas present that you could receive.” Appropriately, as Smend climbed down from the pulpit after speaking for about thirty minutes, the congregation broke open the hymnals to finish the hymn “Mach Hoch die Tür.” The text of the final stanza reiterates the desire that Christ the Redeemer come, and the congregation uses the hymn’s language to make a personal request for the present time: “Come, O my redeemer, Jesus Christ. The door to my heart is open to you [emphasis added].” When he next spoke, Smend resumed his role as spokesperson and voiced the congregation’s needs, requesting

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that God grace and protect his people. He then recited the Lord’s Prayer and joined the congregation in singing one last verse of a hymn. Foreshadowing the conclusion of the service, this stanza abandons the intercessions’ communal “we language” for the “me language” of the individual: “I will stick to you [the Lord] diligently, and live with you there . . . for in time I will soar with you full of joy, without time, there in the other life.” And with three brief benedictions, Smend’s narrative of hope, salvation, community and song came to an end. At the same time that the Reformed church’s service dedicated to the hymnal illustrated many of the principles that liturgical reformers promoted at the turn of the century, the very object of the community’s celebration—the new hymnal—was both a product of that movement and one of its significant early triumphs. As Smend mentions in his sermon, the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries represent a low-point in the history of Protestant hymnody. Across German Europe, the spirit of the Enlightenment encouraged church leaders to rewrite many hymns in light of contemporary tastes and rationalist theology, to “square” hymn tunes by regularizing their rhythms (such as with Luther’s “Ein’ feste Burg”), and quite simply to drop numerous “old-style” chorales from the songbooks.119 As the rationalist tradition ebbed in the 1820s and 1830s, the pietist and confessional revivals began, which generated new hymnological research and, in time, pressure to revise these “revolutionary” hymnals. In Alsace, the Pastoral Conference took on this project in 1842. The book that arose from its labors, the so-called Conference Hymnal of 1850, was a work of compromise that befit its goal of constructing a hymnal that the entire Lutheran community in Alsace could use, whether liberal, pietist or conservative. Whereas many greeted it as an improvement over the previous hymnal, the Conference hymnal had many detractors. Prominent church leaders, including the rationalist Inspector Edel (New Church), thought that it was too conservative. By contrast, orthodox Lutherans, notably Friedrich Horning (Young St. Peter), felt that it was not sufficiently Lutheran, largely because it failed to restore many of the old texts 119 For a critical assessment of this development in Alsace, see Wilhelm Horning, Die Revolutionsgesangbücher (1798 –1808 ff.) (Strasbourg: Hubert, 1898). A more measured analysis appears in Ernst Muller, “Les recueils de cantiques d’Alsace du XIXe siècle. Evolution de la piété en Alsace d’après les Recueils strasbourgeois de langue allemande,” BSHPF 124 (1978): 48 – 66. On the crisis of Protestant church music in German Europe at the beginning of the nineteenth-century, see Friedrich Blume, Geschichte der evangelischen Kirchenmusik, 2nd ed. (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 1965), 229 –35.

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(in their original forms). In 1851, the General Consistory consented to authorize the hymnal for public use, but it refrained from establishing it as the Lutheran church’s official German-language hymnal.120 Horning’s attack on the Conference hymnal was part of his broader campaign to restore the French Lutheran church to its true foundations, in both doctrine and liturgy. However, by claiming the cause of hymnological reform—and liturgical renewal more generally (restoration would actually be the more accurate term)—for the orthodox Lutheran movement, Horning effectively forced theologians and ministers of other theological persuasions to distance themselves from such concerns. Indeed, in the heat of the intraconfessional polemics of the 1850s and 1860s, to demonstrate interest in church music and liturgical life was tantamount to declaring oneself for the confessional Lutheran camp. This association between religious orthodoxy and church music was only strengthened in the 1860s, when Horning’s colleague in Grafenstaden (a community just south of Strasbourg), Georg Heinrich Rittelmeyer, succeeded in publishing a hymnal that brought together a large number of hymn texts (almost 600), restored to their original beauty and length. Although many in the Superior Consistory recognized this Gesangbuch für Christen Augsburger Confession as a definite improvement to the Conference’s text, they were hesitant to approve its use. Indeed, Rittelmeyer had to make two rounds of extensive revisions (primarily to fix objections to the diction in many of the hymns) before the body sanctioned it in 1869. Even then, several delegates lamented that the Rittelmeyer hymnal’s introduction, even if only facultative, would solidify the lines of intraconfessional division.121 The Rittelmeyer hymnal called attention to significant weaknesses in the Conference book. The Conference addressed some of these problems in 1880 by issuing a supplement that contained a group of eighty-seven well-known texts and forty-two chorales especially appropriate for youth services ( Jugendgottesdienste). But by this point, the damage caused by the confessional infighting had taken its toll. As Julius Redslob pointed out in a report commissioned by the Directory

120 Horning was a member of the song-book commission, but left it in 1848 when it became clear that the commission would not realize his vision for the new hymnal. Strohl, Protestantisme, 383 – 84. 121 Wilhelm Horning, Das Gesangbuch für Christen Augsburger Konfession und die Kämpfe zu seiner fakultativen Einführung (1863 –1869) (Strasbourg: privately printed, 1898); RO 21 (1864): 64 – 83; RO 24 (1867): 60 – 83; RO 26 (1869): 157– 62 and 173.

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for discussion at the 1887 Superior Consistory session, hymn-singing was in a deplorable shape. With the notable exception of parishes like Young St. Peter, where the Hornings devoted great attention to congregational singing, most rural and urban parishioners knew and sang regularly only a fraction of the hymns in the Conference hymnal (at New Church this meant only 50 of some 750). Frequently, “the organ must help fill up the emptiness of the singing. Instead of accompanying the voices, it often ends up overwhelming them.” Although Redslob and the other pastors responding to the Directory’s survey identified many different reasons for this sorry state of affairs, they agreed that many of the problems stemmed from the hymnal’s inadequacies. The consensus was that reforming the hymnal would promote improvements in church singing and help restore vitality to and interest in Protestant worship in the Reichsland.122 Seven years passed before the Pastoral Conference raised the question of devising a new hymnal. Significantly, the theologian invited to discuss the issue at the 1894 meeting was not an Alsatian, but rather, an old German, Professor Friedrich Spitta. It proved to be an inspired choice. A gifted musicologist in his own right, Spitta was also the son of the noted hymnologist and Bach scholar, Philipp. As an outsider, he was able to advocate hymnological reform without being considered beholden to one theological camp or another. Indeed, in evaluating the existing hymnal, Spitta argued that liturgical rather than confessional criteria must prevail, since it was first and foremost a book designed for worship. Not surprisingly, Spitta urged the Conference to develop a new hymnal, one that was both better suited to the needs of contemporary worship and more distinctively Alsatian. The Conference overwhelmingly endorsed Spitta’s recommendation and established a committee led by Spitta, Karl Gerold (a liberal pastor at St. Nicholas) and Redslob (a conservative) to draft a text for future discussion.123 The hymnal that the committee asked the Conference to back four years later was, in fact, a very different type of songbook. Following Spitta’s basic definition of a Protestant hymnal, the hymns were grouped

122 Redslob, Bericht über den Kirchengesang in Elsaß-Lothringen. Auf Grund der Einzelberichte aus sämmtlichen Gemeinden im Auftrag des Direktoriums der Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1887); AS 42 (1887– 88): 78–79 and 96 –110; ADBR 172 AL 277. 123 Spitta, “Das Gesangbuch für die evang. Gemeinden Elsaß-Lothringen,” ASPC 10 (1892–97): 191– 229 and 286.

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according to their liturgical function, rather than the major categories of dogma or sections of the Lutheran catechism (as was of the case for the 1850 hymnal and the Rittelmeyer hymnal, respectively).124 The number of hymns was also dramatically reduced: whereas the 1850 hymnal had over 800 texts, and Rittelmeyer about 600, the “SpittaGerold-Redslob” book contained only 411. While the committee strove to restore the original language of the hymns, it did not always include all of the verses. It had, for example, pruned two verses from “Gott sei Dank durch alle Welt,” and five from “Fröhlich soll mein Herz singen,” two chorales that Smend used in his hymnal service. Practical liturgical considerations drove most of these decisions. Because the songbook was neither a prayer book, nor an archive of religious poetry, at least in Spitta’s mind, it did not need to contain every single hymn text. Similarly, since few congregations sang every single verse of the longer hymns, the committee observed in its report, it made sense to make certain excisions. Restricting the number of hymns to the “best from each of the main periods of Protestant church music” also enabled the commission to satisfy another important objective: to provide notes for the hymn tunes with their associated texts.125 As with the previous Conference book, the 1898 hymnal included texts that reflected a wide range of theological opinion and background. Lutheran classics by Luther and Paul Gerhardt were included with texts by noted Reformed authors such as Zwingli and Johannes Zwick. But the committee also made a point of including the hymns by several noted Alsatian poets—Théophile Pfeffel, Adolf Stöber, and Friedrich Weyermüller and even Franz Haerter—to underscore that this was a hymnal for the Reichsland.126 Although conservative pastors like Wilhelm Horning lambasted the “Spitta” songbook as a “union product” (Unionsware) and censured the work for having “robbed” Alsatian Protestantism of some three

124 See here Spitta’s 1896 “progress report,” ibid., 158– 61, and the Conference’s discussion of the hymnal’s first draft in 1897, ibid., 225–30. As Gerold acknowledged at the 1897 session, Spitta performed the bulk of the committee’s labors to create the new hymnal. 125 Discussion of the songbook at the 1898 session, ASPC 11 (1898 –1903): 10 –15; Spitta, “Referat über die Noten im neuen Gesangbuche,” ibid., 246–56. 126 “Von den Worten und Weisen des Gesangbuches,” in Evangelisches Gesangbuch für Elsaß-Lothringen (Strasbourg: Heitz u. Mündel, 1899), 488–98.

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hundred hymns, the Pastoral Conference endorsed it roundly.127 During a special session on 22 November 1898, the Superior Consistory voted unanimously to authorize the hymnal’s use in the Reichsland’s Lutheran parishes.128 Before the end of November, Strasbourg’s Pastoral Society also recommended that each city parish introduce the hymnal.129 By July 1899, every inner-city Lutheran parish save Young St. Peter, which used the Rittelmeyer hymnal, moved to adopt the new Conference book.130 Although the Reformed Synod had no authority to approve liturgical books, when it convened in April 1899, it too gave the hymnal its blessing. Lastly, on 28 November, Strasbourg’s Reformed parish adopted the new songbook, setting the stage for Smend’s service twelve days later.131 To be certain, the appearance of the Evangelisches Gesangbuch für ElsaßLothringen, as the 1899 Conference hymnal was formally named, could not bring people back to the churches by itself. Yet, as Spitta intended, it provided pastors with a powerful set of tools for revitalizing the Protestant worship experience. Supplying numerous suggestions for various types of church services throughout the church year, even pastors with only a passing knowledge of hymnology would feel comfortable with its extensive and varied repertoire. Special courses were also established with state subsidies, so that church organists could learn to play the new and restored hymns with the appropriate tempi and rhythms.132 The widespread acceptance of the hymnal symbolized the end of the principled opposition to matters of ritual in many Alsatian Protestant circles. Numerous Reichsland curates now joined discussions on liturgical questions by writing articles and reviews for Smend and Spitta’s

127 Cf. Johannes Simon, Was ist von dem “Evang. Gesangbuch für Elsaß-Lothringen (neuen Konferenzgesanbuch Spitta-Gerold-Redslob 1899) zu halten? (Strasbourg: Ev.-luth. Schriften, 1899), 4–9; Wilhelm Horning, Neue Gesangbuchsnot. Das zweite Straßburger Konferenzgesangbuch . . . mit seinen hymnologischen und kirchlichen Schäden (Strasbourg: privately printed, 1898); idem, ed., Der Raub eines Teiles des hymnlogischen Kirchenschatzes nämlich bei 300 kirchlich bewährter, in Elsaß-Lothringen autorisirter und eingeführter Lieder durch die Kommission des zweiten Straßburger Konferenzgesangbuches (Gerold-Spitta-Redslob) (Strasbourg: privately printed, 1898). 128 AS 53 (1898–99): 268–96. 129 PB-SPG, vol. 4 (28 Nov 1898), ADBR 172 AL 292. 130 PB of the respective consistories and parish councils; AS 55 (1900): 34–36. 131 Proceedings of the Reformed Synod session of 25 April 1899, ADBR 133 AL 95 (96); PBKR (28 Nov 1899), 173 AL ADBR 61. 132 Report from Puttkamer to Statthalter Hohenlohe-Langenburg, 22 Feb 1898, ADBR 27 AL 540. In the first year, twenty-six organists participated in this program. AS 55 (1900): 36.

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Monatschrift. They included liberals like August Ernst and August Hering (who became colleagues at St. Thomas), pietists like Paul Grünberg, and even orthodox-leaning conservatives like Hans Ihme and Karl Hackenschmidt. In 1911, Hering reported on a particularly modern Lenten observance he led at St. Thomas that revolved around the presentation of slides depicting images of the Passion. To establish the event as Protestant worship, and not just a lecture on art, Hering began and ended the evening with organ music, prayer, and a congregational hymn. But there was no sermon. Instead, the display of some slides was accompanied by organ music. Others received commentary with a scripture reading, a hymn, or a vocal solo, while meditative silence prevailed during the projection of some slides.133 Even if Hering’s “slide show devotional” was unique for the extent to which it harnessed contemporary culture for religious purposes, it was typical of the liturgical experiments that reformers encouraged to help make worship seem more attractive and relevant. For Smend and other like-minded theologians, creating modern liturgies was not solely a matter of innovation. Pastors also needed to have the proper resources at their disposal, which meant not just a modern hymnal (which the Alsatians now had), but also a modern collection of liturgical texts (Kirchenbuch or, more commonly, Agende). Speaking before the Pastoral Conference in 1902, Smend catalogued the deficiencies of the liturgies currently in use. The language of the prayers and liturgical formulas was outmoded and often tended toward the “doctrinaire . . . bombastic, blasé, and conventional.” They contained insufficient materials for feast days and festive seasons, and nothing at all for such modern celebrations such as Inner Mission or Gustav Adolf Sunday. Smend maintained, too, that the Reichsland’s churches had a right to their own Kirchenbuch, which reflected their particular ecclesiastical needs and traditions, rather than those of Württemberg or Bern.134 This speech, in effect, resulted in the Reichsland obtaining two such compilations. Although the Conference decided against producing its own book, Smend carried on and published the first volume of his Kirchenbuch für evangelische Gemeinden, devoted to worship (Gottesdienste) in 1906, and the second, devoted to church rites (Handlungen), in 1908.

Hering, “Gottesdienstliche Feiern mit Lichtbildern,” MGkK 16 (1911): 78 – 82. Smend, “Ist für die evangelischen Kirchen Elsaß-Lothringens ein eigenes Kirchenbuch erwünscht?,” ASPC 11 (1898 –1903): 426 – 52. 133 134

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At the same time, Karl Maurer, an orthodox Lutheran theologian and former student of Smend, worked in a similar fashion and updated and expanded the old Strasbourg Kirchenordung to meet contemporary needs.135 His Agende für Gemeinden Augsburgischer Konfession in Elsaß-Lothringen also appeared in 1906. Despite differences in length and content, both books shared the common purpose of serving as modern “liturgical reference manuals.” They didn’t just provide texts for prayers and formulas for the full range of rites and services in the modern church, they supplied an abundance of these materials. To help pastors avoid the “liturgical sin” of monotony, Smend’s Kirchenbuch offered 180 different greetings, 37 distinct formulas for the confession of sins, and 88 versions of general intercessions. Both collections also offered numerous model liturgies for every possible service such as worship with and without sermons (so-called “liturgical” services), Sunday afternoon worship, weekday devotions, the Emperor’s birthday, and adult baptisms. Here again, Smend was much more generous than Maurer and offered his readers not only more models, but also lengthy lists of resources and suggestions for further reading—he was a professor of practical theology, after all.136 The panel of inspectors who reviewed the two liturgies for the Superior Consistory in 1907 criticized aspects of both works, in particular, Smend’s choices for modernizing traditional formulas and prayers. Nevertheless, they recommended approving both, since each collection would greatly aid the clergy in encouraging an active and healthy parish liturgical life. The Superior Consistory’s full membership concurred with the inspectors’ assessment and sanctioned the facultative use of both Kirchenbücher.137 Expressing Membership: Sacraments and Rites of Passage One of the most frequent complaints about the state of Protestant parish life in Strasbourg at the time was that many families took interest in the church only when they had a particular need for its services. Inspector

Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 104–05. Smend, Kirchenbuch für evangelische Gemeinden, 2 vols. (Strasbourg: Eduard van Hauten, 1906 and 1908); Maurer, Agende für Gemeinden Augsburgischer Konfession in ElsaßLothringen (Strasbourg: Verlag der Evang.-luth. Gesellschaft, 1906). 137 AS 62 (1907– 08): 9 –11, 168 – 80. In contrast to the situation with the confessional hymnal in the 1860s, the admission of “rival” liturgies was unavoidable; orthodox Lutherans would never approve a Kirchenbuch written by a Reformed Protestant. 135

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Ungerer noted in 1874: “We can count all too many who keep their distance from the church once they have been confirmed and come to services only when there is a marriage, a baptism, a funeral, or some other urgent reason to attend.”138 Historians and sociologists frequently cite such remarks as evidence of secularization, especially in the city, but more circumspection is in order.139 To begin with, Strasbourg’s churches were partly responsible for this emphasis on rites and sacraments (Handlungen).140 People didn’t have to join a personal congregation to hear a sermon, only if they wanted to receive a church wedding or have their children baptized. Consequently, it was understandable that Protestant families generally registered with a given clergyman only as circumstances required.141 More fundamentally, the high level of participation in religious rites of passage—in Strasbourg and in many other Germany big cities apart from Berlin and Hamburg—speaks to the continued salience of these forms of religious practice.142 Individuals actively chose to take on and reassert their identity as Protestants through them. Custom and local circumstances may have helped drive these decisions, but they do not diminish the overall significance of the act. It brought people into the church, those receiving the rite, their family, and their friends. It also exposed them to the symbols and messages of the ritual narrative and reinforced their awareness of belonging to the Protestant community.143 NCIR 1873, 6 –7. On this point, see especially Callum Brown’s critical discussion of secularization theory in Death of Christian Britain, 2–15, but also Lucian Hölscher, “Secularization and Urbanization in the Nineteenth Century: An Interpretative Model,” in McLeod, European Religion, 263–88. 140 Lutherans and Calvinists recognized only baptism and communion as sacraments. Confirmation, marriage and funerals were merely rites that the church promoted. To simplify the discussion that follows, however, I will generally refer to both types of action under the rubric of church rites. 141 To prevent pastors from “poaching” parishioners from one another and to shore up individual ministers’ disciplinary authority, Strasbourg’s pastors agreed that they would only conduct rites for their own parishioners, unless the “home” pastor had granted a dispensation. “Convention avec le Consistoire réformé de Strasbourg au sujet des rapports entre les pasteurs des deux cultes protestants.” 18 May 1825, RO 2, 73–74; and “Directorial-Erlass betr. die Aufschliessung der Pfarreien” 30 Jan 1866, Dursy, Staatskirchenecht 2:234 – 238. 142 I have discussed the broader German context of these trends in “Religion as Urban Culture: A View from Strasbourg, 1870 –1914,” Journal of Urban History 30 (2004): 152 – 88, esp. 167– 69. 143 This is precisely why, in parts of northern Germany, Protestant ministers actually devoted more attention to the issue of religious rites of passage as the nineteenth century came to a close. Von Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch, 328 – 36. 138 139

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Of course, arguing for the continued importance of rites and sacraments does not mean that nothing changed in this key sector of urban cultural practice during the Reichsland era. New ideas about liturgy and changes in theological sensibility resulted in modifications to the rituals’ content. Demographic shifts and the reorganization of city birthing and funerary facilities altered the system of demand for certain church services. As elsewhere in Imperial Germany, the Reichsland’s Protestant churches kept regular records on two basic types of Handlungen: communion and rites of passage. These data shed considerable light on the processes of community formation and affiliation in Strasbourg, but they do have their limitations. One problem is that the data for Strasbourg itself is patchy, especially for the Lutherans. The religious inspectors submitted annual statistical reports based on the inspection, not the parish or consistory, and the extant archival material does not permit the reconstruction of full data series for all of Strasbourg. The analysis that follows reflects essentially complete records from the Reformed church and the partial information available from the Lutheran parishes. A second difficulty develops out of the gaps arising from Strasbourg’s personal parish system and the city’s function as a metropolis and a regional health care center. Census figures counted more Protestants than were registered in the city’s parishes and the municipality’s vital statistics failed to distinguish between resident and nonresident births, deaths, and marriages. Under these circumstances, meaningful calculations of the number of city’s Protestants who actually received church rites as a proportion of the total Protestant population are impossible to calculate. The alternative proffered by Lucian Hölscher and other recent scholars of German Protestantism—privileging communion data—is also unsatisfactory.144 On the one hand, receiving communion was no longer a mandatory for being Protestant on either side of the Rhine after 1800, so it makes little sense to treat it as a valid measure of churchly ties (Kirchenverbindungen). Moreover, the data rarely permit controlling for repeated communions by the same person; neither do they take into account the range of Eucharistic practices in the city’s Protestant parishes. Hölscher develops his arguments in numerous articles, but see especially Hölscher, “Religion des Bürgers,” and idem, “Möglichkeiten und Grenzen der statistischen Erfassung kirchlichker Bindungen,” in Elm and Loock, Seelsorge und Diakonie, 39 – 62. See also Liedhegener, Christentum und Urbanisierung, 295 – 310 and 512 – 34. 144

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Although Strasbourg’s Protestants were not obligated to take communion, it remained an important sacrament and point of confessional differentiation. Whereas Catholics could partake of communion weekly, Lutherans and Calvinists had the chance only at specific times of the year. There were also significant differences in Calvinist and Lutheran attitudes towards communion. Strasbourg’s Reformed parish held communion services only four times a year: as part of the celebration of three major feasts—Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost—and on Michelmas (29 September). Within the Lutheran fold, the frequency of communion services varied from parish to parish. At a minimum, communion was offered on Good Friday, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost, Reformation Day, and Christmas. In four parishes (New Church, St. Aurelia, St. Thomas, Young St. Peter) additional services made communion possible each month; even St. William regularly added a communion service in the months of February, June, August and September.145 The communion statistics for Strasbourg during the German period are woefully incomplete. Nevertheless, data from four of the inner-city parishes (Reformed Church, New Church, St. Thomas and Young St. Peter) are suggestive of broader trends. This information appears in Figures 5.4 and 5.5, and Table 5.1. We see that, overall, communion rates kept up with changes in parish membership. Levels of communion trended positive in each of the four parishes. St. Thomas’s modest gains reflected its relatively stable parish size, while the strong trend at Young St. Peter mirrored the parish’s notable post-1871 expansion. Nevertheless, a slight ebb is evident starting around 1900, a development that, at least at the Reformed Church and St. Thomas, stems primarily from a drop in women’s participation. Strasbourg’s communion data also demonstrate that women were both more assiduous in attending services and much more likely to take communion than men. While it is not clear whether men’s communion rates indicated a greater degree of churchly disinterest, it does imply that communion played a significant role in Protestant women’s piety. This said, the vast majority

145 August Hering, “Die gegenwärtige Stellung und Bedeutung des heil. Abendmahls im evangelischen Gottesdienste,” ASPC 9 (1886 – 91): 361– 379, here 367. In 1885, the decline in the Reformed church’s French-language community resulted in a further reduction in communion services to two occasions: Christmas and Easter. ADBR 173 AL 61, session of 19 May 1885. See also, weekly schedules of services (Kirchenzettel ) in PR and KB, 1871–1914.

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Male

277 Female

Total

800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100

Figure 5.4

19 10

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19 00

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0

Communion at the Reformed church, 1880–1913 (data from ADBR 173 AL 24 and 67).

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Figure 5.5

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Communion at St. Thomas, 1874–1913 (data from ST).

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Lutheran communion trends, 1871–1913

New Church Male

Female

Total

St. Thomas Male Female

Total

Mean 466.43 1,318.70 1,855.39 344.6 842.25 1,152.58 St. Dev. 259.42 26.61 73.18 97.51 Min. 216 808 1,093 315 677 951 (1871) (1871) (1871) (1894) (1909) (1874) Max 265 1,622 2,378 422 973 1,341 (1903) (1910) (1899) (1909) (1896) (1896) Trend 10.710 1.057 -4.468 4.052

Young St. Peter Total 3,457.93 578.91 2,513 (1885) 4,171 (1894) 23.20

SOURCE: TN, SPJ, ST; AMS Fonds TN; ADBR 136 AL 12. For TN, data is from 1874–1888, 1900–1901, 1905–1913; for SPJ, figures reflect available data for the period indicated.

of all communions, men’s and women’s, occurred at the same time of the year: Holy Week. At New Church, for example, over 65% of its annual communions occurred during this period, with the bulk of them falling on Good Friday.146 Although a slackening of ties to organized religion may have negatively affected taking communion in some instances, this was hardly the sole factor. As August Hering observed in a presentation to the Pastoral Conference in 1890, many who attended church opted not to receive the sacrament out of a sense of religious modesty or because of personal doubts about what the Eucharist really represented. Furthermore, the liturgical setting created obstacles to participation. On the one hand, to receive communion a Protestant was expected to attend the preparation ritual, which, in Strasbourg, was customarily held the afternoon or evening before. That is, to take communion one had to go to church not once, but twice.147 On the other hand, pastors generally treated the communion service itself as an addendum to the main Sunday or feast day liturgy. After the sermon and the general intercessions, curates read the day’s announcements and all who did not wish to commune were then free to leave. Most did. The result, Hering notes, was far from attractive:

146 147

TN; AMS TN 90 – 92, 101, 103 –104, 110; ADBR 2G 482 E, 74 –76. PB-SPG, vol. 4 (30 July 1894), ADBR 172 AL 292.

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After the great majority of the congregation has left, there remains only a small, often tiny group of individuals, who now feel lost in the empty church. . . . The words of the liturgist ring in an essentially empty room; the congregation’s song is now weak and powerless. In short, the celebration has no opportunity to become festive and, for that reason, it is often brought to a close quickly.148

Beginning in the 1880s, Strasbourg’s Protestant clergy experimented with a range of measures to renew interest in communion. Pietist and moderate Lutheran ministers at St. Thomas, Old St. Peter and New Church worked to augment the number of regular communion services and promote greater participation in and familiarity with the sacrament. Pastors also altered the communion liturgy itself. In 1886 Emil Nied and Karl Hackenschmidt combined the preparation and communion service at Young St. Peter into a single afternoon liturgy on non-feast days. It worked so well that by 1894 both New Church and St. Thomas followed suit.149 Liturgical reformers like Julius Smend and August Hering also encouraged their colleagues to do more with the actual liturgy. When communion occurred as part of the main Sunday service, pastors were to strive for a better balance between the liturgies of the word and the Eucharist, by shortening the sermon and by dismissing the congregation only after sermon and sacrament were completed. Hering also advocated playing up the notion of communion as a communal meal. Protestants should receive real bread and wine, he contended. They should sit down to receive, as at table, or gather around the Lord’s table, the altar. He even proposed allowing communicants to take bread and wine in their own hands, and offering them to each other.150 Hering’s colleagues were receptive to recommendations for making communion services more celebratory. But they were less willing to alter the form and method of distribution, because it would remove one of the remaining differences between Lutheran and Calvinist liturgical practice. In Strasbourg, for instance, the Reformed parish had long used unleavened bread rather than wafers, and as Karl Piepenbring reported to the 1890 Pastoral Conference, “the parish had had only

Hering, “Stellung und Bedeutung,” 366 – 69. SPJ PBKR, 2:122–24 (5 Oct and 3 Nov 1886); PB-SPG, vol. 4 (30 Jul 1894), ADBR 172 AL 292. 150 Hering, “Die Reform der Abendmahlsfeier,” ASPC 12 (1904 – 09): 67– 84; Smend, Evangelische Gottesdienst, 73–93. 148 149

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positive experiences with the faithful taking the bread and the chalice into their own hands.”151 After 1900, several parishes in Strasbourg introduced changes in how communion was distributed in order to meet one final source of congregational discomfort with the sacrament: hygiene. Although it was not uncommon for Protestants to shy away from the altar because they didn’t wish to share the chalice with strangers, in 1903 a series of articles appeared in the German press that depicted communion as a real hygienic threat. Imperial health officials tried to assure the public that the danger was grossly overstated; nonetheless, Protestant theologians felt pressed to respond. Friedrich Spitta, in particular, advocated the use of individual communion cups, and by 1904 he persuaded five Strasbourg parishes to give it a try.152 The Reformed Church held a special service with individual cups on Holy Wednesday, while New Church, St. Aurelia, German St. Nicholas, and St. Thomas did so on Maundy Thursday. The number of individuals who took advantage of this opportunity was fairly small, a total of 459 (83 men and 376 women) for the inaugural year, and no parish offered communion exclusively in the new format. Yet, the parishes regarded these figures as significant enough for them to continue the practice as long as interest held. It did. Participation levels abated somewhat between 1906 and 1909, but recovered thereafter, with 417 people still taking communion with individual cups as late as 1913.153 For all the Protestant clergy’s efforts to promote greater lay interest in communion, the fact remained that it was not through communion but rather the rites of passage—baptism, confirmation, marriage, and Christian burial—that Lutherans and Calvinists most reliably declared and affirmed their identity as Protestants. In 1878, Inspector Ungerer reported that virtually all Protestant infants were baptized and there were few Protestant children who did not receive confirmation. Similarly, only in rare instances were marriages and funerals celebrated without

ASPC 9 (1886 – 91): 309. Reports from the Imperial Health Ministry to the Prussian Interior Minister, 14 Jan 1904 (ADBR 41 AL No. 2/5) and 28 May 1904 (ADBR 172 AL 268); Spitta to the Strasbourg Pastoral Society, PB-SPG, 5:9 –12, ECAAL; Letter Spitta to Mayor Back on the “Einzelkelch” movement, 14 Dec 1903; BAK, Kl. Erw. 257, vol. 2, 76 –77. 153 AS 59 (1904): 46 – 48; Parish reports to the Directory on the “Einzelkelch,” ADBR 172 AL 268; RK PBKR, 17 Feb 1904, ADBR 173 AL 61; statistical data on the use of the individual cups culled from Directory’s annual reports to the Superior Consistory for the years 1906 –1913, AS 61– 68. 151 152

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a church ceremony. Twenty years later, Julius Redslob advanced similar claims. Writing to Inspector Metzger in 1902, he observed: “Only rarely did parents delay the baptism of their children for months, much less years, that couples were satisfied with only a civil marriage, or that families refused to contact a pastor to help bury a loved one.”154 The statistical evidence from the city’s inner-city Lutheran and Reformed parishes (Figures 5.6 and 5.7) corroborates these impressions, especially within the broader socio-institutional context of German Strasbourg. Nevertheless, the data alone provide only part of the picture of what was happening. This is particularly true of baptism. At first glance, the evidence presented in the graphs seems to contradict the argument of persistence, inasmuch as the numbers of baptisms in Strasbourg, especially in the inner city, plummeted during the final two prewar decades. This trend owed little to changes in Protestants’ sense of attachment to the religious community. Instead, it reflected, at least partially, reforms at the city hospital. In 1892, the hospital’s governing board unilaterally decided to make the hospital chaplain (an official Lutheran pastor) responsible for all rites and sacraments conducted at the hospital.155 More problematically, the rules effectively required all newborns to be baptized at the hospital, unless the mother expressly requested otherwise. Thus, while the number of parish baptisms between 1901 and 1912 fell from 1518 to 943, those at the hospital rose from 376 to 573.156 These policy changes aroused a storm of protest from the city’s Protestant ministers. But their grievance had less to do with the violation of their ministerial rights than the religious consequences of the hospital’s actions. By making the act of baptism a mere formality, speedily accomplished in the absence of both parents and godparents, the hospital fundamentally debased the rite of baptism. This was precisely the type of abuse that the Pastoral Society and the Reformed Synod tried to correct throughout the 1890s. Whereas clergy in North German Protestant churches increasingly sanctioned baptism at home in order to give the sacrament a more intimate and familial character,157 the Alsatian clergy strove to have baptisms occur at the church. NCIR 1877, 9 –10; SWIR 1902, 25 – 26. Letter from the Municipal Hospitals to the Directory, 17 June 1892, ADBR 172 AL 143, for the Lutheran minister’s reaction, see the letter of the Pastoral Society to the Directory, 25 Oct 1892, ibid. 156 PB-SPG, vol. 4, 27 Oct and 24 Nov 1902, ADBR 172 AL 292; and PB-SPG 5:203 – 04 (2 Feb 1913), ECAAL. 157 Von Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch, 334 – 35. 154 155

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40

Baptism

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Marriage

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35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0

1880

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Figure 5.6 Handlungen at the Reformed church, 1880–1913 (data from ADBR 173 AL 67).

1200

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0

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1913b

Figure 5.7 Handlungen at the inner-city Lutheran parishes, 1877–1913 (data from 172 AL 143, 239, 242, 244, 245, 246, 252, 262 and Directory to the Ministry, 1888, ADBR 133 AL 67; 1913b includes data from suburban Strasbourg).

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They wanted to emphasize the rite as an act of initiation into the community, even if it meant delaying the ceremony by a few days so that both parents (mother and father) and godparents could attend. The Reformed Synod stated explicitly in 1898: “So long as the child’s health and other circumstances permitted, baptisms should be held on Sundays in the presence of the congregation. The godparents should be confirmed Protestants. . . . If they cannot attend the ceremony, they are to be replaced by baptismal witnesses.”158 As August Ernst pointed out in a presentation to the Pastoral Society in 1913, however, the real reason for the steep decline in baptisms was demographic. As we see from data marked “1913b” in Figure 5.7, the shift in population from the inner city to the suburbs accounted for part of the drop in inner-city baptism rates. But there was also a significant shift in natality city-wide. Between 1870 and 1885, the city witnessed a strong increase in natality: in 1875, for instance, there were 39.7 live births for every 1,000 residents, 34.8 in 1880, and 33.5 in 1885. This explains the rise in baptisms in both the Lutheran and Reformed communities until the turn of the century. Thereafter, birth rates declined, especially after 1905. In 1900, there were still 29.5 live births per 1,000, but 28.0 in 1905, and 23.6 in 1910 (in terms of absolute figures, there were 4,456 live births in 1900, 4,216 in 1910, and 3,983 in 1912). In France much of this demographic shift owed to changing birth practices among Catholics. However, in Strasbourg, as in many other big German cities, the decline was largely due to Protestants’ lower natality. In 1895, births from Protestant families accounted for 31.3% of all births in Strasbourg, but in 1912 only 27.8 of the city’s children were born into Protestant households. In short, Strasbourg’s churches reported fewer baptisms after 1900, because there were notably fewer Protestant children to baptize.159 Demography also had a bearing on Protestant confirmation rates. As Figures 5.5 and 5.6 reveal, the number of annual confirmations rose steadily until the turn of the century and fell only slightly during the final prewar decade. In several parishes, including St. Aurelia and

PB-SPG, vol. 4, 24 Feb 1896, ADBR 172 AL 292; MSV 4 (1898). PB-SPG, 5:203 – 04 (1913), ECAAL; Eichelmann, “Geburtenrückgang.” Of the cities that Eichelmann listed as having 25 live births per 1,000 inhabitants or less, only Aachen, Munich and Strasbourg were “Catholic” cities. On the situation in France, a useful starting point is Karen Offen, “Depopulation, Nationalism, and Feminism in Fin-de-Siècle France,” AHR 89 (1984): 648 –76, esp. 649 – 52. 158 159

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St. Thomas, the overall trend for the Reichsland period was even positive. Again, the modest decline in confirmation rates must be understood in terms of the shifts in the city’s demographic profile, since confirmation was one of the most popular of all the rites of passage and normally coincided with the end of obligatory schooling. Between 1905 and 1910, the consequences of falling natality were beginning to affect the age cohort for Protestant catechumens, namely thirteen and fourteen year olds (girls and boys, respectively). Whereas the number of 10 –15 year olds per 1,000 inhabitants stood at 97.9 in 1890, it decreased to 89.0 by 1910, a decline of 8.9%.160 Of all the rites of passage, confirmation was arguably the most important for its ability to build and express religious community. Although baptisms, weddings and funerals occurred in church, they were frequently private ceremonies. Confirmation, by contrast, was an explicitly public rite that took place as part of a main Sunday service.161 Not only did the children hear the pastor talk about what it meant to be Lutheran or Calvinist, but in the course of the liturgy they—along with the entire congregation—renewed their baptismal promises and declared their faith as members of the community. In Strasbourg, as in Alsace generally, the customary Sunday for confirmation was Palm Sunday. At the beginning of the Reichsland period, most city parishes also made an effort to hold a single service for all their catechumens, but increasingly this became impossible. As the number of catechumens increased, so too the service’s length, since after the public examination of the confirmation class, the children were called individually to the altar to receive a blessing, their special Bible verse (Konfirmationsspruch), and (often) a copy of the New Testament.162 Some pietist ministers, including Franz Haerter and Emil Nied, also included a communion liturgy as part of the service, but more frequently, the newly confirmed waited until Good Friday to take communion for the first time.163

Eichelmann, “Geburtenrückgang,” 688; ST, SA. In the Lutheran church, pastors had to seek permission from the religious inspectors for private confirmations. 162 Emil Nied, “Konfirmation,” SB 8/14 (1881): 211–14; Edmund Unsinger, “Ist Confirmation ein Muß?” ASPC 13 (1913): 344 – 68. 163 PB-SPG, vol. 4, (2 April 1900), ADBR 172 AL 292. Later on, parishes also set up special communion services for the youth and their families. August Stern did this for his congregation at St. Thomas; at St. William, the families of all three of the parish’s personal congregations were invited to a service on the evening of Maundy Thursday. 160 161

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Already in 1870, New Church and Young St. Peter were holding separate services for each resident pastor, a decision driven as much by numbers (111 at New Church in 1874 and 91 at Young St. Peter) as by theological differences. At Young St. Peter, for instance, one pastor held confirmation on Palm Sunday morning, his colleague had a special confirmation liturgy that afternoon, while Pastor Horning celebrated on the Sunday after Easter.164 But after 1890, Old St. Peter, St. William, and even St. Thomas also organized multiple services (typically one on the Sunday before Palm Sunday, and two on Palm Sunday itself ) in order to keep the length of the liturgies manageable for all involved.165 Although multiple confirmation services had the drawback of calling attention to divisions within the parish community, it enabled Strasbourg’s parishes to avoid the impersonal, mass confirmations that plagued many Protestant parishes in cities such as Berlin, Hanover, and Dresden.166 While baptism and confirmation established membership, weddings and funerals functioned more as affirmations of one’s membership in the Protestant community. They also differed in that, although normally taking place at the church, these rites were not celebrated in the context of regular parish religious services. Strictly speaking, individuals did not require the church’s involvement for either act. In Protestant theology, neither marriage nor funerals were sacraments; furthermore, thanks to the French Revolution’s anticlerical politics, civil marriage and burial had been available in Alsace and Lorraine since the beginning of the century. Indeed, no wedding could be blessed before the couple had signed the marriage register at the mayor’s office.167 Thus, it did mean something for individuals to invite the church to be present in their lives at these key moments. Conversely, the churches regarded both rites as privileges

“Kirchenzettel” in PR, 1870 –1889. Kirchenzettel KB, 1890 –1900. St. William struggled to maintain a single service for many years, before bowing to the inevitable in 1893. SG PBKR, vol. 2, passim (1891–1893). 166 Paul Grünberg, “Die Parochialverhältnisse in großen Städten,” Monatschrift für Pastoraltheologie 4 (1908): 367– 84, here 369–71; and on Berlin more specifically, McLeod, Piety and Poverty, 7– 8. 167 The French Penal code (Book III, Title 1, Section 3) set forth a penalty of between 16 and 100 francs for any minister who held a wedding before the couple had completed the civil ceremony. RO 1 (1840): 61– 62. Interestingly, when the German Protestant churches sought to end civil marriage and burial in the late 1870s and early 1880s, the Reichsland’s Protestant pastors publicly opposed the change. PB-SPG 4: 65– 66 (31 Jan 1880), ADBR 172 AL 292; ADBR 1 W 1049, 10 Mar 1881. 164 165

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of membership. That is, since they were optional rites, ministers didn’t want to bless those whose personal conduct patently violated what the church taught and expected of its members. Both the Lutheran and Reformed churches urged their clergy to exercise great caution in exercising their disciplinary authority. Not only was any assessment of one’s personal religiosity, especially that of the deceased, highly subjective, but in an era of rising antichurch sentiment, ecclesiastical authorities feared that the denial of rites could cause “marginal” Christians to sever their ties to the community altogether. Overall, the available data indicate that, until 1914, Strasbourg’s Protestants continued in large numbers to have the church bless their marriages and funerals. Despite ministers’ concerns about the state of religious sentiment in the big city, Strasbourg did not witness a massive move away from church weddings, like in Berlin following the introduction of civil marriage and divorce during the early Kulturkampf years. Nor were Protestants in Strasbourg inclined to forsake the church’s comfort on the death of a beloved family member, as was increasingly the case in many French cities from the 1860s onward.168 With respect to marriages, the statistics suggest a generally positive situation for the Protestant churches, especially when data from the city’s statistical office are taken into account. In both the Lutheran and the Reformed community, the numbers of church weddings trended upwards, although only modestly. One might object that this slight degree of change in marriage rates is actually the sign of greater disinterest, since Strasbourg’s Protestant population continued to grow in absolute terms. The city’s numbers, however, reveal that by 1896 at the latest, the number of Protestant marriages had stagnated (to about 404 annually), which explains the leveling off of church marriage rates.169 Comforting, too, was that divorce was fairly infrequent in Strasbourg (on average, 76 per year after 1900), which saved ministers from asking whether one or both parties was a divorcé(e) when preparing to bless a marriage.170

168 On Berlin, see McLeod, Piety and Poverty, 183–84; for the growing popularity of civil burials in France, see Thomas A. Kselman, Death and the Afterlife in Modern France (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), esp. 106–10. 169 Statistische Monatsberichte der Stadt Strasbourg, 1896–1914. 170 According to Protestant teaching, the marriage bond could only be dissolved by death. Consequently, many ministers believed that, after divorce had been legalized in the 1870s as part of the Kulturkampf legislation, weddings involving divorced persons should not be blessed. The Lutheran church never made an official stand on this thorny question, but in 1901, the Reformed Synod resolved that marriages of divorced persons

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More troubling, from the churches’ perspective, were the elevated numbers of mixed marriages in the city, that is, marriages between Protestants and Catholics.171 The data suggests that it may not have been a new problem for Strasbourg, since 31.9 percent of all marriages between 1877 and 1886 were mixed, a figure that was essentially the same for the period 1896–1914 (30.59 percent). Still, Protestant officials had reason to worry about it. Not only did the total number of mixed marriages in each of these two periods surpass those between two Protestant spouses, but the data show that Protestant men were much more likely to cross the confessional line to take a partner than their Catholic counterparts. For the period 1877–1886, over 58 percent of all mixed marriages involved a Protestant male, as did 52.5 percent of marriages between 1911 and 1914.172 Distressing, too, was the fact that only a minority of couples in a mixed marriage sought a Protestant service. Prior to 1900, for instance, only about 43 percent of mixed marriages received a Protestant blessing, with the majority of these cases occurring when the bride was Protestant (55.6 %).173 These figures help to explain why Strasbourg’s Protestant churches, like their counterparts in many other parts of the German Empire, regarded mixed marriages with such concern.174 Mixed marriage didn’t just represent a blurring of confessional boundaries. It constituted a frontal attack on Protestantism itself, a point that emerges clearly in the various polemical pieces published on the subject between 1870 and 1914.175 Why did Protestants come to this conclusion? Because of the Catholic church’s policies on mixed marriage. In Catholic practice, no marriage was valid until the church ceremony occurred. But for a mixed marriage, the couple had to pledge to baptize and raise all their children as Catholics for this ceremony to take place. Herein lay

could be blessed only under exceptional circumstances. Cf. Gerold, “Referat über die Ehescheidung,” ASPC 7 (1874 –79): 17, 65– 83. For the discussions within the Reformed church, see MSV 7 (1901): 25–28 and ADBR 133 AL 95 (96). 171 Marriages between Christians and Jews in Strasbourg were extremely rare, accounting for less than 1% of all marriages between 1896 and 1914. 172 AS 42 (1887): 54 –56; Statistische Monatsberichte der Stadt Strasbourg, 1896 –1914. 173 AS 42 (1887): 54 –56; see also PB-SPG, vol. 4, 25 Nov 1895, ADBR 172 AL 292. 174 Smith, German Nationalism, 96–101. 175 E.g., J[ohann]. Schneider, Eine Mischehe (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1887); and Adolphe Schaeffer, Warum bin ich evangelisch und nicht katholisch? Dem protestantischen Volke zu ernster Beachtung dargereicht durch den elsässischen Hauptverein des Evangelischen Bundes. (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1904).

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the rub. Although nothing prevented a marriage from being blessed by both Catholic and Protestant ministers, the latter expected that at least some of the children from the union be raised as Protestants. This expectation could not be met when the Catholic partner insisted on a Catholic rite and this ceremony occurred first, as was frequently the case in Strasbourg. In real terms, mixed marriages tended to cost the Protestant churches more both in the short and the long term. At the same time that they strove to educate their members about the dangers of mixed marriages, the Reichsland’s Protestant churches also strove to stiffen their own policies. First the Superior Consistory (in 1887) and then the Reformed Synod (in 1900 and 1901), issued new regulations that called for their clergy to refuse a Protestant blessing on mixed marriages that had already been consecrated in the Catholic church or where the couple had already promised to raise any future offspring as Catholics.176 Ultimately, neither policy had much impact on diminishing the number of mixed marriages in Strasbourg, but they did have the salutary effect of heightening the clergy’s awareness of this problem. Finally, regarding funerals, the data suggest that the number of church rites kept pace with the overall trends in mortality rates. More funerals were celebrated as mortality climbed to its peak level in 1905 (3,326 total deaths), and then both the number of funerals and death rates abated until the outbreak of war in 1914 (2,828 total deaths in 1913). At the very least, it appeared that the numbers of funerals celebrated was fairly consistent from year to year. Still, it is difficult to be fully confident in these findings. There are, first, numerous gaps in the churches’ own funeral data, for instance, only for 1913 is there complete information for all of the city’s Protestant parishes (inner city and suburban). Second, judging from the remarks of clergy like Gustav Ungerer and Julius Redslob, there is a distinction between Protestant death rates (which are also unavailable for the entire period) and Protestant burial rates. Namely, even when we take into account that a portion of the deaths reported in Strasbourg were nonresidents (in 1910 they represented some 14% of the total), the number of Protestant funerals consistently

176 AS 42 (1887): 49–54; AS 43 (1888): 151–52; MSV 6 and 7 (1900/01). Neither policy had binding status, however, since the Ministry felt it inappropriate to approve them as official changes in church discipline; Puttkamer to the Directory, 30 June 1887, ADBR 172 AL 273; and copy of Ministry to Piepenbring, 16 July 1900, ADBR 172 AL 309.

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stood well below the number of Protestant deaths. In 1913, for instance, there were 1,153 Protestant deaths in Strasbourg, but only 671 funerals (58.19%), a figure with which Protestant church officials would not have been satisfied. This rate would also have put Strasbourg at odds with the general trend towards higher levels of church burial in German Protestantism during the final third of the long nineteenth century.177 Nevertheless, as with baptism, some of the reductions in the numbers of funerals reported by the churches were due not to demographic shifts, but to new institutional arrangements in the city, which the Protestant clergy, in fact, generally supported. For instance, although the Pastoral Society disliked the reforms at the city hospital with respect to baptisms, they backed the new policy on funerals since it usefully resolved the sometimes sensitive question as to who should hold the funerals for those who died there. To wit, the hospital chaplain assumed responsibility for all funerals, unless the family specifically requested that its regular pastor officiate over the service.178 Of even greater consequence was the reorganization of the municipal burial office (Begräbnisbüro) between 1901 and 1909. Prior to then, the city played a largely administrative role in funerals: it processed the requisite paperwork for both the death and the burial. Instead, the lion’s share of funeral-related services—acquiring the coffin, delivering the body to the church and/or gravesite, hiring the hearse, sending funeral announcements—was provided by the parish, that is, by its sacristan. As part of the restructuring, the city erected a new mortuary and took over the responsibility for handling the deceased’s body (e.g., preparing it for burial and transporting it to the funeral home, church, and cemetery).179 Although this reform also made it possible to hold truly secular funerals, Strasbourg’s Protestant clergy had few misgivings about leaving the burial business. After all, the churches’ real interest was in the rite itself, about setting the civil act in a religious context for the benefit of the deceased’s family and friends. Thanks to the city’s initiative with the burial office, the clergy could now focus on these liturgical matters.

177 Von Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch, 331–334. Julius Smend, too, remarked on the greater attention that Protestant churchmen gave to funerals over the course of the century. Smend, Evangelische Gottesdienst, 102–04. 178 Strasbourg Pastoral Society to the Directory, 25 Oct 1892, ADBR 172 AL 143. 179 PB-SPG, vol. 4 (30 Sep 1901), ADBR 172 AL 292; see also Mayor’s office to the Directory, 25 Feb 1909, ADBR 172 AL 144.

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The termination of the churches’ funeral monopoly also had financial consequences, since many of the services previously performed by parish sacristans were no longer necessary. In light of this, the city agreed to pay parishes an annual sum for fifteen years as compensation for the fees that the sacristans normally collected for those duties.180 This settlement made it possible for many parishes to modify the schedule of fees that they charged to help cover the costs associated with rites that did not occur as part of regular worship, such as lighting candles, ringing bells, and having the organ played. Although the charges defrayed real parish expenses, notably the salaries of both the organist and the sacristan, as with pew rents, they were the focus of growing lay criticism. People complained that even the most basic form of marriage or funeral required a few marks, which gave the impression that the church was charging for its blessings. This motivated some Protestants to go elsewhere (funerals and baptisms at the hospital, for instance, were entirely free), or to do without the church’s blessing altogether. But there was further dismay that the churches offered different levels of ritual services (each with different fees), which insinuated that there were also different classes of Lutherans and Calvinists.181 Even though pastors such as Robert Will and laymen like Julius Weirich pushed to reform tariff arrangements by creating, at the very least, one form of each rite that was fee-free, financial necessities continually stood in the way. The city’s offer of compensation for the funeral services largely removed that impediment. St. William passed the most radical of the reforms, eliminating all fees for weddings and funerals in the parish church at the end of 1912. Old St. Peter, meanwhile, established totally free forms of both rites, as long as they were celebrated in the church. The other parishes did not do away with fees altogether, but most took the opportunity to simplify their tariffs or, at least, reduce the charges for many services.182 In this way, too, the city’s

180 The papers detailing the negotiations between the city and the several Protestant parishes may be found in ADBR 172 AL 144 (Lutheran parishes) and ADBR 173 AL 66 (Reformed parish). 181 On the pastors’ awareness of these sentiments, see esp. Inspector Knittel to the Directory, 18 Feb 1898, ADBR 172 AL 141, and Robert Will’s remarks in PB-SPG, vol. 4, 25 Sep 1899, ADBR 172 AL 292. In general, Strasbourg’s Protestant parishes had three levels of service for each rite. For funerals at St. Thomas, for instance, the charges were set at 28, 20, and 15.5 francs in 1872. ADBR 172 AL 141. 182 ADBR 172 AL 144; SG PBKR, 3:127–28 (10 Feb 1899) and 4:288–90 (6 Dec 1912).

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Protestant parishes sought to profit from changes we associate with urban modernity—efficiency, greater rationalization, growth of state action—to pursue reforms that would encourage the faithful to maintain their ties to parish communities and, at the same time, permit a better realization of Protestant teaching about religious community. Without question, the social and cultural changes that accompanied urbanization in late nineteenth-century Western Europe created multiple challenges for faith communities. New residential patterns and occupational structures, increased mobility and, above all, an expanded variety of options for filling one’s leisure time—a concept that was itself a consequence of European modernity—all these had dramatic consequences for how individuals related to the churches and participated in their cultural offerings. In short, churches discovered that the “faithful” were no longer satisfying the traditional expectations of community membership, at least in quantitative terms. Whether we look at Strasbourg or Berlin, Bochum or London, fewer Protestants—but also Catholics and Jews—were going to church (or synagogue) on a regular basis. Yet, many of these men and women were still coming to church. They made it on feast days. They came when their sons and daughters were confirmed, or when family and friends were married and buried. The irregularity of these appearances does not minimize their qualitative significance in the least. Regardless of the motivation, the act of attending church (re-)established ties between individuals and faith communities. The faithful entered the community’s shared space, the church or chapel, and helped give the sense of community tangible form. As part of this body, Protestants also did more than just hear the minister’s narrative about faith and community membership. They actively participated in its elaboration by singing hymns and responding to prayers, and through such actions, individuals situated themselves in the liturgical narrative itself. They internalized its story of community identity. Lastly, gathering at church exposed individuals to a rich symbolic language, a set of sights and sounds that could connect the faithful to the worshipping community even in their absence, as with the custom of the “Our Father bell.” As we will see in the next two chapters, urbanization also opened a number of new ways for obtaining one’s religious bread and expressing membership in a faith community. Nevertheless, these developments drew on a foundation that was created through worship. Indeed, far

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from being moribund and marginal, worship figured as a meaningful form of cultural practice in many parts of urban Europe. In places like Strasbourg, strong interconfessional rivalries certainly had a hand in encouraging individuals to maintain ties with the churches by receiving the religious rites of passage and attending services on days like Easter. But tradition was not the only factor at work. Worship’s strength as a form of cultural practice also owed much to the reforms that the Protestant clergy pursued with respect to sacred time, the worship environment, and the liturgical exp erience itself. Indeed, if the underlying ideas about worship and its significance for Protestant community seemed timeless, they took on new form and content. Worship became modern at the same time that, in Strasbourg, it became more Alsatian.

CHAPTER SIX

BEYOND THE CULTURE WARS: RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN SCHOOL AND PARISH As the twentieth century commenced, a number of school-related incidents caught the attention of the Alsatian press. One case involved a father who enrolled his son in the Mulhouse Mittelschule (a form of advanced primary school). After giving the son’s name and age, the principal asked about denominational affiliation. The father replied, “none,” since the child had not been baptized. The principal then let it be known that this was unacceptable, for according to the law the child had to receive either Catholic, Protestant, or Jewish religious instruction. When the father suggested that it really didn’t matter to him, the principal replied, “No, you are the father, you must choose.” The father responded, “If I absolutely must, then I choose Jewish.” To this the principal inquired, “Is he circumcised? The Rabbi won’t accept him if he is not.” The son, however, had not been circumcised. So the father, exasperated and wanting to end the already overly lengthy interview, agreed to enroll his son provisionally in the Catholic section. Soon thereafter he filed a complaint with the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine, and when that failed to bring any positive results, the son was transferred into the Protestant section. Meanwhile, in Lorraine, several fathers had been brought before the authorities because their children failed to attend the religious education provided outside of the schools by the (Catholic) clergy.1 One father appealed his punishment, a twenty-four hour jail sentence, arguing that since the priest’s instruction was not part of the official school curriculum, it was optional for his sons. But in 1905 the courts held that, although school authorities had no direct influence over parochial education (which prepared youth for confirmation and first communion), the law required children to attend this instruction as long

1 According to the 18 April 1871 ordinance that introduced compulsory education in Alsace-Lorraine, parents were liable for their children’s attendance; truancy could be punished with fines and/or imprisonment.

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as they were of school age. Local officials, thus, had acted properly and the penalties for the truancies would stand.2 These episodes call attention to an important dimension of religion’s role in late nineteenth-century European society, one that the extensive literature on the culture wars has largely ignored. Namely, while ecclesiastical and political authorities across Europe clashed over who should control the schools, the place of religious instruction in the various school curricula remained secure—France excepted—down to the end of World War I.3 During the Kulturkampf, for instance, Prussian bureaucrats purged clergy from the ranks of the school inspectors, but they upheld the number of hours devoted to religious instruction per week in the primary and secondary schools.4 Given the conservative bent to German political culture during the Kaiserreich, the inclusion of religious education in the German states’ primary school curricula is perhaps not surprising. It reflected a consensus among political leaders—and churchmen—that religious instruction was essential to Erziehung (education, especially in the sense of personal and moral development), which was the principal goal of the German primary school. In other words, teaching religious precepts remained useful for socializing the masses. Yet, even in the secondary schools, the humanistic Gymnasium and the more “modern” and technically-oriented Realschule, the number of hours devoted to religion held constant even when these

These episodes were recounted in the anonymous pamphlet, Der Kirchenzwang in Elsaß-Lothringen von einem Elsässischen Freidenker (Frankfurt am Main: Neuer Frankfurter Verlag, 1909), 11– 21. See also the circular from Paul Albrecht, the head of the Reichsland’s Superior School Authority (Oberschulrat) to the district presidents of 3 Oct 1905, which reproduced the text of the Reichsland’s Superior Court (Oberlandesgericht) decision. ADBR 65 D 296, Vol. 5, III 5854/OS 5738. 3 For a European perspective on the conflicts between (the Catholic, particularly) church and state over education, see Nicholas Atkin and Frank Tallett, Priests, Prelates & People: A History of European Catholicism since 1750 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 85 –194, passim, as well as Clark and Kaiser, Culture Wars (especially the essays by James McMillan, Els Witte, and Laurence Cole). On the situation in Germany, the standard account is Lamberti, State, Society, & the Elementary School; for France see especially, Ozouf, L’École, l’Église et la République. 4 For a discussion of the Prussian School Supervision Law of 1872, see Lamberti, State, Society, 40–55. Although each German state set its own educational policies, Prussia’s standards for religious education exemplified a more general pattern in Germany, whereby primary schools gave two to four hours, secondary schools two hours of religious instruction per week. See the curricular plans in Christa Berg, ed., Handbuch der deutschen Bildungsgeschichte, vol. 4, 1870 –1918: Von der Reichsgründung bis zum Ende des Ersten Weltkriegs (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1991), 217–27, 272–78, 296–303. 2

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institutions encountered significant pressures to reduce the length of the school week.5 The implications of religion as an obligatory school subject extended well beyond the obvious: in this purportedly secular age, religious influences on the socialization that occurred during schooling remained considerable.6 In Alsace-Lorraine, as the father from Mulhouse discovered, it was not generic religious instruction, but something tailored to a specific state-recognized faith community: Protestant, Catholic, Jewish. Even where children of different faiths attended the same school, as was the case in all the Reichsland’s secondary establishments, students were sorted by confession for religious instruction. Schools thus played a major part in promoting the awareness of confessional difference in society at large. Moreover, by creating different courses of instruction for the different types of primary and secondary institutions, school officials promoted a sense of religious identity that had specific gender and class connotations. Above all, late nineteenth-century educational advances increased the importance of schools as sites of religious acculturation. In AlsaceLorraine, the introduction of compulsory schooling in 1871 meant that all school-age children would receive religious instruction, even if their families had no regular contact with a parish or synagogue community. Whereas the schools’ religious education programs initially served to prepare and complement the clergy’s own instruction, by the end of the century, many children received their knowledge of organized religion—its practices, beliefs, and world-views—primarily from school. Schools emerged as sources of religious knowledge in their own right. Acting independently of the officially-recognized faith community, they circulated ideas about faith and religious identity in the society at large. Especially in the big cities, these propagators of what Jeffrey Cox called “diffusive Christianity,” contributed appreciably to maintaining the vitality of urban religious culture.7 In Strasbourg, church and synagogue officials regarded the changes in schooling after 1870 with mixed emotions. Although most recognized 5 A good starting point here is James C. Albisetti, Secondary School Reform in Imperial Germany (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983). 6 As an example of newer research on the relationship between religion, schooling, and the construction of social identities, see Margaret Kraul and Christoph Lüth, eds., Erziehung der Menschen-Geschlechter: Studien zur Religion, Sozialisation und Bildung in Europa seit der Auflklärung (Weinheim: Deutscher Studien Verlag, 1996). 7 Cox, English Churches, 93–97.

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the important work that the schools accomplished, they were uneasy and often downright alarmed by the sacrifices they made in the name of educational “progress.” Catholic and Protestant ministers complained regularly, for instance, about the reorganization of schooling in Strasbourg between 1871 and 1873 that drastically curtailed their supervision of primary instruction and religious education. They also struggled for years with school (and later municipal) officials to maintain traditional arrangements for providing pastoral instruction to the youth outside of school. Complicating the efforts to resolve these conflicts, however, was a fundamental discrepancy between Catholic and Protestant attitudes toward the schools. While Catholics steadfastly insisted that the Church should be master of the school and, consequently, that Strasbourg’s primary schools should be organized by parish, Protestant churchmen prioritized the narrower issue of religious education in the schools and its relationship to pastoral instruction for the youth. And by framing their concerns in terms of content and quality, rather than control, Lutheran and Calvinist church officials realized several reforms after 1900 that gave them real influence over religious instruction in the primary and secondary schools. Modern Schools for a Modern City Lately, scholarly discussions of nineteenth-century nationalism have devoted considerable attention to schools, especially primary schools, regarding them as privileged sites of nation-building. In the schoolhouse, Eugen Weber argues in his classic Peasants into Frenchmen, children all across the nation learn to speak and write the same language. They receive lessons in national history and geography. Schooling did not just civilize the youth. It played a key role in getting them to imagine themselves, following Benedict Anderson, as members of a supra-local, national community.8 German schools likewise molded subjects loyal to the regional princes and, later, the emperor. In Prussia’s eastern provinces, they had the explicit task of Germanizing the local Polish populations.9 After 1871, schools played a major role in helping Bavar8 Eugen Weber, Peasants into Frenchmen: The Modernization of Rural France, 1870 –1914 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1976), esp. 303–38; Anderson, Imagined Communities, 5–7. 9 Christa Berg, Die Okkupation der Schule. Eine Studie zur Aufhellung gegenwärtiger Schulprobleme in der Volksschule Preussens, 1872 –1900 (Heidelberg: Quelle & Meyer, 1973); and for the situation in Poland, see, Lamberti, State, Society, 109–53.

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ians, Saxons and Württembergers frame their local, regional identities in terms of the new nation.10 Schools also figured prominently in integrating the Reichsland into the German national community. Already in October 1870, Civil Commissioner Kühlwetter declared to Heinrich von Mühler, the Prussian Minister of Education and Religious Affairs: “It is through the school that this territory should be Germanized, and I believe that a thorough and complete introduction of the Prussian school system will win friends for us among the largest and best parts of the [native] population.”11 Accordingly, the German authorities took command of the educational system. They imposed new curricular plans that made German the language of instruction and devoted greater attention to history and geography. Yet, even here, as Stephen Harp has demonstrated, the construction of national identity proceeded through the study of the region: Alsace. Alsatians were to be turned into Germans, not by imposing some artificial conception of Germanness from on high, but by reawakening the territory’s German spirit and placing that Heimat tradition in its proper national context.12 For most observers, the Alsatian schools’ efforts at Germanization fell well short of the mark. On the eve of the First World War, both Prussian conservatives and French revanchistes pointed to the 1913 Zabern Affair and the renewed expressions of Francophile sentiment among Alsace’s youth as evidence that they had not been won over to Germany.13 Although historians like Hans-Ulrich Wehler contend that this failure stemmed from an excess of German zeal, Dan Silverman suggests that the problem ensued rather from the German authorities’ efforts to accommodate the local population. Felicitas von Aretin takes the debate a step further by asserting that the schools did not follow any consistent Germanization policy at all.14 Stephen Harp, by contrast,

See here especially Confino, Nation, 46–51; and Weichlein, Nation und Region, 296–41 and 366–70. 11 Citied in François Igersheim, “Politique scolaire,” 250. 12 Stephen L. Harp, Learning to Be Loyal: Primary Schooling as Nation Building in Alsace and Lorraine, 1850 –1940 (De Kalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 1998), esp. 87–124. 13 On the Zabern Affair, see David Schoenbaum, Zabern 1913: Consensus Politics in Imperial Germany (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1982); and Wehler, “Der Fall Zabern.” Bernard Vogler outlines the main reasons behind and the manifestations of the fin de siècle French revival in his Histoire culturelle, 364–69. 14 Hans-Ulrich Wehler, “Das ‘Reichsland’ Elsaß-Lothringen,” 52–62; Silverman, Reluctant Union, 76–84; Aretin, “Erziehung zum Hurrapatrioten? Überlegungen zur 10

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asserts that until 1914 at least, schools actually did help Alsatian youth accept their German nationality, if only because real alternatives were absent.15 If the degree of germanization via the schools remains in dispute, there is little argument about what happened to the schools themselves. After 1870, the German authorities modernized the system of public education in the Reichsland and modernized it à l’allemande. Although Alsace’s schools were among the most advanced in France, soon after Strasbourg capitulated, Civil Commissioner Kühlwetter and Prussian Minister von Mühler determined that the French system had to go. It was ill suited for preparing youth to function in a modern, industrial society, much less reawakening feelings of Germanness in the hearts of Alsatian youth.16 The consolidation of German rule set in motion a thorough reorganization of schooling in the Reichsland. In the process, the new regime also significantly altered the context and content of religious instruction in the schools, particularly in Strasbourg. All in all, the Reichsland’s new rulers made quick work of the educational reforms. While the system would later be tweaked to reflect later political and pedagogical developments, its fundamental elements were all in place by late 1874. To begin, German officials extended the all-German practice of compulsory schooling to Alsace-Lorraine. This reform actually fulfilled a long-standing wish of Alsace’s liberal and Protestant elite, who saw it as a means of improving the schools’ effectiveness. Improving the quality of education, though, was only one of the factors motivating the German administration’s actions. Kühlwetter regarded compulsory education as a critical component of any successful campaign of Germanization; schools could hardly promote “German values” if Alsatian youth did not have to attend them.17 The change came on 18 April 1871, when General Governor Bismarck-Bohlen signed an ordinance that required the Reichsland’s youth to attend a state-approved school beginning that fall. However, for reasons that remain unclear, the ordinance created different obligations for boys and girls. Boys and girls both started to attend school at Schulpolitik des Oberschulrates im Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen 1871–1914,” in Grenzregionen im Zeitalter der Nationalismen, ed. Angelo Ara and Eberhard Kolb (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1998), 91–113. 15 Harp, Learning, 205. 16 On the situation in Alsace prior to 1870, see especially Harp, Learning, 19–48. 17 Igersheim, “La politique scolaire.” 253. On the German evaluation of the situation in Alsatian schools during the Second Empire, see Harp, Learning, 57–58.

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the age of six, but girls could take the final examination to leave school (Entlassungsprüfung) once they turned thirteen, whereas boys had to wait until they were fourteen.18 Similarly, German replaced French as the official language of instruction in Alsace-Lorraine’s schools, except for those schools located in the Reichsland’s French-speaking regions.19 In the primary schools, this change was realized in April 1871 with the publication of the official curricular plan (Normallehrplan) for the territory’s elementary schools. Schools in the German-language zone were still permitted to use some French in the upper grades until late 1872, but then both instruction in French and most study of French itself in the elementary schools was abolished.20 When the secondary schools reopened in 1871, they too adopted German as the official language of instruction, even if, as August Baumeister, the Prussian school councilor (Schulrat) named to help reorganize secondary schooling in Alsace-Lorraine, acknowledged, that “the achievements of many of the students would suffer for a while as a result.” Nevertheless, secondary school students were still allowed to study

18 A copy of the ordinance appears in Hermann Blum, ed., Gesetze, Verordnungen und Verfügungen, betreffend das niedere Unterrichtswesen in Elsaß-Lothringen, 1st ed. (Strasbourg: Friedrich Bull, 1886), 1–3. In his memoirs, the primary school inspector for Strasbourg (Stadtkreis Straßburg), Hermann Prass, explained this odd arrangement as a compromise between German (eight years of obligatory schooling) and French (seven years) traditions. However, there is no archival evidence to support this theory or its variations (namely that the lesser obligation for girls aimed to appease Catholics). Indeed, the documentary record (especially the files in ADBR AL 105) is strangely silent on why this unprecedented approach to compulsory schooling came into existence. Hermann Prass, 27 Jahre im Schuldienst (1871–1898) des Reichslandes Elsaß-Lothringen (Strasbourg: Friedrich Bull, 1900), 40–41. Prass’s statement that it was customary in Alsace for girls to attend school for only seven years is also inaccurate, for in Protestant communities at the very least, Lutheran girls and boys both had to attend school until they were confirmed at the age of fourteen. “Arrêté relatif à la confirmation des enfants,” 15 Oct 1852, RO 10 (1852): 35–37. 19 But even in these areas, all situated along the new Franco-German frontier, German officials pressed the cause for German language instruction. See Harp, Learning, 87–105. As of the 1910 census, most of the Alsatian French speakers lived in the three Vosges mountain cantons of Saales, and Schirmeck, and Schnierlach. In “German” Lorraine, they resided in the nine western cantons: Château-Salins, Delme, Dieuze, Gorze, Lorchingen, Metz-Land, Pange, Rixingen, Vernym and Vic. Rossé, Das Elsass, Map 4 (“Die Verbreitung der französischen Muttersprache”), 4:16. 20 As Harp points out, cities and towns with strong commercial ties to France, i.e. Colmar, Gebweiler, Mulhouse and Münster, were permitted to maintain French instruction in the upper grades for a time. But this exception was phased out by the 1880s. Harp, Learning to Be Loyal, 91– 93.

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French and in some schools, chemistry, physics, and math classes were held in French until late in the 1870s.21 The curricula for the Reichsland’s schools were also reorganized along German, and especially, Prussian lines. In devising a standard teaching plan for the elementary schools in 1871, Kühlwetter’s primary school advisor, Hermann Schollenbruch, drew heavily on the Prussian regulations of 1854 (the Stiehlische Regulative). This reinforced the central place of religion within the curriculum. It also made subjects like history, geography, physical education and music required school subjects. When Möller and Bismarck released their own curricular guidelines in 1872 and 1874, respectively, these too bore deep resemblances to the Prussian “General Regulations” of 1872.22 The German teaching plans, however, did more than simply change what was taught. They altered the pedagogical orientation of schooling. As Strasbourg’s long-serving primary school inspector, Hermann Prass, observed, the Germans replaced the French school’s analytically-minded pedagogy and tendency to promote breadth of learning, with a more synthetic approach that emphasized depth of learning.23 The instructional plans for the secondary schools elaborated by Baumeister and the Imperial Chancery in 1871, 1873, and 1878 also closely followed Prussian models. This stemmed partly from Baumeister’s own Prussian background, but partly too from practical considerations. It was essential that the certificates granted to graduates of the Reichsland’s secondary schools enjoy recognition throughout the Empire. And for that to happen, the

21 In fact, until 1877, students at a Reichsland gymnasium could write a French essay instead of a German one on the composition section of the Abitur. August Baumeister, “Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen,” in Die Einrichtung und Verwaltung des höheren Schulwesens in den Kulturländern von Europa und in Nordamerika, vol. 1, part 2, ed. idem (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1897), 212–38, here 214 –15. 22 A good description of the Prussian school regulations of 1854 and 1872 appears in Karl A. Schleunes, Schooling and Society: The Politics of Education in Prussia and Bavaria, 1750 –1900 (Oxford: Berg, 1989), 152–55 and 174–78. The Alsatian school texts of 1872 and 1874 departed most visibly from their Prussian models in their continued emphasis on confessionalized religious instruction. 23 Prass, 27 Jahre im Schuldienst, 37–38. The text of Schollenbruch’s curricular plan appears in ADBR 105 AL 2091. The 1872 Möller curriculum appeared as: NormalLehrplan für die deutschen Elementar-Schulen in Elsaß-Lothringen (Strasbourg: C. F. Schmidt, 1872); Bismarck issued his curricular guidelines in the 4 January 1874 “Regulativ für die Elementarschulen,” which served as a basis for a new Normallehrplan that was developed and published as the Normal-Lehrplan für die deutschen Elementar-Schulen in ElsaßLothringen, Neue Ausgabe (Strasbourg: C. F. Schmidt, 1877).

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schools had to adhere to “German” standards both in terms of curriculum and method.24 In addition, to ensure compliance with the new curricular standards, the German administration assumed complete responsibility for education in the Reichsland. It rejected the principle of “educational liberty” that took root in France following the passage of the 1850 Falloux Law and with it, the French practice of autonomous private schools.25 The compulsory schooling ordinance of 1871 started this process. Accordingly, students could fulfill their school obligations only in public schools or in private institutions that followed the state-approved teaching plan and whose teaching personnel possessed qualifications recognized by the state. Then, on 12 February 1873, the Reichstag passed the Law on Educational Affairs (for Alsace-Lorraine). This statute officially made primary and secondary education in the Reichsland an exclusive state prerogative. State approval was required to provide instruction, to open schools, and to appoint teachers. Moreover, schools that did not follow the official curricular plans and organizational regulations, as determined during regular inspections, could be closed.26 This latter provision was no idle threat either, for when Bishop Raess refused to allow state officials to oversee instruction in private Catholic schools (most famously the “petit seminaires” at Strasbourg and Zillisheim) Superior President Möller shut their doors and provoked cries of an Alsatian Kulturkampf.27

24 Baumeister, “Reichsland Elsass-Lothringen,” 214–17 and 220–22. Under Statthalter Manteuffel’s pressure, there were further changes in both the organization of secondary schooling and the secondary school curricula (“Ordnung der Lehraufgaben der höheren Schulen und der Verteilung der Lehrstunden,” ADBR 105 AL 1592) but these modifications have little bearing on the present discussion. 25 Maurice Agulhon, The Republican Experiment 1848 –1852 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 121–24; Price, Second French Empire, 193–204; and more recently, Patrick J. Harrigan, “Church, State, and Education in France from the Falloux to the Ferry Laws: A Reassessment,” Canadian Journal of History 26 (2001): 51–83. 26 “Gesetz, betreffend das Unterrichtswesen,” printed in Blum, Gesetze, 5–6. There did remain some private primary and secondary schools in the Reichsland, but after 1873 they stood out primarily in setting their own pay schedules for teachers and their ability to offer extracurricular courses in French. This latter fact alone, Prass suggested, explained the continued existence of such establishments. Prass, 27 Jahre im Schuldienst, 48–49. 27 See here especially Felicitas von Aretin, “Die reichsländische Schulpolitik während des Kulturkampfes 1872–1873,” Archiv für Sozialgeschichte 32 (1992): 181–205. The secondary school at Zillisheim reopened in 1880, Strasbourg’s in 1883 (as the Catholic St. Stephan’s school [Gymnasium]). Epp et al., Catholiques, Protestants et Juifs, 64–65.

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The Law Concerning Educational Affairs and its enacting ordinance of 10 July 1873 also clarified how the German regime would manage educational affairs in Alsace-Lorraine. It gave the Imperial Chancellor complete authority to issue regulations for the schools that ranged from drawing up official curricula and setting the length of the school day, to regulating teacher training and certification.28 It also empowered the chancellor to delegate these duties and their implementation to the Superior President in Strasbourg. With the reorganization of the Reichsland’s political administration in 1879, these powers devolved, respectively, to the Statthalter and the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine until 1882, when Statthalter Manteuffel vested the Ministry’s responsibilities in a new agency, the Superior School Authority (Oberschulrat).29 The district presidents, who succeeded the French prefects, retained much of their responsibility for primary school affairs, which now encompassed not just the elementary schools, but also the teaching academies and their preparatory schools, advanced girls schools, middle and vocational schools, and kindergartens. The position of the primary school inspector, too, took on greater importance after 1870, which is why they became full-time positions, one per county (Kreis).30 They conducted regular inspections of all the schools in their districts and they administered the final exams. Inspectors were responsible for adjusting the official curriculum and teaching plans to take account of special local conditions, such as the existence of four- and six-grade schools in Strasbourg. They also held regular teachers’ conferences, during which they helped instructors learn the curriculum and new teaching methods. In Strasbourg, only two men occupied this vital post during the Reichsland period: Hermann Prass (1871– 98), an old-German Protestant from the Prussian Rhineland; and Thomas Motz (1898 –1918),

28 Only in the Reichsland did the Imperial government acquire authority over educational matters that was the exclusive prerogative of the federal states elsewhere. 29 The Oberschulrat reported to the State Secretary for Alsace-Lorraine, but it had its own director, first, Heinrich Richter (1882–1901) and then Paul Albrecht (1901–1914). On the creation of the Oberschulrat, see especially Paul Sachse, “Schulpolitik,” 559–61. 30 As Stephen Harp points out, the number of inspectors doubled from the French period, eleven inspectors for the departments of Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin, and Moselle, as opposed to the initial twenty-two for the similarly-sized Reichsland. Later, Hermann Prass noted, the large Alsatian counties of Mulhouse and Zabern each received a second inspector. Harp, Learning, 52–53; Prass, 27 Jahre im Schuldienst, 29.

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a Lutheran from the nearby Alsatian village of Hangenbieten.31 This accident proved to be quite fortunate, since it provided for administrative stability during a time of constant structural change. The direction of secondary school affairs changed only superficially after 1870. Instead of the French Académie, the Superior President’s office (and after 1882, the Oberschulrat) oversaw all recognized establishments and their programs of study. Nevertheless, the new regulations formally required all schools, public or private, to conform to one of three German school types—Gymnasium, Realgymnasium, or Realschule—and follow a curriculum appropriate to it.32 In his position as Schulrat for the secondary schools, August Baumeister worked closely with the school principals, who were in the rule old Germans, to make the shift to the new regime. In Strasbourg, the public lycée (renamed the Lyzeum) and the private Protestant Gymnasium opted to operate as Gymnasien. When the Catholic petit séminaire reopened as the St. Stephan’s school in 1883, it too, followed the official gymnasial program.33 Of all the changes in educational policy implemented after 1870, the introduction of compulsory schooling had the greatest consequences for the city of Strasbourg. Not only did the school-age population suddenly expand in 1871, but as a result of the capital’s urbanization, it continued to grow markedly over the course of the Reichsland period (see Table 6.1). The municipal authorities’ immediate response to the rise in demand was to reorganize the inner city elementary schools. The new plan, approved by the City Council on 26 June 1872, maintained the tradition of separate schools (or at least classrooms) for boys and girls. 31 Personnel file for Hermann Prass, ADBR 54 D 30; personnel file for Thomas Motz, 34 AL 136. 32 After 1883, this division was simplified further. Schools either followed the gymnasial model (the Gymnasium, Progymnasium, and Lateinschule), with its prominent classical language program and the right to sit for the Abitur (and thus attend university), or the Realschule model (Oberrealschule, Realschule), which devoted more attention to modern languages, math, and science. For a more detailed discussion of the different school types, see James C. Albisetti and Peter Lundgreen, “Höhere Knabenschulen,” in Berg, Handbuch der deutschen Bildungsgeschichte, 4:228–78, esp. 239–66. 33 Because most of the secondary school principals and many of the teachers in office as of July 1870 refused to serve under a German administration, Baumeister had to recruit staff for the schools among old Germans. Baumeister, “Reichsland ElsassLothringen,” 212–17. Arnold Sachse, a former secondary school teacher in Strasbourg and member of the Oberschulrat, later argued that this aspect of “educational germanization” was less fortunate since it resulted in maintaining too many schools relative to the enrollments (which primarily benefited the old Germans). Sachse, “Erinnerungen aus der Elsaß-Lothringischen Schulverwaltung.” Elsaß-Lothringisches Jahrbuch 6 (1927): 207–40, esp. 212–14.

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Year

Strasbourg’s school population, 1870–1910

Total school Public Private elepopulation elementary mentary

Other Secondary schools primary schoolsa

1870b 1871b 1872b 1875 1880 1890 1900 1910

5,502 5,955 6,312 9,705 11,353 15,821 17,316 21,623

5,502 5,753 5,819 6,469 7,458 10,802 11,470 15,261

– – – 755 940 1,022 1,178 876

– – – 1,421 1,261 2,150 2,671 3,432

– 202 493 1,060 1,694 1,847 1,997 2,054

% Change 1875–1910

135.9

1.8

31.1

15.4

184.2

SOURCE: VBSS 1870 –1910. a Other primary schools included the middle schools, “higher girls” schools, and the preparatory school attached to the normal school. b For 1870–1872, only public elementary school figures are available (the lycée did not reopen until October 1871).

It also upheld the practice of confessionalized schooling, such that Catholics, Protestants, and Jews all had their own schools. However, to promote a more efficient use of available classroom space and to facilitate the introduction of the four-grade school as the norm for the inner city, the city council established school districts that no longer coincided with parish boundaries.34 In general, the city combined existing parishes in pairs, with one parish’s school house serving as the boys school for both parishes, and the other’s building serving as the common girls school. For example, the Cathedral school became a Catholic boys school, and St. Madeleine a girls school; the St. Thomas school served as a Protestant boys school, and St. Nicholas a Protestant girls school. Because Protestants did not have geographically-defined parishes, however, the city ended up doing more than reallocating Protestant

34 Edouard Goguel, Réorganisation des services de l’instruction primaire; rapport lu au conseil municipal dans sa séance du 27 mars 1872 (Strasbourg: Berger-Levrault, 1872); and Jules Klein, Rapport lu au Conseil municipal dans sa séance du 26 juin 1872 (Strasbourg: Berger-Levrault, 1872). On 5 July 1872, Mayor Lauth requested District President Ernsthausen to approve these reforms, which duly occurred later that month; ADBR 54 D 227, vol. 1.

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school resources. They established residence-oriented districts for the Protestant schools, with the result that children from several different congregations would attend the same school.35 During all of this, the Jewish community was basically unaffected, because a single Jewish elementary school still sufficed for its needs. The steady rise in Strasbourg’s school population after 1872 also necessitated regular renovation of existing buildings and the construction of new schools. This was especially pressing in the suburbs, where by 1901 over half of Strasbourg’s school-age children now lived. These developments created a sharp increase in the number of available classrooms. In the inner city, the number of classrooms grew from 60 in 1870 and 97 in 1889, to 123 in 1901 and 142 in 1910. Extra muros, the evolution was even more dramatic: 21 (1870), 73 (1889), 112 (1901), and 198 (1910). This type of growth was itself important, since it made regular improvements (modernization) of the learning environment in Strasbourg possible. In 1876, the rise in the number of classrooms already allowed the inner city schools (with the exception of the Jewish school, where there were insufficient students) to move to the six-grade standard, whereby students in each of the levels (Stufen) were separated into an upper and lower division, each with its own classroom. After 1900, conditions were such in the inner city and in the larger suburban schools (e.g., Ruprechtsau, Neudorf ) school officials could set up classrooms for each age group, leading to the establishment of the seven-grade girls schools and the eight-grade boys schools.36 To take advantage of these improved circumstances, Prass and Motz also developed specialized versions of the official teaching plans for Strasbourg.37 On average, between 1872 and 1910 just over two-thirds of Strasbourg’s school-age children (67.45%) attended the public elementary school, where they received four hours of religious instruction weekly. 35 We will return to the controversies and difficulties arising from this reorganization in the final part of this chapter. 36 VBSS 1870 bis 1889/89, 361– 66; VBSS 1. April 1900 bis 31 März 1910, 404–05. 37 Lectionsplan für die Schulen des Kreises Straßburg-Stadt (1874) AMS, 3. Division, IV 15/71; Prass, Lehrplan für die Knabenschulen der Stadt Straßburg (Strasbourg: Straßburger Druckerei und Verlagsanstalt, 1889); idem, Lehrplan für die Mädchenschulen der Stadt Straßburg (Strasbourg: Straßburger Druckerei und Verlagsanstalt, 1889); Th[eodor]. Motz, Provisorischer Lehrplan für die Elementarschulen der Stadt Straßburg (Strasbourg: Straßburger Druckerei und Verlagsanstalt, 1904). As he noted in his introduction, Motz developed his teaching plan specifically to take into account the introduction of seven- and eightgrade schools in Strasbourg.

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After the difficulties of the early years, school officials reported that most of these boys and girls indeed attended school regularly. Whereas in 1880 there were roughly three absences per student, by 1889 this figure had fallen to one-half (0.43), and in 1909 to less than one-fifth (0.14) per student.38 These data reveal that most of Strasbourg’s youth actually received the instruction outlined for these schools in the official curricula that Prass and Motz maintained uniformly across the city in order to minimize the impact of intra-urban mobility and revisions of school district boundaries. Roughly twenty percent of Strasbourg’s youth attended primary schools other than the elementary schools. The largest share (just over half ) were in private girls schools (the “höhere Töchterschulen”), which were favored by the “better” Alsatian and many old-German families.39 Herein lies the explanation for the boys’ numerical superiority in the public elementary schools. In 1901, for instance, there were 6,488 boys in the public elementary schools, but only 5,624 girls. However, there were an additional 1,845 girls attending the private girls schools and a further 195 in the city’s advanced girls school.40 After 1870, new types of primary schools were also established in Strasbourg. The most important of these were the “middle schools” (Mittelschulen), which provided an advanced primary education for boys and prepared them for work in the trades, commerce, industry and the civil service. Strasbourg’s first middle school opened in 1877, a second commenced instruction in 1889, where a separate section for girls was established in 1893. Structurally, the middle schools were capstone programs. They accepted students on the basis of merit for the final two years of obligatory schooling and then held them for one more.41 In curricular terms, the middle school distinguished itself mainly by teaching French and bookkeeping,

VBSS 1870 bis 1889/89, 389 – 90; VBSS 1. April 1900 bis 31. März 1910, 435–36. Cf. Prass, 27 Jahre im Schuldienst, 53–54. 40 VBSS 1. April 1900 bis 31. März 1910, 404, 418. 41 Thus, as adjunct mayor Alexander Dominicus stressed, these were not just schools for children of the middle and upper classes. By 1907, between fifteen and twenty percent of all middle school children were of working-class background. The city of Strasbourg also helped ensure that such students could actually complete the extra year of schooling by offering an annual stipend of 150 marks in addition to free tuition and learning materials. Dominicus, “Die Reform unserer Bürger-(Mittel-)Schulen: Ein Strassburger Versuch,” Der Säemann. Monatschrift für Pädagogische Reform 3 (1907): 361– 66, esp. 364 – 65. 38

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which resulted in a reduction of the hours devoted to religious education from four to two.42 The remaining ten percent of Strasbourg’s school-age children attended the city’s secondary schools. Just as during the French period, secondary schooling was open primarily to the boys of the city’s (and territory’s) elite after 1870. Scholarships enabled boys from poorer families to attend these establishments and girls also began to be admitted in 1906. Nevertheless, scholarship students and girls remained distinct minorities (e.g., in 1910 only twenty-five girls were officially enrolled).43 The main innovation in the area of secondary schooling during the Reichsland period was the introduction to Strasbourg of the German Realschule, with the Realschule at the St. John church opening in 1874. This effort was so successful that in 1879 city opened a second Realschule (by the Kaiserpalast), and a third in 1903 (in a building on the Schreibstubgasse that once housed the city’s superior girls school). By 1883, roughly one-third of the students attending Strasbourg’s secondary schools were in one of the “Latin-free” Realschulen, a level that reached forty percent by 1901 and stood at forty-six percent in 1913. All six of the recognized secondary schools—the Lyzeum, the Protestant Gymnasium, the Catholic Gymnasium (St. Stephan school) and the three Realschulen—were open to children regardless of confessional background. For the obligatory two hours of religious instruction each week, the boys were separated into classes according to confession (if there were not enough students of one faith to justify a separate class, alternative arrangements were made for them). Yet, in contrast to the primary schools, many of the secondary school students did not receive the school’s full program of religious instruction. This did not reflect attendance problems, but rather the fact that the complete course of secondary school instruction exceeded the length of obligatory schooling by at least two years. And many boys attending the secondary schools dropped out once they satisfied their legal obligations.44

42 VBSS 1870 bis 1888/89, 378; VBSS 1889/90 bis 1893/94, 256–58; Prass, Stoffplan für die dreiklassige städtische Mittelschule (Strasbourg: Elsässische Druckerei und Verlagsanstalt, 1890). 43 Attendance figures for the secondary schools appear in VBSS 1870–1910; the Oberschulrat approved the admission of girls to secondary schools on 25 September 1906; VBSS 1. April 1900 bis 31. März 1910, 467. 44 Wilhelm Walter, “Die Mittelschule und ihr Verhältnis zu anderen Unterrichtsanstalten. Vortrag gehalten auf dem elsaß-lothr. Mittelschullehrtag in Straßburg am 27.

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In practice, the degree of confessional “mixing” varied considerably from one secondary school to another. As expected, the Protestant and Catholic Gymnasia were attended almost exclusively by, respectively, Protestants and Catholics. The Protestant Gymnasium also had a significant number of Jewish students throughout the period, on average about eleven percent of the total, because of its image as a good Alsatian (as opposed to an old-German) establishment. The St. Stephan’s school attracted a good number of old-Strasbourg and Alsatian children. But because it was the only Strasbourg secondary school under Catholic direction, old-German Catholics also sent their sons there, and by the mid-1880s almost half of the school’s students were from old-German families. 45 Although Catholics comprised the majority of Strasbourg’s population, Protestants outnumbered Catholics in all four of the city’s public secondary schools. Until 1902, over sixty percent of the students at the Lyzeum were Protestant. Catholics were more numerous at the Realschulen, but they never comprised more than forty percent of the total at anyone. As elsewhere in the Kaiserreich, this pattern of Catholic “underrepresentation” reflected the Catholic population’s sense that these schools were inherently hostile to Catholicism. They all had Protestant directors, and many of the teaching materials (e.g., history books and readers) were felt to be biased against Catholics.46 Furthermore, many of the schools—first and foremost the Lyzeum—had a pronounced old-German character: the directors were old Germans as were a majority of the students. This fact encouraged many Alsatian

Dezember 1906,” Sonderabdruck aus dem Elsaß-Lothringischen Schulblatt (Strasbourg: Straßburger Druckerei und Verlagsanstalt, 1907), 4–5. 45 Between 1874 and 1883, when the Catholic school was closed, the percentage of Catholic children attending the Protestant Gymnasium reached as much as 12 percent. After 1883, though, there were never more than eighteen Catholic students enrolled. Protestants attending the St. Stephan school were even rarer, no more than five in any given year. Children from old-German backgrounds constituted at most twenty-five percent of the total enrollment at the Protestant Gymnasium. Pierre Schang and Georges Livet, eds., Histoire du Gymnase Jean Sturm: Berceau de l’Université de Strasbourg 1538 –1988 (Strasbourg: Éditions Oberlin, 1988), 362–65. Data on Catholic trends were taken from the annual Programm der höheren Kath. Schule an St. Stephan zu Straßburg (Strasbourg: E. Bauer, 1883–1914). 46 Rossé, Das Elsass, 3:107–09; anon., Die konfessionellen Verhältnisse an den Höheren Schulen in Elsaß-Lothringen statistisch und historisch hergestellt von einem Mitglied des katholischen Volksvereins (Strasbourg: Buchdruckerei Müller, Herrman & Cie, 1894).

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Catholics, particularly members of the traditional bourgeoisie, to send their boys elsewhere, even across the border to France.47 Religious Education in Strasbourg’s Schools Thanks to the reorganization and evolution of schooling in Strasbourg after 1870, the city came to possess a system that was modern, efficient and, by all accounts, effective. The official curricula were indeed taught at the several types of institutions present in the city, which schoolage children duly attended. These developments also meant that Strasbourg’s schools were instrumental in providing religious instruction to the city’s youth. With four hours of weekly instruction in primary institutions and two hours weekly in secondary institutions, children received more religious training from the schools than from the clergy. Indeed, as long as they were in school, boys and girls had to attend religious class, even if they no longer received lessons from their pastor, priest or rabbi. As we will see, these religion classes strove to raise new generations of Catholics, Jews and Protestants. But because of the different approaches to religious instruction in the various types of schools, this instruction also imbued these confessional identities with gender- and class-specific overtones. At both the primary and the secondary levels, an important goal of the religious instruction in the school was to develop an awareness of what it meant to belong to a specific faith community. This occurred in part through the very act of physical separation. Students of different confessions either attended distinct elementary schools or, in Strasbourg’s mixed primary and secondary establishments, they were divided into confession-specific sections for religion class. These arrangements all had the effect of accentuating religion’s significance as a social marker. They taught students from a very young age that confession—membership in a specific faith community—was one of the primary points around which social life in Strasbourg was organized. More tangibly, each course of religious instruction aimed to impart a knowledge of faith-specific practices and outlooks to the youth, so that they could engage in the community’s ritual life and understand

47

Vogler, Histoire culturelle, 312–13.

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what made the community unique.48 All students learned the basic prayers used by their respective communities: those said at mealtimes and before going to bed, in addition to those spoken in an explicit ritual or devotional context (e.g., the Rosary). Pupils received basic catechism instruction according to their faith’s approved text (e.g., the diocesan catechism for Catholics, and either Luther’s Small Catechism or the Heidelberg [Reformed] catechism for Protestants). Children also learned to recite and sing hymns and other music for worship in accordance with the specific practices of their faith community. Lastly, teachers explained the meaning of the holy days to their charges and, in the upper grades, gave lessons in church history. This basic approach to religious education is noteworthy for the opportunities it afforded to reinforce notions of confessional difference. Catholic and Protestant teachers, for instance, used the required discussion of holy days to emphasize their churches’ particular interpretations of common feasts like Easter or Pentecost. Protestant schools might even use the occasion of All Saint’s Day or the Feast of the Immaculate Conception to explain why these days were not celebrated as holy days in either the Lutheran or the Reformed Churches. Similarly, church history lessons looked very different depending on whether one was Catholic or Protestant. Whereas Catholic instructional programs emphasized events bearing on the construction of the church in apostolic times and the rise of the papacy, their Protestant counterparts stressed the emergence of the early Christian community and the Reformation.49 Moreover, the programs reveal clear confessional preferences in the task of religious instruction. The Catholic curricula stood out for their attention to catechism instruction, which the Church traditionally regarded as the centerpiece of all such education. Although the first Normallehrpläne limited catechism lessons to the final years (Oberstufen) of the elementary schools, in 1881 Statthalter Manteuffel removed this restriction to appease local Catholic interests.50 This “Catholicization”

48 The following discussion rests principally on the curricular and teaching plans listed in notes 23 and 37, above. 49 Thus, at the end of Eduard Stricker, Evangelische Christenlehre unter Zugrundlegung des Heidelberger Katechismus (Mulhouse: Evangelische Buchhandlung, 1904), the author (one of two pastors for Strasbourg’s Reformed community) devotes the final twenty pages to a discussion of the main points of difference between the Catholic and Protestant churches. 50 Article 4 of the “Bestimmungen, betreffend die Abänderung des Regulativs für die Elementarschulen vom 4. Januar 1874,” printed in Blum, Gesetze, 67–68.

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of the school curriculum greatly displeased the Reichsland’s Protestants. Because of the theological differences within the Protestant community, the Lutheran and Calvinist ministers wanted students to be introduced to these difficult texts only when they were mature enough to understand them (and when the pastors could explain them properly). Moreover, Protestants felt that schools should do more than just teach catechism. The Protestant elementary school curriculum called on children to learn more hymns than their Catholic peers (in 1877, the Protestant canon contained forty-one songs against the Catholics’ thirty-two). Protestant schools also devoted more attention to Bible study, which was effectively absent from the Catholic program. Protestant boys and girls started out by memorizing Bible verses. In the fifth year, they progressed to reading from school Bibles and by the time of graduation, they had read most of the Psalms, all four Gospels, (beginning with Matthew and ending with John), and parts of several other New Testament books. The Protestants’ cries were rather ingenuous, since the entire school curriculum, both in the elementary schools and in secondary schools’ preparatory classes (the first three years), already had a distinct Protestant bias. According to the Regulation for the Elementary Schools of 4 January 1874: “The study of Bible stories serves as the foundation (Grundlage) for religious instruction.”51 For men like Hermann Prass, who played a key role in developing the section devoted to religious instruction in the 1872 Lehrplan, this choice was driven less by confessional than by pedagogical and psychological considerations: young children learned best through stories. The method played to the pupils’ natural interest in plot and character, their sense of wonder and awe. It awakened interest and, above all, facilitated understanding. Thus, just as the Evangelists had Jesus telling parables to explain matters of faith and morals, the official curriculum similarly relied on the biblical stories to teach students about God and salvation. The great figures of the Biblical past—Moses and David, Ruth and Mary—also provided models for living as a man or woman of faith in the present. Finally, discussing stories like the account of the Passover in Exodus, the birth of Jesus in Luke, and the coming of the Holy Spirit in Acts gave teachers an opportunity to discuss both the importance of feast days like

51 Section 8, “Religionsunterricht” of the “Regulativ für Elementarschulen,” 4 January 1874, printed in Blum, Gesetze, 13.

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Passover, Christmas, and Pentecost, and the specific customs attached to them (e.g., the Seder meal and the nativity crèche). Although placing Bible stories at the center of the religious education program could help bridge the confessional divide, the lists of stories prescribed for each grade level make clear that this element of religious instruction actually furthered the cause of confessional consciousness raising. Jewish children, for obvious reasons, only learned stories from the Old Testament. And while the Catholic and Protestant canons had many stories in common, there were telling differences. For instance, certain stories were present in one confessional list, but absent in the other. In the programs elaborated by school inspector Prass, only students in the Catholic schools read about Gabriel’s visitation of Mary, Mary’s visit with Elizabeth, Peter’s selection as the first of the apostles, Peter’s reception of the “keys to the kingdom,” and the institution of the apostolic mission. Similarly, Protestant students alone were expected to read about the Tower of Babel, Sodom and Gomorrah, Jesus and Nicodemus, the resurrection of Lazarus, Jesus reappearing to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias ( John 21), and the martyrdom of Stephan. In revising the lists in 1904, Motz continued to allot stories to Catholic youth that spoke to such topics as the special status of Mary and Peter (as the first pope) and the Biblical origins of the seven sacraments. For its part, the Protestant canon privileged stories that stressed God as lawgiver and judge, Jesus as healer, and that examined the beginnings of the Christian community. But Motz added to the Protestant list stories that taught respect for state authority (e.g., the story of Caesar’s coin) and promoted such virtues as charity and forgiveness (the story of the widow’s pennies, the tale of Jesus and Zacchaeus). Motz’s program of Bible stories also caused Protestants to spend more time with Old Testament sources than Catholics. Whereas Catholic students completed their study of Old Testament stories in the first half of the sixth year, Protestant students spent the entire sixth year and the first part of the final, eighth year on Old Testament subjects. Even when they read the same stories, Catholic and Protestant youth learned to draw different conclusions from them. In part, this resulted simply from how their teachers told and explained the stories. But these confessionally-oriented readings were also reinforced by the very organization of the curriculum. Protestant and Catholic children frequently learned the same story at different times of their schooling. Catholic pupils learned the stories of Adam and Eve’s sin, the giving

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of the Ten Commandments, Jesus’ temptation in the Desert, and the Last Supper all before their Protestant counterparts. Protestant boys and girls, however, took up the stories of Moses’s calling, Moses and the golden calf, the miracle at Cana, Jesus blessing the children, and the parable of the prodigal son first. Furthermore, Catholic and Protestant pupils came to regard the same story as different because it did not have the same label in the two school programs. In part, the distinctive appellations revealed specifically Protestant or Catholic interpretations of a story and its larger importance. For instance, Catholics described Exodus 20 as “God gives the Ten Commandments,” while Protestants employed the phrase “the giving of the Law on Sinai.” Similarly, in Catholic schools, the story of Ruth was framed as “Ruth’s love for her stepmother,” but Protestants referred only to “the pious Ruth.” Other differences appear to have been primarily semantic in nature. While Protestants described Creation as a “Schöpfung” and the Ascension as the “Himmelfahrt Christi,” Catholics used the labels of “Erschaffung” and “Jesu Himmelfahrt.” Even if they were only semantic, such distinctions remained highly significant. Through these confessionally-specific labels, schools encouraged boys and girls to talk about such stories and their moral and religious content with discrete vocabularies that established patterns for interpreting the larger world and interacting socially that endured long after formal schooling had ended. Learning Bible stories did more than just foster confessionally-specific approaches to religion and religious identity. It also helped to gender that sense of religious consciousness. Just as the canons of Bible stories varied from Protestant to Catholic elementary school, they also varied between the girls and boys schools for each confession. While many of these differences stemmed from the fact that boys attended school one year longer than girls, not all did. Indeed, several stories on the girls’ lists were altogether absent from the boys’ lists; not surprisingly, almost all of these were stories about women. In these stories, we see the schools striving to develop specifically feminine understandings of piety. One such story was that of the Canaanite woman (Matt 15:21–28), whose faith and maternal devotion saved the life of her daughter. Another uniquely “girls’ ” story was the parable of the ten bridesmaids (Matt 25: 1–13), which taught that female virtue led to marriage and salvation, while female foolishness was punished with damnation. This gendering of Christian identity also had a confessional component. The story of Mary and Martha taught Catholic girls about womanly service and

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devotion; they learned about feminine “good works” through the story of the woman at Bethany anointing Jesus just prior to the last supper. Conversely, the story of Jesus’ post-crucifixion appearance to the two Marys (Matt 28:1–8) provided Protestant girls examples of female piety (grieving, visiting a grave), and also exemplified women’s special role as couriers of the gospel, a role that fit neatly with nineteenth-century expectations of women’s religious responsibilities.52 The boys elementary schools likely also nourished gender-specific ideas about religion in the discussion of Bible stories, but the available evidence provides few clues on how this occurred. Nevertheless, we can get a good sense of how schooling helped develop a masculine take on religious identity by shifting our attention to the male world of secondary schooling. Religion classes at the Gymnasia and Realschulen did not just develop confessionally-specific religious identities for boys and young men generally. The very differences in the secondary schools’ approach to religious education promoted forms of identity with specific class biases. In other words, the schools inculcated a religious consciousness deemed to be appropriate for men of the bourgeoisie (Bürgertum). Several factors contributed to the development of such class-specific religious identities. The very place of religion in the curricula suggested that it was less central to secondary school learning, that is Bildung.53 Whereas primary schools devoted four hours weekly to religion, secondary schools offered only two.54 In part, this arrangement resulted from the greater demands placed on secondary school students. But it also reflected a sense that secondary school children were brighter than their primary school peers. The Realschule near St. John (a.k.a. the St. John Realschule) expected Protestant boys to learn all the Bible stories in the elementary school canon in three years (during the threeyear preparatory program). Moreover, for this task, these students were assigned a textbook that in the primary schools could only be used in See, for instance, Hugh McLeod, “Weibliche Frömmigkeit.” “Bildung” represented both a liberal arts style of education (acquiring knowledge for its own sake) and a respect for knowledge and learning that was the mark of the upper-middle class (the Gebildeten, the Bildungsbürgertum). See here especially Reinhard Koselleck, ed., Bildungsbürgertum im 19. Jahrhundert, vol. 2, Bildungsgüter und Bildungswissen (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1990). 54 On the secondary schools’ curricular plans and obligations in the 1870s, see Baumeister, “Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen,” 212–17; under Manteuffel’s influence, these plans were modified significantly and published on 20 June 1883 as “Ordnung der Lehraufgaben der höheren Schulen und der Verteilung der Lehrstunden,” ADBR 105 AL 1592. 52 53

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the intermediate grades (Mittelstufen).55 Similar sentiments also led school authorities to propose that they, and not the parish clergy, prepare their students for first communion and confirmation, a proposition that the clergy energetically—and successfully—opposed.56 The idea that religious instruction was less essential also emerged from the placement of these hours in the weekly school program. In elementary schools, religion was taught in the first hour of the day.57 This arrangement meant that the school day normally began with prayer. In Catholic schools, it also resulted in schoolchildren going from the seven o’clock school mass directly to religion class.58 By contrast, the secondary schools slotted religion into the schedule where it was most convenient. Since only one or two teachers gave religion classes, there was great variability as to when instruction was offered. Some grades received it first thing in the morning, others later in the day. Many schools also scheduled religion class in the eleven o’clock hour, at least for those students who were preparing for confirmation and first communion, which was the hour when these students were supposed to receive instruction from their ministers.59 Two other structural factors alerted students to religion’s awkward place in the secondary school environment. After sitting together for lessons in subjects such as Greek, math, and German, the students at the confessionally-mixed Lyzeum and Realschulen had to be separated 55 See the report from Dr. Schädel, director of the Realschule by St. John, to the Ministry of Alsace-Lorraine on the organization of religious education at the Realschule dated 19 Nov 1880, ADBR 34 AL 438. The book in question here is Hermann Schollenbruch, Biblische Geschichten für die Mittelstufe (Strasbourg: R. Schulz, 1877). 56 The Lyzeum, where the Catholic military chaplain offered religious instruction, made such a request to diocesan authorities in 1876, which they denied. Session of the Episcopal Council, 2 March 1876, ADBR 1 V 344. Four years later, the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine floated a similar idea by the Directory, which informed the Ministry that the city’s parish priests strenuously opposed the measure. Ministry of Alsace-Lorraine to the Directory (draft), 3 April 1880, ADBR 105 AL 1592; PB-SPG, vol. 4:69–70 and 84–85, ADBR 172 AL 292. 57 Initially, Prass devoted the fifth morning hour in the week (Saturday) to singing, specifically hymn singing. By the 1880s, Wednesday became the “religion-free” day, with its first hour devoted to reading or writing, depending on the grade level. AMS 13° Div, Sect. IV 15/72 and 74/370. 58 On this practice, see the report of Prass to District President Back of 6 Mar 1882, ADBR 65 D 301, III 2661. 59 We will return to this “doubling up” of the schools’ and the clergy’s religious education in the following section. For the organization of class schedules and religious instruction, see the reports from the two Realschulen, the Lyzeum, and the Protestant Gymnasium to the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine from 1879 and 1880, ADBR 105 AL 1592.

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into confessional sections for religion class. Admittedly, this did promote confessional awareness among the students. But it also marked religion as something foreign that required unique arrangements on the part of school and student. Religion was also the only major subject in the gymnasial program that was not required for the Abitur. Some specialists, like the éminence grise of Prussian secondary education, Ludwig Wiese, contended that this was actually desirable. In 1890, Wiese argued that religion should not be an Abitur subject, because religion classes were supposed to do more than teach the type of facts tested on such an examination.60 Yet, even if teachers and clergy agreed that it made pedagogical and theological sense not to test religion on the Abitur, this did not lessen the symbolism of the absence: religion was not as important as those subjects that were examined.61 Wiese’s remark points to the other main difference between religious education at the primary and secondary levels: instructional goals and method. All in all, the elementary schools pursued religion as a matter of the heart. The goal of religion class wasn’t just to teach students religious knowledge, but to awaken and promote religious sensibilities that would inform the students’ conduct in all aspects of their life. In the Gymnasia and the Realschulen another ethos prevailed. Religion classes had a distinctly intellectual, even theological character, as Director Schädel’s description of the religious education program at the St. John Realschule illustrates clearly.62 The students in the lower grades still learned Bible stories, hymns, and the basic prayers and practices of their respective faiths. But in the intermediate and upper grades, the university-trained religion teachers generally conducted their classes with the humanistic approach used for any other school subject. In the fifth school year (Quinta), the learning of Bible stories in the Protestant classes served mainly to teach Biblical history and 60 Wiese, Der evangelische Religionsunterricht im Lehrplan der höheren Schulen: Ein pädagogisches Bedenken (Berlin: Wiegandt and Grieben, 1890), esp. 46–49. In 1871, Wiese had also been called to Alsace to advise the General-Government on the organization of the future Reichsland’s secondary schools. It was he who recommended Baumeister’s appointment as Schulrat for the Reichsland’s secondary school affairs. Wiese, Lebenserinnerungen und Amtserfahrungen, 2 vols. (Berlin: Wiegandt & Grieben, 1886), 1:318–37. 61 By contrast, school officials did pose questions about religion to elementary school students as part of the official final exam. “Instruction betreffend die Abhaltung der Entlassungsprüfungen in den Elementarschulen des Stadtkreises Strassburg,” 25 Mar 1878, ADBR 105 AL 2058. 62 Schädel to the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine, 19 Nov 1880, ADBR 34 AL 438.

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formal Church teaching (Lehre). Likewise, with every year, catechism instruction increasingly took on the character of systematic theology. In grades six and seven (Quarta and Tertia), all students—even Catholics—received formal introductions to the Bible: its languages, translations, and organization. Gymnasium students had to go a step further and learn to read Scripture in the original, both Hebrew (for Protestants) and Greek (Protestants and Catholics). During the last years of school, religion class was also used to provide formal courses in church history, doctrine, and ethics. Many teachers used this as an opportunity to help foster a deeper understanding of local religious conditions. Director Schädel, for instance, included references to local Protestant figures like Bucer, Spener, and Oberlin in his church history lessons. And he routinely led his advanced students in a comparative examination of the major statements of faith, remarking that “in this confessionally mixed city, the creeds need to be studied more carefully than in other places.”63 Many secondary school teachers, like Friedrich Nußheg at the St. John Realschule, maintained that religious education “was not just a matter of knowledge, but one of feeling and will.” Yet, the school’s constant appeal to the students’ intellects in the course of this instruction was equally unmistakable. Boys learned about confessional differences by studying the actual statements of faith. They received not just biblical history lessons, but introductory courses in church history. And while some pedagogues and pastors decried this intellectualism, it was not fully out of place. The secondary school curricula prepared these boys to take up religious and theological topics that would have been well beyond the ken of their elementary school peers. Hence, Catholic boys in the secondary schools could even be trusted to read the Bible. Moreover, this approach to religion met the expectations of the schools’ primary clientele: the middle class. Even if he did not attend services regularly, it was still desirable for the good Bürger to be knowledgeable of his faith and religious background. And it was religious knowledge, and not just religious sentiment that the secondary schools aimed to deliver to their charges.

63

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chapter six Competing Visions of the Schools as Agents of Religious Acculturation

Through their programs of mandatory religious instruction, Strasbourg’s primary and secondary schools came to play an important part in the promotion of religious culture in the modern, urban environment. Although this state of affairs boded well for the recognized faith communities, they were nonetheless discomfited, even alarmed, by many of the specific changes. At the same time that they acknowledged the churches’ interests in the schools’ religious education programs, school authorities progressively undermined—at times denying outright—the churches’ ability to influence the content and the quality of this instruction. In the name of “progress,” the schools also pursued policies that impinged upon the clergy’s own religious education classes for the youth. As elsewhere in Imperial Germany, these conditions provoked a series of highly public clashes between church and state. The Alsatian “culture wars,” however, were unique in that the Protestant churches joined the Catholics in opposing many school policies. Nevertheless, this was at best a marriage of convenience. Protestants and Catholics had widely divergent conceptions of how the schools should discharge their religious responsibilities. And while the Catholic Church won some significant victories, they never managed to attain what the Protestants did: a significant voice in how the schools actually taught religion. Illustrative of the special confessional dynamics in school politics were the responses to the introduction of obligatory schooling in 1871. Catholics opposed it vigorously and argued that it violated the rights of parents to raise their children. In an article on the school question from September 1871, the Catholic Volksfreund contended, “The State is not charged with the task of educating the youth . . . therefore it has no authority to concern itself with the church’s and parents’ rights to do so.”64 Another complaint frequently heard in Catholic circles was that the length of compulsory education was excessive, especially for girls. Young girls did not need to be subjected to state schools nor their dangerous ideas, the clergy stressed. Nor should they be kept from helping at home any longer than necessary.65 Volksfreund, 36 (3 Sep 1871): 285. Harp, Learning, 149; Remarks of the Catholic deputy Eugène Ricklin to the Landesausschuß, session of 16 May 1907, 627 (“We know that girls are losing their sense and joy for work in the countryside [Landarbeit]; we must do what we can to prevent this. 64 65

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Protestants, by contrast, warmly endorsed the establishment of compulsory education. In his annual report to the Directory, the Lutheran inspector Gustav Ungerer (New Church, Strasbourg) remarked, “Today the Alsatian school has a bright future. The introduction of obligatory schooling and the return of German as the language of instruction promises to promote the thorough, successful and altogether beneficial education of the youth, especially in moral and religious terms.”66 But Lutherans protested energetically against the decision to let girls leave school once they turned thirteen. They disagreed with this measure not only as a matter of principle, but also because it challenged Church policy for the rite of confirmation. In both the Lutheran and the Reformed church, youths could not be confirmed until the age of fourteen. But the Lutheran church also required children to attend school until they were confirmed. It improved their preparation for the pastor’s lessons as well as their attendance. The new decree threatened this arrangement. Either girls would have to wait one year for confirmation after they had been released from school, or the churches would be compelled to allow girls to be confirmed a year before boys. Neither scenario was appealing to Protestant church authorities. Indeed, by the end of 1871 both Churches announced that they would hold fast to the minimum age for confirmation. The Reformed Consistory of Strasbourg explained its stance by observing: “If the civil authority has taken away a year of instruction for girls, it is vital that the ecclesiastical authority refuse to reduce the amount of time consecrated to their religious instruction.”67 Taking advantage of the fact that the school law did not actually require girls to take the final exam at thirteen, the Lutheran church even strove to enforce the policy of attending school until confirmation. But this effort quickly foundered in the face of practical realities. Parents demanded that pastors confirm their daughters once they left school according to custom. Some Lutheran parents even sought to have their daughters confirmed by a Reformed minister to get around the schooling requirement.68 School officials sympathized with the Lutheran church, but in Strasbourg Therefore we do not want girls to go to school and be removed from their household duties any longer than necessary.”) 66 NICR 1870–71, 9. Similar sentiments were expressed in the pietist-leaning Sonntagsblatt 8/36 (1871): 431–32. 67 KS PBK, 1:317 (7 Nov 1871), ADBR 173 AL 9; the Directory reaffirmed the existing policy in a text dated 5 January 1872; AS 26 (1872): 313–15. 68 NCIR 1875 (Ungerer), ADBR 172 AL 242.

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administrators were actually anxious for girls to leave once they turned thirteen: they didn’t have the classroom space or the personnel to keep teaching them.69 Thus, during the annual session of 1878, the Lutheran Superior Consistory agreed to repeal the articles in the confirmation ordinance that required school attendance until confirmation.70 This capitulation deeply troubled the Lutheran clergy. Year in, year out they complained that girls’ preparation for confirmation suffered as a result of the early release from school. They didn’t come to class regularly. Or, when they were there, they could not concentrate or apply themselves to their lessons because they were exhausted from their day work.71 The Lutheran Church attached great importance to the restoration of the status quo ante, whereby girls would again attend until fourteen. Möller and his school advisors (Schulräte), Heinrich Richter and Hermann Schollenbruch, received the Directory’s entreaties favorably, particularly since it would bring this aspect of the Reichsland’s school policies into conformity with old-German practices. They actually tried to effect this change while drafting the regulations for the 1873 Law Concerning Educational Affairs. But this effort was vetoed by Berlin because the law in question had no clause relative to the length of schooling. As the head of the Alsace-Lorraine division within the Imperial Chancery, Karl Herzog, explained, the only way to equalize the length of schooling for the Reichsland’s youth was by passing a law, since the 1871 ordinance stemmed from a time when Bismarck-Bohlen’s decrees had the force of imperial law.72 This state of affairs effectively doomed the Lutheran cause. Bismarck did not deem the matter important enough to warrant bringing it as a piece of special legislation before the Reichstag. More decisively, after 1877, all laws for Alsace-Lorraine had to come before the Landesausschuß. Lutheran leaders knew that the body’s Catholic majority would never endorse a bill that extended the length of schooling for girls. This didn’t stop the Lutheran Directory and Lutheran politicians from trying. When Statthalter Manteuffel asked the churches in early 1881 how he might resolve some of the frictions over schooling, Directory President Kratz put the issue of the age for girls’ leaving school at the

69 70 71 72

District President Ernsthausen to Möller, 10 Oct 1874, ADBR 121 D 26. AS 34 (1878–79): 45–48. NCIR, STIR, SWIR, passim. Herzog to Möller, 27 June 1873, ADBR 105 AL 2063.

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top of his list.73 But it went nowhere. Similarly, when a pair of teachers’ associations for women asked the Landesausschuß in 1907 to have girls attend school for eight years, the former Lutheran pastor Georg Wolf remarked on the floor of the house: “This question . . . has come up many times before this body . . . and once more the committee has refused to consider any changes.”74 The disputes over the length of schooling underscore some of the fundamental differences in how Alsatian Catholics and Protestants approached schooling and, hence, the schools’ function as agents of religious acculturation. Catholics felt that the state should not be involved in the education business. Furthermore, because (primary) education was fundamentally religious in nature, they argued that the Church should set the tone not just of religious instruction, but the entire school program. Protestants had more faith in the schools and, overall, supported the post-1870 improvements in schooling. Their main concern was that the schools properly prepare the youth to be good Christians and parishioners. But if they disagreed over the level of influence, the Churches agreed on an important point: as long as religion was taught, they should have a say in how it was taught, so that it complemented parochial instruction and church traditions. In principle, the new German administration accepted this position. But in practice, church prerogatives were frequently subordinated to the cause of educational progress and efficiency. Thus, while the schools taught religion, the churches increasingly had little say in how this was done. In many respects the fundamental problem was attitude. Almost as soon as the German administration was established in Strasbourg, school policy was set without any meaningful input from local notables, including the Churches. All of the school counselors, and virtually all of the primary school inspectors and secondary school principals were old Germans. They were the ones who drew up the territory’s curricular plans, reformed the teachers’ academies, and inspected the teachers and students. During Möller’s tenure, educational advisory panels like

73 Felicitas von Aretin, “Die Schulpolitik der obersten Schulbehörde im Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen 1871–1914,” (Dissertation, European University in Florence, 1992), 175–77. 74 Verhandlungen des Landesausschusses, 34th session, 17 (16 May 1907): 626–27 and 550–51 (report from the Second Committee). Interestingly, one of the petitioning groups was the Alsatian branch of the Association of Catholic Women Teachers.

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the local school boards to which the churches had sent representatives also ceased to function. In short, the entire packaging and delivery of religious education at the primary and secondary levels were carried out unilaterally by the state. Because many of the French educational laws remained in effect in Alsace-Lorraine after 1870, the recognized faith communities technically had a series of rights that would enable them to influence and supervise religious education, at least in the elementary schools.75 Clergy could enter the schools to inspect religious instruction at any time. Candidates for vacant teaching positions were presented by the churches and all appointments had to be made from the presentation lists. The churches also had to approve the books that the schools wished to use in religion classes.76 Nevertheless, the needs of a school system in a constantly evolving urban environment meant that these prerogatives lost much of their value in Strasbourg. By combining children from different parishes into the same school, for instance, the reorganization of Strasbourg’s elementary schools in 1872 effectively prevented clergy from inspecting religious instruction. On the one hand, ministers felt that they had no authority to supervise the religious instruction of children belonging to another’s congregation.77 On the other hand, the actions of the school officials in Strasbourg made it unclear whether clergy could even still visit schools. Thus, when asked about his relationship to the schools in 1889, Julius Redslob, a Lutheran pastor at St. William, reported, “I cannot bring myself to enter the schools. First, the

75 Since the Falloux Law permitted the Churches to open their own secondary schools, it did not give the Churches similar rights in the state-run secondary institutions. 76 Significantly, in keeping with the decentralized nature of the French Reformed Church, the Decree-Law of 1852 did not grant any body within the Reformed community the right to approve religious books (although the local consistories did have to authorize their introduction into a specific school). In the Reichsland, thus, books for Protestant instruction were approved by the Lutheran Superior Consistory alone. However, in a measure of ecumenical generosity, the Superior Consistory decided in 1912 to invite two delegates of the Reformed church to serve as members on its newly established religious textbook commission. MSV 21 (Nov 1912): 174–74. 77 It was this loosening of ties between parish and school that motivated the strong Catholic opposition to these reforms in 1872, and their repeated efforts in subsequent years to revive the parochial school in Strasbourg; cf. Joseph Burg, La question des écoles paroissiales à Strasbourg (Rixheim: A. Sutter, 1886). Similar sentiments could also be heard among the Lutherans. Compare Friedrich Horning’s remarks at the 13 May 1872 meeting of the Young St. Peter parish council, SPJ PBKR, 1: 177; and the PB-SPG 3:254 (2 April 1872), ADBR 172 AL 291.

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ecclesiastical authorities have not asked me to; second, I do not know if I’m even allowed to do so.”78 Catholic forces in Strasbourg not only fought vigorously against the 1872 reorganization on these grounds,79 but in subsequent years pressed the cause of reestablishing parish-based elementary schools with political authorities at every level. While many sympathized with the ideal of parochial schools, city and school officials pointed out that they could be created only by increasing class sizes and abandoning the norm of the six-grade school. And with the city needing to use its educational resources as efficiently as possible to meet the demands placed on the growing school population, erecting a true parish based system was simply not viable.80 For instance, when the inner city was transitioning to the seven- (for girls) and eight-grade schools, School Inspector Motz pointed out that the city would need a minimum of ninety classrooms to meet Catholic demands, nineteen more than were available.81 The churches’ ability to make meaningful use of their rights to present candidates for teaching vacancies, and thereby ensure that the individual giving religious instruction was both competent and appropriately tempered, were also increasingly restricted. The introduction of the official curricula and the restructuring of teacher training after 1871 played a major role in vitiating this privilege. The Lutheran consistories, for instance, found themselves reviewing candidates largely on the basis of personality, for they all had the same preparation and would have to follow the same teaching plan. But school officials also endeavored to wrest control of teacher hiring from the recognized faith communities. Throughout the 1870s, Church officials protested the violation of their rights. Teachers were either appointed without any consultation of the concerned consistories or the school inspector hired teachers “provisionally” and then asked the consistories later if they had any objections to a definitive appointment.82

SWIR 1889. See, in particular, the remarks of the Catholic city councilor, Gustave Petiti, Ville de Strasbourg. Réorganisation des services de l’instruction primaire (Strasbourg: Berger-Levrault, 1872). 80 See, for instance, Burg, La question des écoles paroissiales; Bishop Fritzen to District President Halm, 13 Apr 1904; Catholic Clergy of Strasbourg to Fritzen about parish schools, 27 Feb 1905, both in AMS 13° Div IV 17/82. 81 Back to District President Halm, 14 Apr 1905, AMS 13° Div IV 17/82. 82 See the remarks during the Superior Consistory session of Oct 1872 (AS 28 [1872] 32–33) and Oct 1876 (AS 32 [1876–77] 24–25). 78 79

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In 1876, Superior President Möller formally affirmed the religious authorities’ presentation rights. But district and county officials then introduced new ways to limit them. First, consistories were told that they had only four weeks after a vacancy was declared to draw up a presentation list. In 1881, the District President of Lower Alsace decided that vacant school positions would no longer be announced in the religious newspapers. Seven years later the Oberschulrat announced that candidates would apply directly to district or county authorities, who would forward the list of applicants to the concerned consistory.83 Hence, as the Lutheran pastor Paul Bruns concluded in a presentation to the Alsatian Pastoral Conference in 1901, “the [presentation] right had [become] an empty one.” When Statthalter Wedel approved a new statute concerning the elementary schools in 1908, the privilege disappeared altogether.84 Church and state also clashed repeatedly over whether religious authorities could control which books were used in the schools’ religious education classes. This was a sensitive issue on several accounts. There was the matter of general principle, which is why the faith communities had the right in the first place. The churches felt that school officials lacked the necessary competence to judge the religious merits of a specific book. Moreover, by authorizing the use of a particular book in a particular school, church authorities exercised a real influence over what was taught. But the faith communities also used this right to promote harmony between school and parochial instruction. They insured that a school used the same catechism that the priest did in preparing students for first communion, or that students learn hymn texts and melodies from the same hymnal used in parish services. Initially, the German school authorities in Alsace-Lorraine flat out ignored the faith communities’ rights in this area. The lists of approved textbooks for the standard teaching plans of 1871 and 1872 contained titles, such as Zahn’s Biblische Geschichten and the hymn collection 80 Kirchenlieder, that had never been approved for school use by the Lutheran Superior Consistory, as the law required. Furthermore, in villages and towns across Alsace-Lorraine teachers and principals decided to use

83 AS 32 (1876–77): 24–25; Regulation of 10 Sep 1881, printed in AS 37 (1881): 37; Regulation of 16 Dec 1888 (OS 9650), ADBR 173 AL 22. 84 Paul Bruns, “Die gegenwärtige Stellung der elsaß-lothringischen Kirche und Volksschule zu einander,” ASPC 11 (1901): 354–82, here 361–62; “Gesetz betreffend das Unterrichtswesen vom 24. Februar 1908,” printed in Blum, Gesetze, 3rd ed., 165–66.

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textbooks, including catechisms and hymnals, without ever seeking approval from local parish authorities. Priests, pastors, village mayors, even the District Assembly (Bezirkstag) of Lower Alsace complained to Möller and the District Presidents about these violations of church and parish authority. 85 In 1876, Möller finally acted. On 2 May he decreed that elementary schools had to use the same catechisms and hymnals as the local parish. With respect to other books (e.g., the collections of Bible stories), he required teachers “to come to an agreement with the wishes of the pastor and parish council.” Moreover, once a book had been selected, it had to remain in use for as long as possible.86 Yet, Möller’s ruling left most of the fundamental issues unresolved, as the flare up over Schollenbruch’s Biblische Geschichten soon showed. In late 1878, Möller’s advisor for primary school affairs, Hermann Schollenbruch, completed his collections of Bible stories for the Reichsland’s three school divisions. The following year, school officials made plans to use them that fall. School Inspector Prass even asked District President Ledderhose to allow all of Strasbourg’s Protestant schools to adopt the books.87 When the Lutheran St. William parish council learned that the St. William school was among those that planned to introduce Schollenbruch, it quickly apprised the Directory of the situation. Not only had the school acted without prior consultation of the parish, but again it sought to use a book that lacked the requisite ecclesiastical authorization.88 After Directory President Kratz confronted Ledderhose on the matter, permission to use the Schollenbruch texts was suspended pending action by the Superior Consistory. The Superior Consistory took up the question at its October 1879 session. Speaking on behalf of the committee that reviewed Schollenbruch’s work Inspector Heintz (St. Thomas, Strasbourg) regretted that the school administration sought approval for the books only after the fact. Yet, he admitted, “the committee, and likely the entire body, is delighted that the government has

85 NCIR 1870–71; 1873 Petition of the “Evangelisch-Protestantischen Verein” to the Directory, ADBR 172 AL 306; Minutes of the 1876 Superior Consistory session, AS 32 (1876 –77): 24. See also Die Verwaltung des niederen Unterrichts in Elsaß-Lothringen von 1871 bis Ende 1878 (Strasbourg: C F. Schmidts Universitäts-Buchhandlung, 1879), 20. 86 AS 31 (1875–76): 197–98. 87 ADBR 54 D 37. 88 Resolution of the St. William Parish Council, SG PBKR, 2:37 (30 July 1879).

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at last acknowledged the [Church’s legal right to review such literature] by bringing this book before [us].”89 With its response to the Schollenbruch controversy, the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine confirmed the Superior Consistory’s power to approve all books destined for Protestant religious instruction. Thereafter, if authors or publishers requested permission to place a book on the list of authorized school texts, whether for the primary or the secondary schools, they were informed that the Lutheran church first had to decide on its religious merits.90 This posturing was itself significant, for it points at a gray area that remained even after 1879. Namely, could the Superior Consistory reject a text on pedagogical grounds? In 1879, the Superior Consistory argued: yes. While the review would concentrate on religious content, the body agreed that it could limit the authorization or refuse it outright if the content was sufficiently compromised by the book’s pedagogical shortcomings. Thus, it approved only the volume Schollenbruch put together for advanced students (Oberstufen). The issue continued to lie dormant until 1913, when the Protestant Textbook Commission (created in 1906 to streamline the approval process) was asked to review Ntoliczka’s church history textbook. The commission decided that the book was not suited for its intended secondary school audience and denied the authorization. Oberschulrat President Paul Albrecht overruled the Commission; however, arguing that it had no authority to withhold authorization on pedagogical (schultechnische) grounds. Directory President Curtius protested that the law did not so limit the Church’s authority, but State Secretary Köller backed up Albrecht’s ruling, thereby restricting the ecclesiastical review of textbooks to their religious content.91 The outcry over Schollenbruch’s text also revealed that the Reichsland’s political leaders had not really settled whether Protestant parishes could still determine which religious textbooks were actually used in a given school. In fact, the same year that St. William complained about the introduction of Schollenbruch ( just two years after the school adopted Zahn), pastors at both St. Aurelia and Old St. Peter complained 89 Directory to the District President of Lower Alsace, 31 May 1879, ADBR 65 D 327; Minutes of the Superior Consistory session, 29 Oct 1879, AS 35 (1879–80): 212–24. 90 See the correspondence between the Oberschulrat and the Directory on this point in ADBR 105 AL 1692. 91 AS 60 (1906); Albrecht to Curtius, 26 Sep 1913, Curtius to Albrecht 26 Jan 1914, Ministry of Alsace-Lorraine to the Directory, 23 Feb 1914, ECAAL.

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that some of the city elementary schools were not using the same catechisms or hymnals as the parish. At one level, such criticism arose in Strasbourg because the reorganization of schooling in 1872 had blurred the lines between school and parish. Consequently, many of the elementary school principals acted as if they had an entirely free hand in selecting books for their school. But the theological diversity within Strasbourg’s Protestant community, coupled with the mixing of children from different personal parishes in the same school, also made it difficult for school authorities to satisfy the pastor’s demands. Using data from 1891 as an example, students from at least ten different congregations attended the St. Aurelia (boys) school. And in these congregations, at least three different catechisms and two different hymnals were in use. Responding to Prass’s report on the situation, District President Ledderhose conceded that the situation in Strasbourg presented special difficulties. Nonetheless, he stressed, school officials could not just select any old catechism or hymnal. “They had to use at least one of the books currently in use in one of the parishes, preferably that used by the majority of students.”92 Protestant church authorities encountered even greater resistance to their wishes about textbooks from the secondary schools. Part of the problem lay in their weaker legal position: French school law pretty much excluded the churches from the secondary schools’ internal affairs. Once the Superior Consistory had approved a book for religious instruction, the Gymnasia and Realschulen could use it as they wished.93 The Realschule at St. John, thus, employed Schollenbruch’s Biblische Geschichten in its preparatory classes (equivalent to the elementary school Unterstufen), even though the Superior Consistory had not approved this use. More problematic, though, were the secondary schools’ insistence on using old-German catechisms and hymnals, even though none were approved for use in Alsace-Lorraine.94 Lutheran and Reformed officials repeatedly called on the state to correct the situation and have the schools use only the Reichsland’s own religious texts; 92 ADBR 65 D 327; “Schüler und Schülerinnenzahl der prot. Elementarschulen intra muros nach Angabe der Pfarreien,” May 1891, AMS Div. IV, 17/81. 93 This position was formalized in 1887. Secondary schools, both public and private, could use only those books that appeared on the list of approved texts. Any institution that used an unauthorized text faced the possibility of closure. Oberschulrat to the District Presidents, 26 Mar 1887, ADBR 65 D 327. 94 See the reports on the religious education programs in Strasbourg’s secondary schools from 1880, ADBR 34 AL 438.

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nonetheless, the old Germans on the Oberschulrat took no action. In fact, only after a new curriculum for religious education in the secondary schools was introduced in 1906 could church authorities finally get all of Strasbourg’s schools to use the Pastoral Conference’s hymnal in their classrooms.95 The leaders of Strasbourg’s faith communities did not only concern themselves with what occurred in the school house. They were also greatly interested in maintaining a positive relationship between the schools’ religion classes and their own instruction. In Strasbourg it had long been custom that all children attend lessons with their pastor or priest. Children under twelve had the so-called “little instruction” ( kleines Examen) on Thursdays, which gave rise to the “school-free” Thursday. Children preparing for first communion or confirmation had classes for two years at eleven o’clock in the morning, boys on Tuesdays and Fridays, girls on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Although the clergy often criticized the preparedness of school children (especially those coming from the secondary schools), their main grievance was more basic: in a variety of ways, the schools hindered or outright prevented students from receiving parochial instruction. The new school laws and the 1872 reorganization of the inner city elementary schools were partly to blame for this situation. On the one hand, the strict application of the attendance law meant that teachers regularly held students to the last minute of the ten o’clock hour (and sometimes a few minutes over).96 On the other, because of the new school districts, even if they were released promptly, many children simply had too far to walk from school to rectory to arrive on time. Boys whose parents belonged to the Young St. Peter parish, for instance, had to walk there from the St. William school, some twenty minutes away. This meant that the pastor had a maximum of forty minutes for the lesson, because children had to leave at noon so that they could go home for lunch, eat, and then be back in time for afternoon classes at one o’clock. Over the course of the Reichsland period, primary school officials discussed ways of overcoming the frictions caused by this arrangement,

ADBR 105 AL 1692. The mayor’s office and the District President in fact permitted students to leave a few minutes early if necessary, but not all teachers allowed it. Report of Prass to District President Stichaner, 30 May 1888; ADBR 65 D 301; Motz to District President Halm, 16 May 1898, ADBR 54 D 227, vol. 3. 95 96

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but they were never able to find a solution that worked for everyone. The clergy, for instance, planned their day so that afternoons were free for house visits. Confirmation and first communion classes could be moved to the beginning of the school day, but then the first school hour would suffer from tardiness and absences. The school day could also be reorganized to let out classes an hour earlier in the afternoon. This prospect, however, presented distinct disadvantages to the clergy. Not only would children already be tired from the long school day, but they might opt to participate in other after-school activities instead of confirmation or first communion class.97 Another obstacle to minimizing the inconveniences arising from the extracurricular preparation for confirmation and first communion preparation was that any solution would also have to work for the secondary schools. This was no small matter, for the secondary schools would have preferred not to release their students for any kind of parochial instruction. Often they did not. While the Protestant Gymnasium (and later the St. Stephan’s school) were fairly accommodating of local customs, the Realschulen and, above all, the Lyzeum made it very difficult for students to attend their clergy’s lessons. The Lyzeum, for instance, scheduled classes on Thursday mornings so that the younger children had to miss classes to attend parochial instruction.98 Even after the Oberschulrat told the schools in 1883 that they had to keep Thursday morning free for students in the lower grades, the Lyzeum and Realschulen decided only to schedule “less important classes” (like singing or drawing) at these times. As a result of these obstructive practices, they were able to prevail. Since by 1888 only a small number of secondary school students actually attended Thursday religion classes, the Oberschulrat decided that the schools no longer had to accommodate it (beyond excusing students who wished to attend).99 The secondary schools’ misgivings about releasing their students to attend the clergy’s instruction were partly practical in nature. Students prepared for confirmation and first communion, for example, by age and not by school grade. Thus while the majority of these students would be in their seventh and eighth school years, some students in the sixth

Prass to Stichaner, 30 May 1888, ADBR 65 D 301. Directory to the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine, 3 December 1881, ADBR 105 AL 1592. 99 Survey on Thursday instruction attendance (1888); ADBR 105 AL 1677; “Oberschulrat Circularverfügung 276” (on Thursday religion classes); ibid. 97

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and ninth school years would also be affected. Trying to arrange the schedules for all these children taxed the resources of every school, such that even the Protestant Gymnasium and St. Stephens schools could not refrain from scheduling classes for some of the affected grades at eleven o’clock on Tuesdays and Fridays.100 Nonetheless, the schools’ actions betrayed a certain elitism. School officials regarded the Thursday classes, in particular, as little more than glorified Sunday school, which their students did not need. And they felt that their students would gain little from the classes since they combined students of so many different ability levels. The schools’ practices also promoted old-German ideas about parochial instruction in the Reichsland. Thursday instruction was not commonplace elsewhere in Germany; therefore, it should not be necessary in Strasbourg. The Alsatian tradition of two years preparation for confirmation and first communion also diverged from old-German norms. There too, schoolmen offered resistance. For instance, in 1880, Lyzeum Director Deecke complained to the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine: “In the first years after the war, the Strasbourg clergy often made due with only half a year preparation for Confirmation . . . but soon more and more pastors demanded a full year, and last year the Lutheran pastors have decided on a two year requirement.” As Ministerial Councilor Heinrich Richter pointed out, Deecke’s charge was unfounded: the Protestant churches had required two years of confirmation preparation since before 1870. Nevertheless, Deecke’s intent was clear. He sought to spin the situation to decrease the length of preparation to the half or full year required in most of the other German Landeskirchen.101 Although this tack was unsuccessful, the Lyzeum and the Realschulen frequently took advantage of scheduling challenges to force students to choose between the school’s and the clergy’s lessons. They put classes like Greek, French, and mathematics in the eleven o’clock hour. Or they scheduled their own religion classes at that time, so that children had to opt between the two types of religious instruction.102

100 See the summary of the school schedules for the Strasbourg Lyzeum, Realschulen, and Protestant Gymnasium, prepared by Schollenbruch for Under-Secretary of State Pommer-Esche, 16 Dec 1879, ADBR 105 AL 1592. 101 Deecke to the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine 13 Jan 1880, ADBR 105 AL 1592. 102 As a compromise, on 10 Sep 1883 the Oberschulrat decided that students in the confirmation grades were supposed to have either no classes or religious instruction at eleven o’clock. Yet, even this agreement was not always observed faithfully, as

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These flashpoints in Strasbourg’s culture wars highlight several of the ways in which the recognized faith communities saw their ability to shape the religious product disseminated by the city’s primary and secondary schools decline. Nevertheless, it would be inappropriate to regard this trend as a victory of “urban modernity” or even “secularization.” On the one hand, the place of religion within the school curricula was never seriously threatened. After 1900 liberal and socialist politicians advocated dispensing with obligatory religious education and the confessional school. But while their petitions provoked public debate, they yielded no legislative victories.103 On the other hand, the churches scored a few victories of their own. As we noted in the previous section, during the Manteuffel administration, Catholics managed to heighten the place of catechism learning in the elementary schools. In 1881, Manteuffel also accorded the Catholics’ wish to reinstate the local school councils (Ortsschulvorstände), thereby restoring a considerable degree of clerical power over the elementary schools.104 As de jure members of these councils, the local clergy were charged with supervising the instruction and conduct of teachers. They oversaw the enumeration of students who could take the final exams and helped administer them.105 Rural clergy, however, benefited more from the revival of the local school boards than did their urban peers. In Strasbourg, local officials dashed Catholic hopes for reestablishing control over the Catholic schools by forming a single council for the entire city, rather than one for each school.106 The other major concession during the Manteuffel era, the admission of clergy to the examinations for prospective primary school teachers,

an exchange between the Directory, the Oberschulrat and the Oberrealschule (on the Kaiserpalast) from 1895 revealed. ADBR 105 AL 1592. 103 In 1907, a vigorous debate in the Landesausschuß erupted over a petition from the city of Strasbourg to eliminate confessional elementary schools, but in the end no action was taken. Stenographische Berichte des Landesauschusses, 34th session (16 May 1907): 628–34. 104 On Manteuffel’s church and school politics, see especially, Arnold Sachse, “Kirchenpolitik,” 146–71; and idem, “Schulpolitik.” 105 “Bestimmungen, betreffend die Ortsschulvorstände” of 17 May 1881, printed in Blum, Gesetze, 69–70. 106 Mayor Back to District President Freyberg, 20 July 1896, regarding the Bishop’s request for individual school boards in Strasbourg; ADBR 65 D 303, vol. 2; and State Secretary Puttkamer to Freyberg, 18 Nov 1896, authorizing an increase in the number of clerical representatives on the Strasbourg council to two Catholics and two Protestants; ibid.

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was also more symbolic than substantial.107 The problem, as Paul Bruns pointed out in a 1901 speech to the Alsatian Pastoral Conference, was that by the time that teachers stood for their examinations, it was really too late. For the church to make a difference here, “it would have to have a say in who taught religion at the normal school.”108 The Reichsland’s school authorities never granted this request. Nor did they respond well to the chorus of complaints about the quality of the schools’ religious instruction, especially in the secondary schools. When Directory President Petri suggested to State Secretary Puttkamer in 1899 that “religious instruction in the secondary schools was taught with neither the proper method nor the proper seriousness” and that “the state should pay as much attention to the quality of religious instruction at the secondary schools as it does in the primary ones,” Puttkamer chastised the Directory for making unfounded accusations. He noted that a common curricular plan for the subject in fact existed and that all the religion teachers were duly qualified to give religious instruction. Puttkamer even assured the Directory “that this instruction was given with the respect due to it.” In closing the letter, Puttkamer said that if the Directory had specific wishes about the curriculum it should present them to the Oberschulrat.109 Shortly thereafter, the Directory had an opportunity to revisit the issue. The Eisenach Church Conference, a meeting of representatives from the several German Landeskirchen, had placed the issue of ecclesiastical oversight of religious education on its agenda for 1901. To prepare for the discussion, the conference’s steering committee had asked each of the member churches to complete a questionnaire about the organization of religious education in its territory. The Directory contacted the Reformed Synod and the Reformed Consistory of Metz about participating in this project. It also asked the Oberschulrat to supply data for some of the questions, which prompted the new Oberschulrat president, Paul Albrecht, to circulate the survey to the

107 Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine to the Directory, 10 Jan 1882, regarding the appointment of church delegates (Protestant and Catholic) to the District Examination Commission. ADBR 172 AL 306; on the negotiations with the Reformed consistory of Strasbourg on the Protestant delegate, see KS PBK 2:75, ADBR 173 AL 9. 108 Bruns, “Die gegenseitige Stellung,” 375. 109 Petri to Puttkamer, 6 May 1899; Puttkamer to Petri (draft Albrecht), 26 May 1899, ADBR 105 AL 1592.

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Reichsland’s secondary schools.110 When Albrecht received the schools’ responses he discovered that the situation was even worse than the Directory had alleged in 1899. The curriculum was indeed deficient. Although many of the teachers had the certification to teach religion, many lacked experience and guidance. And most worrisome, in their eagerness to avoid fights with the local clergy, most school directors did not even supervise their schools’ religious education classes.111 The conclusion that Albrecht drew from the survey data was straightforward, but still unexpected. As with every other subject at the secondary schools, religion had to be inspected regularly. If the schools abdicated the responsibility, he reasoned, the state might just as well entrust it to the recognized faith communities, as had long been the practice in places like Prussia. This is precisely what the Oberschulrat did. Over the course of 1902, it concluded agreements with Catholic, Jewish and Protestant authorities to designate a small number of individuals to carry out this inspection on behalf of the state. And on 4 December 1902, State Secretary von Köller communicated the names of the inspectors to the school directors, requesting that the latter provide the necessary support to the inspectors as they carried out their charge.112 After lengthy negotiations, it was decided that the Lutheran and Reformed religious inspectors would take on the charge of inspecting Protestant religion classes, each pastor receiving a list of specific schools to supervise. The first round of inspections in 1903 showed that while the situation was not as bad as had been assumed, there was also plenty of room for improvement. Hence, in March 1904 the new Directory President, Friedrich Curtius, called the inspectors, other church leaders, and representatives of the Protestant theological faculty to a conference in Strasbourg to plot a course of action. The conference suggested that each religion class begin with prayer and that each institution have a

110 Directory to Synod President Piepenbring and the Consistory of Metz, 22 Dec 1900; ADBR AL 172 306; Directory to the Oberschulrat (with a copy of the Conference resolution) 10 May 1901, ADBR 105 AL 1592. 111 This was particularly true for Catholic instruction, since Catholic religion teachers refused to allow non-Catholics (which meant most of the school directors) to observe, much less criticize their work. Albrecht’s summary of the school reports, dated January 1902, appears in ADBR 105 AL 1677. 112 Article in the Strassburger Correspondenz 83 (31 July 1902); Superior Consistory Proceedings, May 1902; AS 57 (1902– 03); Zirkularverfügung to the School Directors, OS 7531, ADBR 105 AL 1592.

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weekly service for all students (Schulandacht). But it decided that the most important way to improve the cause of religion in the secondary schools was to institute a common, comprehensive curricular plan for religious instruction. A committee led by Professor Julius Smend and the Director Haeberle of Strasbourg’s Protestant Gymnasium was appointed to develop such a plan. And after the Reformed Synod and the Superior Consistory approved the final proposal in 1905, Albrecht announced on 9 January 1906 that beginning with the 1906–07 all of the Reichsland’s secondary schools would follow this new curriculum for Protestant religious instruction.113 The Oberschulrat’s endorsement of the “Lehrplan für den evangelischen Religionsunterricht an den höheren Schulen” was a major triumph for the Reichsland’s Protestant churches and their effort to influence how the schools socialized the youth to religion. But this was not a victory of reactionary ecclesiastical authority over the schools. On the contrary, the Protestants succeeded with their curriculum plan precisely because it was teacher and student friendly. It advised teachers to approach their task in a more dynamic fashion. Instead of enumerating specific content (e.g., bible stories, hymns, prayers) to be learned in each grade, the plan designated only grade-specific teaching objectives. Teachers could vary their lessons more frequently and adjust them to the needs of particular groups of students. To encourage students to view religion positively, rather than something that was dull, boring, indeed lifeless, the curriculum advocated drastically reducing the amount of memory work and drilling. It also counseled teachers to avoid needless repetition of material from one year to the next; students should learn new things every year. Lastly, by encouraging religion teachers to connect what students learned in religion with what they learned in other classes, the curricular guidelines also strove to integrate religion better into the entire school program.114 As Inspector Georg Metzger (Strasbourg-Neudorf ) informed the Superior Consistory in the fall of 1906, teachers and school directors initially received the new curriculum with suspicion, even hostility. “However opinions soon became more favorable. Teachers were glad that there was now a common curriculum and that it gave teachers

ADBR 105 AL 1592. “Leitende Gesichtspunkte” for the draft Lehrplan as discussed at the Superior Consistory meeting of June 1905, printed in AS 60 (1905–06): 114–31. 113 114

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considerable flexibility to plan their lessons.” Moreover, the teachers were asking school authorities to plan a special teachers’ conference to train religion instructors in the new curriculum, a wish that came to fruition at the end of 1909. Metzger also urged his colleagues to move on to the task that now awaited them: preparing a new religious education curriculum for the primary schools. “You are all aware of the great movement,” he continued, “that has taken hold of the German teaching corps and seeks to remove religious instruction from the schools or at least reorganize it. This movement is also afoot in our lands. . . . Many [of our] teachers thus would be thankful if there were something new to work with.”115 Encouraged by their previous accomplishments, the Superior Consistory endorsed Metzger’s proposal. President Curtius appointed Theodor Renaud, a member of the Directory and the Schulrat for the District President of Upper Alsace, to chair a joint Lutheran-Reformed commission that would develop a proposal. By June 1907, the commission had a draft ready for the churches—and school officials—to discuss. Once again, the Protestant leaders crafted a curriculum plan that spoke to elementary school teachers’ needs and the pastors’ wishes. It encouraged a progressive (instead of repetitive) approach to learning, with each school level (Stufe) having a distinct set of pedagogical goals. The lists of Bible stories, hymns and catechism sections also disappeared; they were replaced by statements of expectations for each level and paragraph-length descriptions of how teachers should organize their lessons. Moreover, and here the pastors’ influence was particularly telling, the curriculum proposal called on the Protestant schools to devote more time to the New Testament rather than the Old. After all, as pastor Karl Gerold (St. Nicholas, Strasbourg) remarked when the Superior Consistory considered the plan in 1907, “The goal of the classes was to create Christians.”116 In 1908, the Protestant churches could chalk up another victory. The Oberschulrat decided to accept their proposal, with only minor revisions, as the text for the section on Protestant religious instruction in the new Normallehrplan then under development. When State Secretary von Köller circulated the draft document to the district presidents and Superior Consistory Proceedings, July 1906, AS 61 (1906–08): 16–18; on the 1909 Instruction Course see Julius Smend, ed., Der evangelische Religionsunterricht auf höheren Schulen (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1910). 116 ADBR 172 AL 306; and AS 62 (1907–08). 115

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school inspectors in 1909, there were long comments on every section—except the one devoted to religious instruction. Admittedly, there was not much to comment on. Neither the Catholic bishops nor the Jewish consistories had proposed any changes to their respective subsections; and the school inspectors had just had an occasion to comment on the Protestants’ revisions. Nevertheless, this silence meant that when the new teaching plan was published the following year, the Protestant churches had prevailed on an issue very dear to their hearts. They had acquired influence over a central determinant of how the elementary schools taught religion: the curriculum itself.117 The various participants in the late nineteenth-century battles over public schooling in Europe all shared an important conviction. They saw in the youth the key to the future, whether that was a democratic, socialist or Catholic future. Yet, while this imagery of combat helps evoke the passions that these contests involved, its rhetoric of winners and losers frequently gets in the way of understanding what happened in these often complex struggles and their consequences for the future. Viewed through the traditional lens of the Kulturkampf, in which these were contests above all for control over the schools, the history of church-state relations in Strasbourg after 1870 looks pretty bleak for the recognized faith communities. With few exceptions, German-styled educational reform and progress trumped ecclesiastical privilege. This reading also would fit in well with most narratives of urbanization as secularization, for in many respects, it appeared that as the school system modernized, it freed itself from church tutelage. Looking more carefully at the dynamics of educational change and contestation between 1870 and 1914, as we have done in this chapter, an altogether different picture emerges. The reforms ushered in by the onset of German rule actually enhanced the position of religion in the schools. Not only did attending school become compulsory, but all students had to take religion classes. At the very least, thus, children gained familiarity with the narratives, practices and signs of their faith community, learning a cultural vocabulary with which they could act through the rest of their adult lives. In this respect, the schools played

117 Correspondence between the Directory and the Oberschulrat in ADBR 172 AL 306; the materials on the development of the 1910 Normallehrplan appear in ADBR 12 D 1.

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a fundamental role in promoting religion’s place, indeed its future, in the urban environment. The churches’ ability to influence how the schools provided this religious knowledge certainly evolved over the course of the Reichsland period. But even here there was room for give and take, depending on how religious authorities played their cards. Since the Catholic Church wanted to shape religious instruction by controlling the entire school, it lost more and gained less of real value. Strasbourg’s Protestants also had misgivings about the religious costs of educational progress. But because they accepted the basic premises of modern schooling, the Protestants were in a position to play it to their own advantage—and did so with significant success.

CHAPTER SEVEN

MINISTERING TO THE CITY In his annual report on the St. Thomas Inspection for 1908, Inspector Michel Knittel reflected at length on the general state of religious life in Alsace-Lorraine. Piety, churchliness (Kirchlichkeit), and morality have unfortunately not kept pace with increasing prosperity. Unbelief and irresponsibility, materialism and free thought threaten piety more and more. For many the church is now little more than a place where one goes for baptisms, confirmations, weddings, and burials. . . . Much has been done to combat the ills of modernity and to awaken new interest in religion. I am particularly mindful of all the church groups and their activities as well as the work of the Inner Mission, which strives to that end. . . . Certainly all of these efforts are beneficial and will bring about good things, especially when they are rooted in the one true foundation: Jesus Christ. For only a new Pentecostal fire, which is set aflame in the heart by the true preaching of Christ’s gospel, can protect the church from decline and help create new life within her.1

At first reading, these comments appear to echo the strains of the oftsung song of late nineteenth-century religious decline. Just as in Paris, London, and Berlin, so too in German Strasbourg did indifference seem to be replacing piety.2 Visits to the tavern and the club house were preferred to attending church. The heightened influence of materialism was also undermining Christian standards of morality. Yet, the pastor’s assessment shows that urban religious conditions were not quite as bleak as contemporary Jeremiads contended. Protestants still had significant ties to the parish. They were also mobilizing to confront the challenges of urban modernity. They founded new types of organizations—like the Urban Mission—to tend to their larger and more diverse flocks. They created religious newspapers to disseminate the gospel message and other community news to those who, for a variety of reasons, might no longer attend services assiduously. Clergy and laity even strove to

1 2

STIR 1908. McLeod, European Religion, remains an excellent starting point for this topic.

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rationalize urban parish structures to facilitate a more efficient use of scarce personnel and financial resources. In short, urbanization did not bring about the demise of religious community, much less eliminate the religious dimensions of urban culture. To the contrary, the confrontation between religion and modernity in places like Strasbourg compelled religious groups—churches as well as independent communities—to adapt and change. The tactics they adopted promoted new ideas about and manifestations of religious community in the city. Moreover, by establishing voluntary societies and engaging in a wide range of publishing activities, religious groups proved themselves to be modern and reasserted themselves as major players in urban cultural and social life, a fact that urban historians have all too often failed to acknowledge.3 Moreover, as confessional communities participated in the construction of urban modernity with their newspapers and associations, they created channels through which the city could positively influence religious activity far beyond its walls and construct new imaginings of supra-local religious communities.4 While hardly absent from discussions about worship or education, it was primarily in the context of ministerial action, what contemporaries referred to as “cure of souls” (Seelsorge) and “community care” (Gemeindepflege), that Strasbourg’s pastors—and even many laypersons— grappled with the complicated question of how to maintain religious community in the new urban environment.5 Through their house visits and assistance to the poor, sick, and the elderly, pastors gained a more intimate understanding of the city itself and the new challenges facing its inhabitants. This type of activity also strengthened the sense of religious community in the city at large. Clergy and laity engaged in charitable work, that is, they were seen acting on their membership in a faith community. Moreover, as Protestants, Catholics, and to a much

Admittedly, urban historians have devoted considerably more attention to the structural and political than the cultural elements of big city life. But when they do discuss developments in associational life, newspapers, even “high” culture (music, in particular), there is nary a mention of the significant religious dimension to these trends, as evidenced by such works as Otto Dann, ed., Vereinswesen und bürgerliche Gesellschaft in Deutschland (Munich: Oldenburg, 1984); Mommsen, Bürgerliche Kultur; and Peter Fritzsche, Reading Berlin: 1900 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1993). 4 On the notion of modernity as a process of globalization (i.e., displacement of the local), see especially Giddens, Consequences of Modernity, 63–65. 5 For a broader discussion of the survival of religious community in modern German society, see the essays in Lucian Hölscher, ed., Die Gegenwart Gottes in der modernen Gesellschaft (Göttingen: Wallstein, 2006). 3

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lesser degree Jews discovered, the appropriation of the voluntary association and the press for pastoral purposes ably facilitated their efforts to maintain and reinforce notions of confessional distinctiveness in the city.6 Finally, as they contended with the travails of urban living, pastors and laity helped to elaborate new ideas about what it meant to be religious in the city. Scholars like Lucian Hölscher have argued that such developments were just part of a broader nineteenth-century movement away from church-based piety.7 While this interpretation has a certain amount of validity, it misses the larger point that is especially significant for understanding urban religion. Namely, no matter how frequently clergy privileged worship and (in the Protestant tradition) preaching, religious practice had never been confined to the church. The changes that occurred in the effort to minister to the big city were not marginal, a type of ersatz religion, but were instead impulses that grew out of an important, if often understudied, dimension of religious life. Exploring this realm of ministerial activity in Strasbourg not only represents a chance to comprehend the evolving understandings of religious community, but also an opportunity to recover a fuller sense of what urban religious life entailed.8 Community Care for the Big City Throughout the Reichsland period, Strasbourg’s Protestant clergy privileged a definition of ministry that was rooted in worship. Speaking at the Inner Mission’s Instruction Course in 1899, Eduard Stricker, a pietist minister at the Reformed Church, declared that after the pastor’s own dedication, properly organized worship services constituted the most important factor in caring successfully for the religious community.9 Similarly, in remarks given before the Strasbourg Pastoral Society on 14 October 1912, the liberal Lutheran pastor at St. William, Robert

6 Unfortunately, due to the weaknesses of the historical record for Strasbourg’s Jewish community, most of the comparative observations presented in this chapter will focus on Protestants and Catholics. 7 See especially Hölscher, “The Religious Divide.” 8 Along similar lines, see also Callum Brown, Death of Christian Britain, 11–14. 9 Eduard Stricker, Die Gemeindepflege. Vortrag gehalten im Instructions-Cursus für Innere Mission zu Straßburg am 3. Mai 1899 (Strasbourg: Eduard von Hauten, 1899), 6–7. A summary of Will’s remarks appears in PB-SPG, 5:185–86, ECAAL.

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Will, asserted: “Protestant Gemeindepflege in the city is, above all, care of the worshipping community. In it the power of religious living flows the strongest and through it courses the Protestant tradition in its purest form.” This emphasis on worship reflected, in part, the special importance given the sermon within Protestantism. Indeed, Will described it as the “most effective and popular way to encourage and activate piety.” But, as we saw in Chapter Six, worship remained critical because, by bringing individuals together to hear the Word and to praise God, it actively created religious community. The act of gathering revitalized the sense of group membership, while the liturgical narrative reminded Protestants of the values and obligations that defined the group. Among the most important of these obligations was the gospel admonition to love one another, particularly in the sense of tending to the needs of the less fortunate members of the community and bringing the gospel message to those who were prevented from attending services. Thus, as both Stricker and Will stressed, effective ministry involved much more than worship. It meant caring for the poor, the sick, and the elderly. It entailed disseminating the sermon’s message beyond the walls of the church and among the public at large. It even implied a certain degree of consciousness raising, that is, drawing attention to the needs and concerns of the Protestant community outside of Strasbourg and Alsace-Lorraine, so that it too might benefit from local goodwill (and financial support). Ministry, in this sense, required an engagement with the contemporary social and cultural environment, however difficult that could be. But it also provided religious communities with multiple opportunities to mark and shape that world, even during an era of rapid change. In principle, all Protestants were called to engage themselves with the needs of the community. Yet, apart from the initiatives founded by Franz Haerter and his pietist followers (most notably, the Evangelical Society), lay involvement in Strasbourg remained limited even after 1870.10 Judging from the evidence, it would seem that the broadest form of lay participation was financial. Lutherans and Calvinists, men and women, contributed to the collections taken as the faithful departed from services. They also donated funds, goods, and used clothing to

10 On Haerter’s work, see Max Reichard, Franz Haerter, Ein Lebensbild aus dem Elsass (Strasbourg: Buchhandlung der Evangelischen Gesellschaft, 1897), and more recently Voeltzel, Service du Seigneur, 107–10.

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support poor relief and other charitable or missionary work.11 The lay-dominated parish councils and consistories managed the parishes’ charitable funds, through which the needy could obtain both monetary and in-kind assistance (e.g., wood, coal, food coupons). In addition, a few devoted lay men and women participated directly in aid work. Women from the upper classes, for instance, joined with the pastor’s wife to gather old clothes or sew confirmation garments for orphans and children from poorer families. Likewise, men from the privileged classes participated with the city’s pastors in the affairs of the handful of benevolent societies that had been formed since 1800 (e.g., the Society for the “Ashamed” Poor [ pauvres honteux], the Orphanage at Neuhof, and groups affiliated with the missionary societies of Basel and Paris).12 Thus, as with so many aspects of parish life, it was the pastor who assumed most of the responsibility for ministering to the community at large. Although some pastors complained about lay passivity—in 1878 Inspector Gustav Ungerer described it as a “regrettable circumstance” that hurt the community and unduly added to the pastor’s burden—two factors made this clerical orientation unavoidable.13 First and foremost, a central aspect of this ministry was the cure of souls that was a pastoral function, which could be exercised only by a minister or specially trained layperson. By the 1870s, most of this work took place in the context of house visits. Pastors used these visits to get to know their parishioners as individuals and learn about their specific spiritual and material needs. Consequently, a considerable amount of the care for the poor and the sick also occurred through house visits. But ministers also took advantage of these opportunities to spread the Word among the congregation and encourage families to follow Christian religious and moral precepts. Eduard Stricker thus counseled: “The pastor should not lose sight of any member of his parish. He must untiringly seek after the lost and the fallen, the indifferent and the unrepentant. He should not make any pastoral visit without saying something serious or without leaving some thought-provoking comment. Such a word, such

11 Several of the parishes, e.g., New Church and St. Nicholas, even had endowments for charitable assistance that had been established through the “rich bequests of previous members of the congregation.” NCIR 1893; STIR 1896. 12 Will, “Restauration,” 273–75; idem, “Juillet,” 53–54; and idem, “Second Empire, II,” 233–36. 13 Ungerer in NCIR 1878.

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a thought often becomes a hook or a reference point to which the soul can always return until it is indeed ‘nearer to God’.”14 House visits consumed a significant portion of a pastor’s time. The ideal was for each pastor to visit all of the families registered in his congregation at least once a year. In 1897, Karl Hackenschmidt, for example, reported that on average he made eight visits per month.15 Typically, these visits took place in the afternoons during the week: pastors normally gave religious instruction to the youth in the morning; evening hours, especially in winter, were inconvenient for pastor and parishioner alike. As important as this work was, Strasbourg’s pastors also sensed that they were coming up short. In part, the problem lay in the timing of the visits, which effectively precluded personal contact between pastor and working men and women. Robert Will confided in 1905, “I know many of the men of my parish not at all, since they are at work during the day when I make my visits.” Yet even with the people they did visit, pastors had difficulties bringing up serious subjects (e.g., matters of faith and morals). As Inspector Theodor Höpffner reported in 1909: “In visits to members of the upper classes discussions generally remain at the level of generalities . . . [and] issues of belief and faith do not arise. With respect to the lower classes, exchanges tend to take the form of a commentary on the fourth request of the Lord’s Prayer (‘Give us our daily bread’). The people thus use the presence of the minister . . . to complain about their own problems.”16 The other reason for the strongly clerical orientation to community ministry in Strasbourg was more particular to the city: its system of personal congregations. Effectively, the Lutheran church did not appoint pastors to serve existing congregations, but rather named missionaries for the city, each of whom had the challenge of gathering a group of faithful and then ministering to it in word and deed. Upon their installation in office, pastors in Strasbourg made house visits to invite their predecessor’s parishioners to join their congregation. Gustav Lasch, who succeeded Julius Redslob at St. William in 1905, left this account of how he proceeded: “Since it was not to be expected that most of the members of [Redslob’s] congregation would come to me and register of their own volition, I visited [these] families . . . to learn of their intentions. . . . Stricker, Gemeindepflege, 8–9. Julius Redslob, “Sulze’s Vorschläge bezüglich der Gemeindeorganisation,” ASPC 10 (1892–97), 558–60. Hackenschmidt in NCIR 1896. 16 NCIR 1909. 14 15

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To my great joy . . . of the 504 families that had made up my predecessor’s congregation . . . 421 have chosen to remain with me.”17 Lasch’s observations demonstrate that a certain stability in congregational composition did indeed exist, thanks in no small part to the Directory’s efforts to fill vacant positions in Strasbourg with men of the same general theological orientation (see Chapter Three). They also point to some of the ways in which urbanization fundamentally challenged traditional approaches to ministry. Significantly, Strasbourg’s pastoral corps was not overwhelmed by the city’s post-1870 demographic expansion. In fact, by late nineteenth-century big city standards, Strasbourg had a rather enviable situation. In 1914, the city had forty-three official Catholic clergy (priests and vicars of whom 26 were in the inner city), 32 Protestant ministers (23 inner city), and 2 rabbis. This amounted to some 2011 Catholics per priest, 2176 Protestants per pastor, and 2856 Jews per rabbi.18 These were ratios of which the clergy in many of Germany’s other urban centers could only dream. Congregations with well over 5,000 parishioners per priest or pastor were common in Germany’s largest cities—Berlin, Hamburg, Leipzig, Munich—and conditions were not much better in the ranks of the smaller big cities. Bremen, for instance, had roughly 5,000 Protestants per minister in 1890 and 7726 in 1912. Likewise in Bochum, which was smaller than Strasbourg by only 50,000 people in 1910, there were 2,500 Catholics for every priest (thus commensurate to Strasbourg’s conditions), but some 4,000 Protestants for every pastor.19 Nevertheless, the changes that accompanied Strasbourg’s transformation into a big city placed visible strains on the traditional approaches to community care. Pastors serving in the parishes closest to the new inner-city districts (i.e., St. William and Young St. Peter) experienced the greatest growth in the size of their congregations, but every pastor saw the amount of time and energy he had to devote to house visits

SWIR 1905. Adreßbuch der Stadt Straßburg (1914): 451– 454; Bevölkerung der Stadt Strassburg 1910, 25. These ratios reflect the number of civilians to clergy, based on the census figures for 1910. 19 Paul Grünberg, “Die Parochialverhältnisse in großen Städten,” Monatschrift für Pastoraltheologie 4 (1908): 367–85 and 415–30, here 368–71; Martin Greschat, “Die Berliner Stadtmission,” in Elm and Loock, Seelsorge und Diakonie, 451–474, here 461; Otte, “More Churches” in McLeod, European Religion, 110; Brandt, “Katholische Kirche,” 227–29; Van Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch, 54; and Liedhegener, Christentum und Urbanisierung, 172–75, 306–09, 444–48, and 491– 501. 17 18

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escalate. For even if the size of his congregation remained relatively constant, Strasbourg’s post-1879 physical expansion encouraged a great dispersal of one’s parishioners within the city, such that it took more time just going from house to house than previously. The upshot was that pastors found themselves forced to visit less frequently. In 1905 Robert Will wrote: “Dear Members! In spite of daily visits, it is not possible for me to reach you all. With my house visits I barely make it to every family in the course of two or three years, since as a result of the city’s extension to the north, my congregation has increased in size and physical compass.”20 High levels of intra-urban mobility also made it difficult for pastors to keep in touch with members of their congregations, particularly those in the lower social classes. The parish election registers of St. William, Young St. Peter, St. Thomas, and Old St. Peter, for instance, reveal not only frequent changes of address in between elections (every three years), but also that as many as seventy names might be dropped from the registers because the parish no longer had a valid local address for those men. At the same time, the difficulties facing the members of Strasbourg’s Protestant communities mounted. One trend that received frequent attention in the annual reports for the three Strasbourg-based religious inspectors was the rise of urban poverty. Already in 1876, Inspector Ungerer remarked on the sudden and “deplorable” rise in begging. Ten years later, Pastor Tubach observed that over half of the families in his congregation were poor, and that the 80 marks that the parish made available each quarter for poor relief no longer sufficed for the three St. William congregations. Even the relatively well-off St. Nicolas parish was affected. In 1895, Pastor Gerold announced that of the thirty children he confirmed that year, almost half required assistance from the parish in order to acquire a suitable garment for the service.21 The reorganization of municipal poor relief after 1900 (the introduction of the “Strasbourg system”) reduced some of the churches’ burden. Still, as Inspector Höpffner observed in 1909, the churches continued to contribute significantly to the care of the lower classes and the sick in Strasbourg.22

20 21 22

Robert Will’s newsletter for 1905, SG. NCIR 1876, SWIR 1886, STIR 1895. NCIR 1909.

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Strasbourg’s clergy also commented frequently on the decline of moral standards in the Reichsland’s capital. In 1885, Gerold remarked: “If one wanted to judge by the relatively low number of births out of wedlock, the low divorce and suicide rates, etc. one may say that things aren’t too bad here. However, there would still be too much to write about the extensive desire for pleasure . . . above all, for drinking. Young males and older men, especially among the workers, have surrendered themselves to liquor. The cessation of work on Mondays and the life in the taverns has led to the ruin of many individuals and families.”23 This pursuit of pleasure, however, was just part of a larger current of materialism that had taken hold in the city. Year in, year out, pastors complained of the growing “materialistic worldview,” which led to religious and moral indifference as well as socialism. In his report for 1904, Inspector Knittel left no doubt as to the link between materialism and socialism and the threat both posed to public order: What makes Socialism so dangerous is not its unrestricted criticism of current circumstances, nor the social utopia that it seeks to realize. Instead, the threat lies in how Socialist ideas lead the masses into a practical materialism that suppresses both morality and piety, repeating thus—if with a different melody—the words of the old heathen song: “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we will die.”24

Indeed, after the lapsing of Bismarck’s antisocialist legislation in 1890, social democracy emerged as a major force in both municipal and regional politics. Socialists won their first city council seats in 1896, gained the city’s Reichstag seat in 1907 and that of the greater Strasbourg area (Straßburg-Land) in 1912.25 23 STIR 1885. In fact, the churches were also actively engaged in the city’s poor relief system (Armenverwaltung). In 1914, one Protestant minister (Belin, the chaplain for the Neuhof Anstalt) served on the administrative board (Armenrat), and six pastors (Hoepffner, Matter, Ernst, Will, Burns, and Zier) were members of the district poor commissions (of which there were a total of sixteen). Adreßbuch der Stadt Straßburg (1914): 496–97. 24 STIR 1904. Three years later, Knittel’s colleague at the New Church, Paul Grünberg, published his own rejoinder to socialism—particularly its claim that religion had no place in the public sphere—Grünberg, Ist Religion Privatsache? (Stuttgart: Chr. Belser’schen Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1908). 25 On the implantation of social democracy in Strasbourg, the classic work remains François Igersheim, “Recherches sur l’insertion de la social-démocratie dans la vie politique strasbourgeoise 1871–1890” (DES, University of Strasbourg, 1966); a useful overview of subsequent developments appears in Léon Strauss, “Le mouvement ouvrier alsacien,” in 1869 –1935: Jacques Peirotes et le socialisme en Alsace, ed. Jean-Claude Richez et al. (Strasbourg: bf editions, 1989), 68–71.

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Complicating matters further was the peculiarity of Strasbourg’s personal parish system. In order to maintain harmonious relations among the various theological factions and between the Reformed and Lutheran communities, pastors tended only to the registered members of their congregations. They did not engage in random house visits. Nor did the poor have access to parochial charity unless they were officially registered as parishioners. Most of the immigrants arriving in Strasbourg after 1870, however, were unaware of these arrangements, unaware that they needed to take the initiative to join one of the city’s official Protestant congregations. Nor was there any easy way of identifying new Protestants and urging them to become members of a congregation. In other German cities where personal congregations existed, police officials routinely informed parishes when new Protestant families arrived or changed addresses, a practice which the Reichsland’s political authorities repeatedly contended could not be introduced in Strasbourg.26 Consequently, to the concern of both church and state, urbanization resulted in the emergence of a new and growing class of Protestants—the “unregistered” ( Nichteingepfarrten)—who were essentially unreachable via the traditional means of community care. In 1893, roughly one-fifth (8,000) of Strasbourg’s inner-city Protestants were unregistered, a figure that had increased to one-quarter by 1905.27 Faced with these challenges, Strasbourg’s Protestant leaders experimented after 1870 in a variety of ways to overcome some of the shortcomings with traditional ministerial practices. At the most general level, they sought to inform the masses of immigrant Protestants about the city’s religious practices and arrangements. In 1895 the Pastoral Society published a “Kirchlicher Wegweiser,” which informed Protestants of the city’s parochial arrangements, provided the names and addresses for all the city’s ministers, and listed the customary hours for religious services in the city’s official parishes. Around the same time, Wilhelm Horning had a similar tract printed to inform orthodox-minded

26 See the remarks in Grünberg, “Parochialverhältnisse,” 372–73; and the 1907 Synod proceedings, where this point was the subject of extended discussion, ADBR 147 AL P. 4 (4). 27 See von der Goltz’s comments during the discussion of the Directory’s plan to erect parish districts in Strasbourg at the 1893 Superior Consistory session, AS 48 (1893): 277–79; and PB-SPG, 5:58–60 (24 June 1907), ECAAL. Nonetheless, as Paul Grünberg emphasizes, “Through the need for rites, charitable assistance and religious instruction for the youth,” sooner or later most Protestants in Strasbourg would have contact with one of the official congregations. Grünberg, “Parochialverhältnisse,” 423.

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Lutherans of the religious and charitable options open to them and the city. And in 1913, the Inner Mission updated the information in the Pastoral Society’s directory by publishing its own “Wegweiser” for metropolitan Strasbourg.28 A few pastors also used print media in the form of informal newsletters to help them reach parishioners that they missed during their house visits. The pioneer here was Eduard Stricker, the German-language pastor at the Reformed Church, who published his first issue in 1899, which then served as the model for both August Stern and Robert Will. Although few exemplars of these bulletins have survived, Stricker described his own practices in the course of his 1899 Gemeindepflege seminar. He used the parish bulletin to inform parishioners about events in parish life, not just changes in worship times but also matters like the introduction of the new regional hymnal. The newsletter also enabled him to discuss issues that could not be discussed from the pulpit but that were also difficult to broach in person. In the only surviving example of his newsletters, Will also presents the parish bulletin as a necessary supplement to his regular work. Like Stricker, he used the two-page sheet to make important announcements. But he also employed it to exhort his parishioners to engage in parish work, such as helping less fortunate members of the community. “Who is ready to act as a patron for a poor child, to visit a needy family and quietly take over their support?,” he queried. “I can furnish addresses to any who are interested. . . . Whoever has employment to offer, should take into consideration members of the parish. I often have visits from people seeking jobs, and many of them are worthy of employment.”29 Furthermore, several pastors organized special parish social events not just to supplement the house visit, but to overcome some of its limitations. These events—the “Tea-Evenings” (Tee-Abende), “Congregational Picnics” and “Confirmation Gatherings” (Confirmandenabende)—were particularly beloved by ministers of a pietist persuasion, like Stern, Stricker, and Paul Grünberg, who often held them in the facilities of the Inner 28 Respectively, Straßburger Pastoralgesellschaft, ed., Kirchlicher Wegweiser; Horning, Gemeinde-Anzeiger; Evangelische Gesellschaft, ed., Wegweiser in die Kirche. 29 ADBR 173 AL 60; Stricker Gemeindepflege, 14–20; SW. I found no examples of Stern’s newsletters, although Inspector Knittel refers to them regularly in his annual reports. Otto Michaelis, who performed part of his vicarial work in Strasbourg and remained well informed of church affairs there after he departed for Metz, also mentions that, at least until 1910, all three pastors continued to print the occasional bulletin for their parishioners. Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 146.

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Mission on Finkmatt Street. But even the liberal and conservative pastors at St. William, Old St. Peter and Young St. Peter organized such functions. The Confirmation Gathering, for instance, brought together children who were either to be or had just been confirmed and their families. It typically commenced with the singing of a hymn and greetings from the pastor, followed by entertainment (skits, musical numbers, even oratory) with clear—if also understated—religious and/or moral content. Halfway through the entertainment, refreshments were served and those in attendance had an opportunity to socialize with each other. And at the end, the pastor came before the group once again to make some concluding remarks and give a blessing.30 Although the specific organization of these events varied from pastor to pastor and from audience to audience, they all promoted the pastors’ ministerial work in several important ways. First, they enabled pastors to meet with many members of their parish, not just the women and the children, but also the men. Moreover, the familial orientation of these gatherings provided an excellent opportunity for ministers to stress the importance of family for Christian living—and the general health of society. Second, because of their congregational nature, these functions helped reinforce the parish community’s claims to be the form par excellence of religious community. Thus, while organizers strove to make these evenings fun—and altogether different from formal worship services—they remained occasions to foster a sociability that was decidedly religious in character. Lastly, the social provided a model for a less-clerically oriented approach to ministry, inasmuch as there were roles in the afternoon’s or evening’s activities for everyone in the parish. Laymen and women helped organize the event. They participated—as did some of the confirmation children—in the skits and musical numbers. They also served the refreshments and helped with the clean up after the event had ended. Minor as these activities might seem, they were indicative of a much wider trend towards greater lay involvement in community ministry at the end of the nineteenth century, which undermines Olaf Blaschke’s and Martin Friedrich’s recent proposition that heightened clericalization characterized both late nineteenth-century German Catholicism

30 Stricker, Gemeindepflege, 27–29; Parish correspondence, ST; STIR, NCIR, SWIR, 1895 –1910 passim; SPV PBK, 3:207; Albecker, L’Évangile dans la cité, 64–65.

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and Protestantism.31 In Strasbourg at least, parishes pursued a more efficient division of labor as a means to extend parish resources. Pastors concentrated on their strictly pastoral duties (e.g. cure of souls), while the laity—men and, above all, women—assumed greater responsibility for ministering to the poor and sick. With respect to poor relief, the main goal was to increase the number of people working on behalf of the needy and, thereby, draw in resources to supplement those which the parish already had as its disposal. The basic means by which this occurred was the parish service committee (deaconate or Diakonat), which drew on the model of Franz Haerter’s women’s service organization (Dienerinnenverein). Friedrich Bühlmann and Emil Nied established the first of these groups for their personal congregations soon after 1870. Bühlmann’s deaconate was for men, Nied’s included men and women. At Old St. Peter, the liberal Karl Fuchs joined with his pietist colleague Karl Friedrich Bögner to create a men’s deaconate for the entire parish. Friedrich Horning had a “Worker’s Society” to serve his orthodox congregation, whereas women from the two St. Nicholas parishes (German and French) joined together to form a “Damenpatronat” (women’s patronage society). And over at the Reformed Church, Eduard Stricker had likewise organized women of the parish into a Damen-Diakonat.32 The specific organization of these groups also varied from parish to parish. At Old St. Peter, the parish council appointed six members to serve three-year terms in the deaconate, whereas the deaconate in August Herzog’s congregation at Young St. Peter consisted of fourteen volunteers (men and women) from the congregation.33 Nonetheless, in mission and method these committees were quite similar. Underlying all of their work was a strong sense of Christian paternalism. Women of the upper classes helped their less fortunate “sisters” with washing and cleaning. They made sure that children attended school and religious education classes regularly, with clean clothes and orderly appearances. Similarly, men from the middle-classes worked with the heads of the household, encouraging them to be frugal, industrious, and clean. In

31 Blaschke, “Der ‘Dämon’ des Konfessionalismus. Einführende Überlegungen,” in idem, Konfessionen im Konflikt, 13–70, here 28–31; and Friedrich, “Das 19. Jahrhundert,” 111–12. 32 Stricker, Gemeindepflege, 14 –18; SPV PBK vol. 1, 3 Feb 1872; NCIR 1893 and 1894; Newsletter for the Will Congregation (1905), SG; STIR 1889. 33 SPV PBK, vol. 1, 3 Feb 1874; NCIR 1893.

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addition to providing families with gifts of meat, bread, and wood, these “patrons” also helped protect parishioners from unscrupulous landlords and endeavored to find good masters and mentors for younger parish members seeking training and employment.34 Equally important, the work of these committees was carefully organized and integrated into the life of the parish (or personal congregation). Eduard Stricker described the situation in his parish as follows: My deaconate meets [with me] every month, when the members report on their activity, discuss their work and concerns, and plan for the distribution of particular types of support. Some older members of the congregation and needy widows receive regular monthly payments . . . but otherwise support is made on a case to case basis . . . In winter we give vouchers for wood and potatoes . . . and for worthy women who need to earn something extra, we provide them with mending and sewing projects each week. . . . When winter is over and the various projects are completed and the cellars empty, then we need to think about replacing everything. At that point, the entire congregation is invited to go shopping for us; they have never let us down.35

In short, the deaconates and aid societies developed into coordinating committees for parish-based charitable assistance. Their members collaborated to determine—and meet—the various needs of the extended parish community, on whom they also depended for financial and moral support. In some instances, the needs identified by the deaconates were met by other parish and congregational groups. Almost every parish, for instance, had a women’s group that sewed confirmation garments and other articles of clothing for needy families. Young St. Peter and St. William also had had work committees, “Arbeitsvereine,” which provided labor assistance to the poor and the sick. Other groups were organized to gather clothing for redistribution to individuals and families. Many parishes also held annual Christmas celebrations for poor children and their families, where after a program of music and recitations, the “guests” received gifts of food and recently-made clothing. In 1908, Robert Will reported that fifty-three families so benefited from the parish’s assistance.36

34 35 36

Stricker, Gemeindepflege, 15; Redslob, “Sulze’s Vorschläge,” 561. Stricker, Gemeindepflege, 16–17. SWIR 1908.

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Initially, the deaconates also supported pastors’ ministry to the sick and the elderly. They alerted the pastor to people who needed attention, they replaced wrappings and picked up prescriptions, and they helped out with household chores. By the turn of the century, however, parishes began to engage deaconesses from the local deaconess house (Diakonissenhaus, founded by Franz Haerter in 1842) to take over the care of the parish’s sick members.37 Eduard Stricker made the first (successful) request for such a Gemeindeschwester in 1897, and by the end of 1899 all of the Lutheran parishes had followed suit (even if at Young St. Peter, Wilhelm Horning’s orthodox congregation made arrangements with the orthodox Diakonissenhaus at Ingweiler).38 Significantly, this innovation also remained explicitly congregational or parochial in its application. At a June 1898 session of the Pastoral Society, Inspector Knittel suggested that it might be more efficient to appoint the deaconesses to serve particular sectors of the city. But his colleagues stressed that the existing system of personal congregations made that approach, however desirable, impracticable.39 To a large degree, Strasbourg’s clergy felt that they could allow parochial identity to trump efficiency because the deaconess came relatively cheaply. Whereas the salary for a new clergyman started at 2,600 M., parishes could obtain the services of a deaconess for a mere 800 M. annually (in addition to room and board).40 But there was also the advantage of specialization. The deaconesses was a trained caregiver who not only relieved pastors of part of their work, but did it better. As Stricker recounted in 1899: A deaconess has now served in our parish for two and a half years, and when I think about all the work that she has accomplished, I cannot even conceive of how I managed without her. Here is one woman, for instance, whose body is covered with wounds that must be cleaned and wrapped daily. There is a mother with a child who, for a time, had to go every day between eleven and twelve o’clock to the clinic. The deaconess 37 On Haerter’s work in establishing the Deaconess movement in Alsace, see Voeltzel, Service du seigneur, 132 – 49. The decision to erect the Diakonissenhaus on the St. Elisabeth street, in the proximity of the municipal hospitals, reflected the fact that providing medical care was, from the outset, one of the deaconesses’ main concerns. 38 PBKR-SND, 21 Oct 1897, ADBR 2G 482 C 118; SPV PBK, 3:114 –15 (February 1898); Diakonissenhaus Director to Stern, 13 June 1898, ST; PBK 8: 334–45 (11 Jan 1899), AMS TN 104; NCIR 1900 and 1906. 39 PB-SGP, vol. 4, 27 June 1898, ADBR 172 AL 292. 40 The terms of the contract signed between St. Thomas and Diakonissenhaus in 1898 were typical, cf. Zäslin to Stern, 13 June 1989, ST.

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In her first year alone, Stricker calculated, the deaconess cared for 143 sick people, made 1,920 house visits to the sick, held night duty 67 times, and made 525 other visits. Stricker also provides insights into how the parishes incorporated the deaconess’s work into the rest of their ministerial efforts. Although appointed by the congregation, she was under the pastor’s direction and supervision. Stricker, for instance, arranged to meet his deaconess three times each week. She also attended the monthly meetings of the parish deaconate, whose members frequently referred cases to her. Conversely, the deaconess turned to the deaconate for assistance when faced with matters outside of her immediate competence. Furthermore, the deaconate retained responsibility for the financial dimension of the deaconess’s work; she had no budget of her own.41 By establishing deaconates and engaging the services of deaconesses, Strasbourg’s parishes hit upon two successful ways to strengthen the sense of religious community in the city while also ensuring that the church’s social and religious mission to the poor and the needy was met during this time of rapid urbanization. While these innovations represented successful adaptations of traditional approaches to urban ministry, pastors were more frustrated in their efforts to develop effective strategies for youth ministry ( Jugendfürsorge) in the big city. Prior to 1870, youth ministry was essentially limited to the pastor’s religious education instruction, since following confirmation parents and employers expected the youth to attend the pastor’s “Christenlehre” at least until they came of age. Soon after the annexation, however, pastors noted that the forces that once kept young men and women in contact with the churches after confirmation were weakening. As Inspector Knittel reflected in 1894: It is a sad but unfortunately all too true fact that soon after confirmation the city youth, especially the young men, dissolve almost right away any and all ties with the church. On the one hand, this is the result of unsatisfactory education, the lack of effective parental discipline, and the father’s poor example [i.e., his indifference]. On the other hand, it owes to the spirit of the times—materialism and the lack of restraint—which

41

Stricker, Gemeindepflege, 17–21.

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the youth encounter and by which they are won over almost as soon as they [leave the schoolyard].42

Eleven years later, Inspector Metzger (Strasbourg-Neudorf ) acknowledged other factors that led to the estrangement of the confirmed youth from the churches. The home no longer has an effective influence over children. The current employment conditions [also] make young men and women independent at an early age, with the result that they do not wish to listen to their parents anymore. . . . Teachers, factory owners, and employers in general devote a great deal of attention to giving children proper vocational training, but they neglect the religious and ethical upbringing of the younger generation almost entirely. . . . Thus the church must do all this work itself.43

Strasbourg’s clergy were quick to identify this “youth problem” and the potential dilemma it posed. Most critically, they understood that if the youth already lost the habit of going to church, it would be very difficult to bring them back at a later age. As Inspector Riff (StrasbourgRuprechtsau) pointed out in his report for 1880, “If it is supposed to get better with respect to the church, despite all that stands in the way, despite all the countervailing influences, then we must begin with the children.” But pastors also worried deeply about the moral consequences of the unstable and dangerous urban environment on the youth, which was why the parishes needed to pursue youth ministry energetically. “A proper understanding of Christian truths,” Riff asserted, “can strengthen [the youth] against temptations and aid them as they struggle against the pernicious influences of urban life.”44 Although pastors and church officials agreed about the need for vigorous youth ministry in the city, devising practices that would reach the youth—absent the support of school, family, and employer—proved difficult. In 1880, Riff offered two suggestions: gathering the youth on Sundays for special worship services and making a concerted effort to visit the confirmed youth at least once a year.45 Other pastors tried STIR 1894, 2–3, ADBR 172 AL 226. Report on the Religious Upbringing of Confirmed Youth (St. William Inspection), 29 Apr 1911, ADBR 172 AL 258. Indeed, if youth remained in the “traditional” schools (the Gymnasia and Realschulen), they continued to receive instruction in religious instruction, which was entirely absent from the curricula of the city’s vocational schools (Fortbildungsschulen). 44 SWIR 1880. 45 Ibid. 42 43

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to bring the newly-confirmed youth together once a week or once a month. But none of these tactics met with significant success. As Eugen Stern remarked in 1900, “A few girls come for a while, but not those for whom [these meetings] would be most useful. The boys show up perhaps once, but then never again.”46 Several pastors also tried to involve young adults in the religious education programs for the youngest children. Recently confirmed teenagers, thus, led small groups of children during the Kindergottesdienste (children’s services), helping with the memorization of bible verses and catechism sections. This arrangement gave older youths the opportunity to solidify their own religious knowledge, while obtaining a better understanding for the pastor’s own work. It also set a good example for the younger children. Nevertheless, only a small number of confirmed youth could participate in such activities, which meant that many of the youth whom the pastors most wanted to influence remained beyond their reach.47 After 1905, both the Reformed and the Lutheran Churches devoted considerable attention to the matter of youth ministry. It was a topic for discussion at the 1906 Synod meeting, the 1910 Superior Consistory session, a series of reports from the Lutheran religious inspectors in 1911, and several meetings of the Strasbourg Pastoral Society in 1913.48 While these deliberations underscored the need for new approaches to dealing with young men and reemphasized the importance of a healthy religious spirit within the family, few concrete proposals for action arose. Nevertheless, in 1913 the Pastoral Society successfully urged the Directory to name the youngest of Strasbourg’s pastors, Johann Klein of Old St. Peter, as youth minister for the entire city. And to assist Klein, the Society created a commission on youth ministry, chaired by August Hering. However, these promising initiatives had scarcely begun when they were interrupted by the outbreak of war in 1914.49

STIR 1900. Cf. Stricker, Gemeindepflege, 11–14; NCIR 1900 (Höpffner). 48 1907 Synod Proceedings, ADBR 147 AL P. 7 (4); AS 65 (1910); ADBR 172 AL 258; PB-SPG, vol. 5, ECAAL. 49 PB-SPG, vol. 5 (24 Feb. 1913 and 20 June 1913), ECAAL; AS 67 (1913): 204. 46 47

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Print Culture and Associational Life One of the clear signs that Strasbourg was developing into a German big city after 1870 was that it witnessed a dramatic growth in the areas of publishing and associational life. Even the infamous “dictatorship paragraph” that allowed the Superior President and the Statthalter to shut down newspapers and societies for reasons of “public order” and remained in force until 1902 failed to prevent the German club and newspaper “mania” from catching on in the Reichsland’s capital.50 Already in 1875, Strasbourg had four political newspapers, three gazettes (Anzeiger), five religious weeklies, and specialist journals for educators, businessmen, and scientists. Five years later, the number of political newspapers published in Strasbourg had risen to ten. As the number of people living in Strasbourg continued to expand rapidly, so too did the market for an ever growing number of weekly and monthly publications, whose content ranged from matters of music and literature to agriculture and fashion.51 Although research into the evolution of associational life in Strasbourg between 1870 and 1918 is much less advanced, the city’s Adreßbücher provide ample evidence of the overall upward trend. The 1884 edition listed eight-six legally recognized societies, a figure that surpassed 1,200 by 1914.52 However, the crucial role that religious communities played in this process, both in Strasbourg and elsewhere in Imperial Germany, has not been emphasized enough. In the face of the challenges presented by rapid urbanization, religious leaders—lay and clerical—responded by launching media enterprises and forming voluntary associations

50 On the dictatorship paragraph’s origin, impact, and eventual abolition, see Silverman, Reluctant Union, 38 and 87– 88, and G. Erwin Ritter, Die Elsass-Lothringische Presse im letzten Drittel des 19. Jahrhunderts (Strasbourg: Elsass-lothringischen wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft, 1934), 319 – 47; Thomas Nipperdey emphasizes the central place that voluntary associations and newspapers played in German public life after 1866, in Deutsche Geschichte, 1866 –1918, 2:168 –70 and 797– 811. 51 In addition to Ritter, Die Elsaß-Lothringische Presse, which concentrates only on political newspapers, important elements of the Reichsland’s press history appear in François Igersheim, “La presse de l’Alsace annexé (1870 –1882),” Saisons d’Alsace 100 (1988): 43–58; and “Presse,” Encyclopédie de l’Alsace (Strasbourg: Publitotal, 1984), 10:6151– 53. 52 Expressed in terms of page length, the section on voluntary associations spanned 4 pages in 1884–85, 54 pages in 1904, and 83 pages in 1914 (by the editor’s own admission, however, since the Adreßbuch had just started to enumerate the city’s associations in 1884, that listing was incomplete). Adreßbuch der Stadt Straßburg 1884 – 85, 1904, 1914.

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of their own. That is, they appropriated these characteristic forms of bourgeois sociability to promote their mission in the city. In fact, they did this so energetically that, by the turn of the century, organizations of confessional provenance made up a sizable share of the city’s total number of media concerns and voluntary associations. For instance, in 1885 almost one-fifth of the major papers (daily, weekly, or monthly) published in Strasbourg were religious or confessional. In 1914, more than ten percent of the associations and societies listed in the annual Adreßbuch had a religious or confessional character.53 Some scholars, primarily of German Catholicism, have regarded these tactics as examples of modernity used for antimodern means.54 Jonathan Sperber has rightly criticized this assessment, noting that many of the objects of associational life—politics, working conditions, even gender relations—represented entirely new areas of religious action and church involvement.55 The research from scholars promoting the “milieu approach” to German Catholicism has likewise made clear that the churches were also changed by this encounter with modernity, a fact that not all churchmen regarded positively.56 Moreover, by embracing the newspaper and the voluntary association and using them to promote broader social and cultural (i.e. religious) as opposed to narrower class interests, faith communities set an example that was widely copied by groups like the socialists.57 Thus, even if the churches hoped to use modern methods to oppose modernity, their actions ultimately had the opposite effect. Most of the elements for making greater use of the printed word to promote religiosity and confessional consciousness in Strasbourg were largely in place before the Franco-Prussian war erupted. As literacy levels

53 Press figures for 1885 are taken from the data in Das Elsaß, 4:215. Of the roughly 1,220 associations listed in the “Vereine” section (excluding mutual aid, pension, and insurance societies), 170 (14%) were religious or confessional; Adreßbuch der Stadt Straßburg (1914): 507–98. 54 Cf. Wilfried Loth, who called it “eine moderne Bewegung gegen die Moderne,” in his introduction to Deutscher Katholizismus im Umbruch zur Moderne, ed. idem, 9 –19 (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1991), 11. 55 Jonathan Sperber, “Kirchengeschichte,” 14 –16. 56 See, in particular, AKZGM, “Katholiken zwischen Tradition”; Liedhegener, Christentum und Urbanisierung; and Josef Mooser, “Das katholische Milieu in der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft. Zum Vereinswesens des Katholizismus im späten Deutschen Kaiserreich,” in Blaschke and Kuhlemann, Religion im Kaiserreich, 59 – 92. 57 Cf. Vernon Lidtke, Alternative Culture: Socialist Labor in Imperial Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985).

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rose in town and country over the course of the nineteenth century, so too did the potential for encouraging the faith via a wider range of printed materials. In addition to bibles and songbooks, Strasbourg’s publishers began to print calendars (e.g., Der Gute Bote, from 1838 on) and almanacs. By the 1840s, pastors and groups like the Evangelical Society had also revived the practice of printing and selling religious tracts. To facilitate lay access to religious literature, reading rooms and parish libraries were also set up. Then, in the 1860s, the earliest Protestant newspapers appeared. In keeping with the decade’s charged intraconfessional climate, each religious “party” developed its own organ.58 The first and most successful paper was the pietist Elsässisches Evangelisches Sonntagsblatt, which was founded in 1863 by the Calvinist pastor in Hunspach, Theodor Stricker.59 In 1868, Karl Bögner succeeded Stricker as editor and brought the direction of the weekly to Strasbourg. The liberals followed and established the French-language Progrès Religieux in 1867, with Albert Schillinger as editor. Then in 1868, Friedrich Horning founded the Kirchenblatt für Christen Augsb[urgischer] Konfession as a vehicle for orthodox Lutheran interests. At the end of the French Second Empire, however, the Protestant newspaper business was still in its infancy. The Sonntagsblatt and the Progrès Religieux were short weeklies (eight octavo pages and four quarto sides, respectively), with only modest circulation figures—at most 1,000 copies for the Sonntagsblatt and 600 for the Progrès. No circulation data are available for the Kirchenblatt, but this monthly would have had fewer readers than the Progrès.60 These early papers differed not only in theological orientation, but their general approach to being a Protestant newspaper. The Sonntagsblatt provided popular religious edification and local ecclesiastical information in roughly equal measure. The Progrès, by contrast, was more cosmopolitan and learned in tone, devoting considerable space to the politics of Alsatian and European Protestantism as well as liberal theological points of view. Horning’s Kirchenblatt was essentially a polemical broadsheet, concerned more with denominational controversy than either religious news or edification per se. 58 The first Catholic religious paper, Der Volksfreund, commenced operations in 1858. By 1870, it had the largest circulation of any Alsatian paper, with a print-run of some 10,000 copies. Jean-Pierre Kintz, “Instruction et lectures populaires à la fin du second Empire,” in L’Huillier, L’Alsace en 1870 –1871, 57–72, here, 63– 67. 59 Theodor was the father of Eduard Stricker, who arrived in Strasbourg as the Calvinist German-language pastor in 1883. 60 Grünberg, Handbuch für die Innere Mission, 210 –13.

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After 1870, these initial efforts at developing Protestant print culture continued, blossoming into a thriving media industry by the 1890s.61 This maturation was signaled above all by improvements in the number, quantity, and quality of publications. The Kirchenblatt ended up as a casualty of the 1870 siege of Strasbourg, but by late October 1870 both the Sonntagsblatt and the Progrès resumed production. In April 1871, two of Horning’s rural associates, the poet Friedrich Weyermüller and the pastor Friedrich August Ihme (Bärenthal) founded a new orthodox Lutheran paper, the weekly Friedensbote. One year later, the Liberal Protestant Union supported the establishment of a German-language weekly for moderate liberal Protestants, the Evangelisch-Protestantischer Kirchenbote, which the founding editors, Alfred Erichson (Director of the Séminaire Protestant or Stift) and Karl Tubach, oversaw until 1901. The number of major Protestant weeklies remained at four until January 1892, when the Progrès, hurt by the steady decline of its French-language readership, ceased activities.62 Improvements in newspaper and communications technology, coupled with demographic growth, helped these newspapers expand in size and circulation between 1872 and 1914. Figure 7.1 (below) presents a summary of extant circulation data for the Protestant papers and, for purposes of comparison, the most important Catholic religious paper, Der Volksfreund. Based on these figures, we can identity three major periods in the evolution of the region’s Protestant press. Between 1870 and 1885, none of the papers experienced a significant increase in circulation. Instead, they expanded the number of pages in each issue. The Sonntagsblatt went from 8 pages in 1870, to 12 in 1872, and 16 in 1876. Likewise, the Progrès and the Kirchenbote doubled in size, going from four to eight pages (quarto and octavo, respectively). The period 1885 and 1900 saw the first significant jump in circulation for both the Sonntagsblatt and the Kirchenbote, with some of the growth in the latter due to the demise of the Progrès. Then between 1900 and 1914, the Friedensbote joined its pietist and liberal peers in enjoying a final round of increased circulation before war broke out in 1914.

61 For a sense of these developments in the German Empire more generally, the standard work is Gottfried Mehnert, Evangelische Presse. Geschichte und Erscheinungsbild von der Reformation bis zur Gegenwart (Bielefeld: Luther-Verlag, 1983), 137–217. 62 PR 48 (9 Jan 1892): 1.

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In absolute terms, none of the Protestant religious papers came close to matching their closest Catholic equivalent, the Volksfreund. However, if one adds up the figures for the individual Protestant papers and then compares that data to the relative size of the Protestant and Catholic populations in Alsace, then the comparison is much more favorable for the Protestants. In 1914, the Protestant papers had a combined circulation of roughly 9,800 copies, the Volksfreund 15,000. According to the 1910 census results, there were some 408,274 Protestants in Alsace-Lorraine and 867,194 Catholics in Alsace (the Protestant papers circulated throughout the Reichsland, whereas the Volksfreund was essentially an Alsatian paper). In other words, there were almost twice as many Protestant papers as Catholic papers per capita (0.024 to 0.013).63 Although there was some lay participation in the religious press, the overwhelming majority of the papers’ editors and writers were clerics. In 1901, for instance, when the Kirchenbote first published a list of

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contributors, of the forty-two men listed, at most six were laymen.64 Under the leadership of men like Bögner, Stern, and Federlin (Sonntagsblatt), Gerold (Progrès), Erichson, Tubach, Will and Ernst (Kirchenbote), and Ihme and Simon (Friedensbote), the clerical editors strove to improve the quality of their product after 1870. All the papers experimented with design changes to improve their visual appeal and readability, indeed to make them look more like modern newspapers (Figures 7.2 and 7.3). The Sonntagsblatt and the Friedensbote replaced their simple, single column format with a more efficient two-column layout. The heavy gothic typefaces used in the 1870s and 1880s, gave way to a more readerfriendly Fraktur in the 1890s. Mastheads, too, were revised to include both typographical and pictorial elements, such as the Sonntagsblatt’s idyllic view of Strasbourg (1888) and the Friedensbote’s image of a rural village. At the turn of the century, all the papers started to include half-toned images on their pages on a regular basis, both as illustrations for articles (such as the Sonntagsblatt’s 1903 series on Holy Week) and as advertising copy, which, by the 1890s, had become a regular feature of each weekly edition. By 1910, the Reichsland’s Protestant papers had become quite similar in their outward appearances. There were also notable parallels in terms of content. With the exception of the Friedensbote, which was the only paper edited outside of Strasbourg (although it was still printed there), all of the papers gave special attention to news about the capital’s religious culture. Week in and week out, they printed the schedules for religious services in Strasbourg’s Lutheran and Reformed churches. They reported on religious lectures that were held in Strasbourg, the results of parish council and consistory elections, and local church politics. Local merchants—shoemakers and jewelers, purveyors of religious items (e.g., individual communion cups and grave markers), and religious booksellers and publishers—also advertised widely in the papers. Of course, the main reason for this focus lay in Strasbourg’s status as the center of Alsatian Protestantism. Strasbourg was home to both the highest organs of church government and roughly one-fifth of the territory’s entire Protestant population. But by printing news of what happened in Strasbourg, the papers enabled Protestants living in other parts of the Reichsland to learn about and participate vicariously in the

It was not possible to determine the status of three of the contributors as either pastor/theology professor or layman; KB 30 (1901): iv. 64

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Figure 7.2 The evolution of the conservative Protestant press in Alsace. Left: the Sonntagsblatt in 1872 (top) and 1911 (bottom). Right: the Friedensbote in 1878 (top) and 1910 (bottom).

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Figure 7.3 The evolution of the liberal Protestant press in Alsace. Upper left: the Kirchenbote in 1872. Upper right: the Kirchenbote in 1910. Lower left : the Progrès religieux in 1875.

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capital’s religious culture. In short, the newspaper helped disseminate urban religious culture into outlying towns and villages and strengthened the awareness of a territorial, even urban Protestant identity. At the same time, with their choice of what news to cover and what types of articles to print, each paper appealed to a distinct social and theological segment within the Protestant community. Although published in French, the Progrès addressed a readership that was clearly kulturprotestantisch: theologically liberal, educated, and bourgeois.65 Its news articles ranged from discussions of local and regional church matters (e.g., lauding the changes in the electoral procedure for pastors, obituaries for leading liberals like Bruch and President Kratz), to stories about ecclesiastical developments in France, Switzerland, and the rest of Germany. It also repeatedly called attention to the threats facing Protestants, not just from conservative church governments, but even more so from the Catholic Church. Pieces of a more edificatory nature appeared in the Progrès too, but these articles (e.g., on the meaning of Easter or the relationship between science and miracle) were more erudite than they were pious. This learned quality of the Progrès was also evident in the amount of space devoted in each issue to book reviews and lists of recent theological and religious literature. The Sonntagsblatt, Kirchenbote and Friedensbote were all pitched to a wider public. In tone, they were more popular and folksy, but also more devotional. The Sonntagsblatt and the Friedensbote routinely printed reflections on the Sunday sermon text (pericope); and all three normally published a list of bible readings for the week and discussed questions of religious practice and morality (e.g., proper attire for confirmation, holding religious services in the evening, stopping work on Sundays). But, like the Progrès, they also catered to specific religious audiences. The Sonntagsblatt and the Kirchenbote accomplished this goal largely by covering events that were significant for their core audience, respectively pietists and Lutheran (moderate) liberals, while downplaying (or ignoring) other developments. The Sonntagsblatt devoted considerable attention to the activities of the Inner and Urban Missions (locally and elsewhere in Germany). It reported on the visits of the prominent

65 Significantly, Karl Theodor Gerold, who took over editorial responsibility for the Progrès after Albert Schillinger’s death in 1872, was also the president of the Strasbourg chapter of the liberal Protestantenverein. The standard work on German (liberal) cultural Protestantism is now Hübinger, Kulturprotestantismus, but now see also Lepp, Protestantisch-liberaler Aufbruch, esp. 91–107 and 319 – 60.

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Protestant evangelist, Elias Schrenk, to Strasbourg, and it defended conservative positions within the Lutheran and Calvinist churches, such as the appointment of Julius Redslob to St. William in 1877.66 It published lengthy obituaries for pietist pastors like Franz Haerter and Emil Nied, but gave liberal figures only the briefest of mentions. Although the liberal and pietist papers occasionally engaged in intraconfessional sniping, only the Friedensbote did this as a matter of course. In addition to its positive program of promoting an orthodox Lutheran consciousness—publishing articles on Lutheran church history and Lutheran hymnology and reporting on the evangelical Lutheran missions—the paper’s editors repeatedly disparaged pietists and liberals. It protested the appointment of “false Lutherans” to church and faculty positions, attacked the “unionists” and their “good works” (e.g., the Inner Mission), and derided the scholarship produced by Strasbourg’s theology professors (e.g., Eduard Reuss’ edition of the Bible). These newspapers represented a wonderful way for Strasbourg’s clergy to reach out to the city’s Protestants. They promoted piety and Christian morality, while also helping individual Protestants imagine themselves as members of specific religious communities. Moreover, conditions in Strasbourg favored relatively easy access to them. Subscription costs were reasonable, particularly for middle-class households, ranging in 1878 from 3 M. for the Sonntagsblatt and 3.25 M. for the Kirchenbote to 4.20 M. for the Friedensbote and 5.20 M. for the Progrès. As a result of the reorganization of the financial backing for the Sonntagsblatt in 1896 and the Friedensbote in 1909, both papers could even reduce subscription prices, to 2 M. and 2.40 M. respectively. To provide a sense of what these sums actually represented, the city’s statistics for consumer prices in 1912 are helpful. Five marks would buy a liter of rum. A pound of butter sold for 2.89 M., and a kilogram of pork meat 1.76 M. A dozen eggs would cost a family 84 pfennig, but a kilogram loaf of white bread only 37 pf.67 Based on the circulation data presented in Figure 7.1 (above), at most, 20 percent of Strasbourg’s Protestant households subscribed to one of the religious weeklies. In all likelihood, the figure was much lower since not all of subscribers were Strasbourg residents. But the Cf. SB 26 (1889), issues for November and December, passim. Schrenk held his first “revival week” in Strasbourg in 1889, returning in 1896, 1901, 1904, 1906, and 1912. Klemm, Elias Schrenk, 626–42. 67 Statistische Monatsberichte der Stadt Strassburg 14 (1912): 20. 66

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percentage of actual readers was probably greater. If one just wanted to read the latest edition of a religious weekly, one could go to the readings rooms of the Evangelical Society, the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA), or the Liberal Protestant Union. In the suburban areas of Strasbourg, like Neudorf and Ruprechtsau, one could visit the parish library. There was also the option of going to the parish rectory, since most of the pastors received at least one of the major papers.68 Moreover, one of the clearest signs of religion’s relevance for urban culture in Strasbourg is that a significant amount of religious and ecclesiastical news could also be obtained from the city’s secular (political) press. Newspapers like the important Straßburger Post, for instance, published each week the list of church services and preachers. They also reported on the activities of major religious associations and weighed in on questions of church government (most notably, the campaign for Protestant church reform between 1907 and 1914). On holy days like Easter and Christmas, the Post even offered its own reflections on the larger meaning of the feasts. The city’s secular press (the socialist Freie Presse excepted) were, like the schools, agents of diffusive Christianity, which also helps to explain another characteristic of the Reichsland’s Protestant press activities. Namely, Protestants never really developed their own political papers. Whereas the Catholics relied heavily on the press to provide both religious and political guidance (the Volksfreund, in fact, joined the ranks of political newspapers immediately after the siege of Strasbourg in 1870), the Protestants opted to steer clear of politics. True, for a few years in the 1890s, the Sonntagsblatt paid the security deposit that allowed it to print political news. And in 1892, Fritz Hoffet, a Calvinist minister in Illzach, founded Die Heimat as a Protestant counterpart to leading Catholic papers such as Der Elsässer. Seven years later, he sold it to Georg Wolf (a young Lutheran pastor), under whose direction it became the Straßburger Zeitung. But in 1908, lack of support from the Protestant community forced Wolf also to abandon the venture.69 Three factors explain the pastors’ reticence to engage in politics via the press, an attitude that distinguished Alsatian Protestants both from Catholics and from other old-German Protestants. First, it was part of the Alsatian tradition, a pattern of behavior that emerged out of

68 69

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the Napoleonic church settlements at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Second, as a discussion at the 1901 Pastoral Conference made clear, the theological divisions within the church made it difficult for pastors to determine a common religious program for an explicitly Protestant political paper. Pastors like Strasbourg’s Karl Hackenschmidt also expressed reservations about whether the secular press was even an appropriate forum for discussing religious and ecclesiastical affairs.70 Lastly, Alsace’s Protestants seem to have felt that the local secular press already worked well as a forum for airing Protestant concerns, inasmuch as both the Catholics and the Socialists were motivated to create alternatives to it. As important as the major Alsatian Protestant weeklies were for promoting Protestant religiosity and community, they represented just one dimension of Protestant print culture after 1870. The expansion of the reading public and associational life in Strasbourg, for instance, encouraged the creation of more specialized periodical literature, such as Wilhelm Horning’s Monatsblatt für Christen Augsburgischer Confession (1866 – 97) and newspapers for the local chapters of the Gustav Adolf Society (starting in 1904) and the Protestant League (Evangelischer Bund, in 1910). Smend and Spitta’s Monatschrift für Gottesdienst und christliche Kunst also belongs in this category. Although printed in Göttingen, this pathbreaking journal for practical theology was intimately linked with Strasbourg and Alsace. Not only were its editors professors at the University of Strasbourg, but the journal itself regularly called attention to aspects of Alsatian church history and religious customs and championed Alsace’s contributions to the bottom-up creation of German national religious culture.71 The Liberal Protestant Union and the Evangelical Society also continued to produce pamphlets for distribution to the general public, such as Friedrich Riff’s satirical Ich gehe nicht in die Kirche (I don’t go to church), Karl Theodor Gerold’s Die Bibel (The Bible), and J. Schneider’s Eine Mischehe (A Mixed Marriage). This last title points to another purpose of these pamphlets—heightening an awareness of interdenominational difference—that also animated the pamphlet series

ASPC 11 (1901): 310 –11. See chapter 2. As Konrad Klek points out, the links between the journal and Strasbourg persisted even after 1919, when the journal adopted the subtitle “founded by Dr. Friedrich Spitta and Dr. Julius Smend as Professors of Protestant Theology in Strasbourg.” Klek, Erlebnis Gottesdienst, 14 –31. 70

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organized by the Protestant League, with pieces like Adolphe Schaeffer’s Warum bin ich evangelisch und nicht katholisch? (Why am I Protestant and not Catholic?).72 After 1870, liberal and orthodox Lutherans also put out their own calendars, the Elsaß-Lothringische Familien-Kalendar and the Evang.-luth. Kalendar, respectively, to compete with the pietist Gute Bote. And in 1899, the Evangelical Society opened the “Evangelische Buchhandlung,” which served simultaneously as a bookstore for religious and theological literature and as a publisher for the Society’s ever growing media activities (which survives today as the Éditions Oberlin).73 Protestantism had long considered itself a “religion of the word.” With the expansion of Protestant print culture in places like German Strasbourg after 1870, this self-characterization took on added significance. Even if they didn’t hear the word in church, Protestants could read it at home—and in an almost bewildering variety of forms. Newspapers, journals, pamphlets and calendars all proved useful means for encouraging religiosity at home across the social spectrum. By keeping Protestants up to date about religious and ecclesiastical developments at home and abroad, these publications also helped foster a sense of Protestant identity across the boundaries of class and space. But at the same time, the promotion of piety via the printed word challenged traditional notions of religious community. One the one hand, it represented a facet of what Lucian Hölscher has called the “individualization” of Protestant devotional culture.74 On the other hand, reading a religious newspaper almost made attending worship services superfluous. For there was everything one expected at church: religious readings, a sermon, announcements—even a collection (the subscription). The only thing that was absent was personal contact, which creates physical community. Yet, that too had an alternative in the “virtual” faith community one joined through the process of reading.75

Friedrich Riff, Ich gehe nicht in der Kirche, Ein Bild aus dem elsässer Volksleben (Strasbourg: F. H. Ed. Heitz, 1881); Karl Theodor Gerold, Die Bibel, (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1875); Schneider, Die Mischehe; Schaeffer, Warum bin ich evangelisch. 73 Grünberg, Handbuch, 219 –233; Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 143–45 and 150 –54. 74 Hölscher, “The Religious Divide,” 36 –39. 75 This is, of course, the same type of community formation that scholars have understood when employing the phrase “Republic of Letters” during the age of Enlightenment but also in the notion of German national identity emerging out of “Kommunikationsgesellschaften” in the late eighteenth and early to mid nineteenth centuries. On the contributions of reading to the emergence of a public sphere during the eighteenth centuries, the essential starting point is now James van Horn Melton, The Rise of the Public in Enlightenment Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 72

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The voluntary association also took on new significance as a tool for serving and promoting religious community in urban Strasbourg after 1870. By the end of the French Second Empire, the city’s religious associational life was more developed than its print culture, but the overall scope of activity remained limited. The vast majority of the legally-recognized organizations served charitable ends, from the Charitable Society of Jewish Women (Chebrath Nashrim) and the Catholic Conferences of St. Vincent de Paul, to the Blessig Foundation for orphaned Protestants, the Deaconess House, the Neuhof Institution (which provided education for poor children), and the Society of Friends of the Poor.76 Within the Protestant community, there were also a handful of associations that advanced Protestant causes, such as the Bible Society, the Pastoral Conference, and the Evangelization Society, which looked to the needs of the Protestant diaspora in eastern France. In this category belongs also the Evangelical Lutheran Society for Inner and External Mission (founded in 1848), which served the interests of the orthodox Lutheran camp, and the Evangelical Society, which Franz Haerter reorganized in 1849 as an independent affiliate of Johann Hinrich Wichern’s Inner Mission.77 Rarer were organizations whose primary purpose was to provide religious sociability outside the parish or congregation, which made the activities of the pietist Evangelical Society all the more significant. It sponsored the creation of a local chapter of the YMCA in 1852 and a group (the “Colloquium”) that gathered men regularly to discuss religious topics. In 1865 it also organized a successful public lecture series on religious and ecclesiastical topics, a tack that encouraged Strasbourg’s liberals to mount their own series at St. Nicholas in 1869.78

2001), 81–122; useful on the development of German national identity through the printed word are Otto Dann, Nation und Nationalismus in Deutschland, 1770 –1990 (Munich: C. H. Beck, 1993), 40 – 43 and 102–11; and, most recently, Celia Applegate, Bach in Berlin: Nation and Culture in Mendelssohn’s Revival of the St. Matthew Passion (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005), 81–86. 76 A list of the major confessional charities appears in Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:151–52. The most complete enumeration of the various Catholic associations (including confraternities and congregations) in Strasbourg appears in Gustav Rominger, Straßburger Katholisches Jahrbuch. 77 Erich Beyreuther, Geschichte der Diakonie und der inneren Mission in der Neuzeit, 3rd ed. (Berlin: C. Z. V. Verlag, 1983), esp. 88–187, provides a useful introduction to the first decades of Wichern’s Inner Mission movement. 78 Grünberg, Handbuch, 223–34 and 273–75.

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After the annexation, Strasbourg’s pietists continued to champion the voluntary association as the ideal vehicle for catering to various urban concerns and were directly responsible for many of the new groups that were established between 1870 and 1914. They founded city-wide and suburban men’s, women’s and youth groups (for boys and girls) to minister to the specific religious, moral, and social needs of these segments of the Protestant community. Girl’s clubs, first created in 1875, held prayer sessions and helped teach young women how to cook and sew. Men’s groups offered regular Bible studies and organized discussion evenings on practical, business, and religious topics. Pietists also played a leading role in establishing organizations to meet specific urban situations. The Ferienkolonien society, founded by businessman and Evangelical Society activist Charles Goehrs in 1881, enabled Protestant children from the lower classes to escape Strasbourg’s unhealthy climate for a three-week stay in the countryside during the summer. Associations like the Herberge zur Heimat (created in 1874) provided economical lodgings and a “positive” environment for craftsmen temporarily working in Strasbourg, while the Magdalenenstift in Neuhof (reorganized in 1877) offered a refuge for at-risk or “fallen” girls and young women. In 1890, the Evangelical Society took the step of launching a new agency—the Urban Mission—to coordinate and develop its work in Strasbourg further. The mission sponsored its own men’s and girl’s clubs. It organized Bible studies and held social events at the Protestant Club House. In founded a local chapter of the Blue Cross in 1895 to combat the evils of alcohol and its missionaries engaged themselves actively in the fight against prostitution and public immorality. But from the outset, the Urban Mission’s main goal was to minister to the growing number of unregistered Protestants in Strasbourg, particularly the old Germans. The missionaries, who were five in number by 1900 (including one woman), each had their own sector of the city to visit, and they were supposed to call above all on Protestants who were either estranged from or not yet formal members of an official congregation.79 Although many of the inner-city pastors regarded this activity with 79 Indeed, until 1919, the presidents, secretaries and treasurers were all old Germans, and all but three of the missionaries appointed to conduct house visits and lead the mission’s other projects hailed from outside of Alsace-Lorraine. Of the Directors, Gottlieb Ihme (1912–1918), alone was Alsatian, but he left Alsace in 1918 on account

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great skepticism, they appreciated the Urban Mission’s contributions in the suburbs. This was especially true for the pastors of Old St. Peter and St. Aurelia, who were responsible not only for some of the poorest and most populous areas of the Altstadt, but also the rapidly growing suburban areas of Kronenburg and Königshofen. As Karl Meyer noted in 1892, “The Urban Mission has introduced religious services in areas that technically belong to St. Aurelia: in Königshofen two religious services for children on Sunday . . . and a Bible study each Wednesday evening.”80 Intraconfessional squabbling expanded the range of Protestant associational life further. The orthodox Lutheran community, led by Friedrich and Wilhelm Horning, was least enthusiastic about the club mania. Nonetheless, in 1888 it founded the Evangelical-Lutheran Stift in Kronenburg to provide social services with an orthodox Lutheran religious character to children, young adults, and seniors. Wilhelm Horning’s successor at Young St. Peter, Paul Wagner, even founded an Evangelical-Lutheran youth and men’s club. Prior to 1880, the lone group with an explicitly liberal character was the Liberal Protestant Union, founded to protect liberal church and political interests. Up until then, as Rudolf Reuss noted in Unsere Stellung gegenüber den “evangelischen” Liebeswerken in Straßburg (“Our Position on ‘Evangelical’ Works in Strasbourg”, 1893), liberal and moderate-minded Protestants regularly donated time and money to many of the pietist initiatives. However, in the 1880s, the newer generation of pietist lay activists, many of them old-Germans, began to use these associations to attack liberal Protestantism. They eased liberal Protestants off of steering committees and prevented children from liberal congregations from joining clubs or benefiting from the services of the Versorgungsverein and Ferienkolonien. Consequently, liberals established their own groups. The Protestant Youth League emerged as an alternative to the YMCA, while the Children’s Patronage Society (Kinderpatronat für Stadt und Land) rivaled the Versorgungverein and the pietist Ferienkolonien.81 And just as the Evangelical Society constructed in 1895 a “club house” (Vereinshaus) on the Finkmattstrasse to provide space for its own and

of his pro-German sympathies. Albecker, L’Évangile dans la cité, 172–74; Grünberg, Handbuch der Inneren Mission, 93–99. 80 STIR 1892. 81 Rudolf Reuss, Unsere Stellung gegenüber den “evangelischen” Liebeswerken in Straßburg (Strasbourg: J. H. Ed. Heitz, 1893), 10 –20; Grünberg, Handbuch, 275–78.

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affiliated associations, so did the orthodox Lutherans open a Vereinssaal in 1897, and the Liberal Protestant Union its own Vereinshaus in 1898. Significant as these party quarrels were, they never dominated the expanding associational scene entirely. Protestants of all theological persuasions helped found and maintain a network of Protestant afterschool centers (Kinderhorte). The Protestant choral society movement, which established church choirs throughout the city after 1880, also ignored intraconfessional divisions. Inspired by the success of the Catholic Caritas-Verband, Strasbourg’s Protestants even established organizations to help coordinate their charitable and missionary work, such as the Confederation for Protestant Charity (Verband Evangelischer Wohltätigkeit, 1910) and the Protestant Foundation for Pastoral Care (Evangelischer Verband für kirchliche Gemeindepflege, 1913).82 Protestants also discovered that, in contrast to the French, German authorities were willing to recognize alternative forms of religious community via the voluntary association. The Baptists, Methodists, and Salvation Army all followed this course of action, as did groups like the Evangelical Community (which built its own church on the Zixplatz), the Free Evangelical-Lutheran Congregation, and the Protestant Worship Society that developed into a conservative, French-language Free Church, which opened its own worship space on the St. Martin’s bridge in 1905.83 Protestant religious associations also contributed meaningfully to the integration of Alsace-Lorraine into the German Empire, or at least into the German Protestant community. Beginning in the 1880s, local Protestant groups joined regional and national Protestant confederations. The Liberal Protestant Union affiliated itself with the Protestantenverein, the Evangelization Society reorganized itself as a chapter of the GustavAdolf Association in 1891, and in 1898 the Evangelical Society joined the Southwest German Conference for the Inner Mission. At the same time, Strasbourg-based chapters for old-German Protestant societies were set up, including Alsatian affiliates of the Protestant League (in 1888), the German Association for Protestant Church Music (1888), and the German Protestant Women’s League (Deutsche Evangelischer 82 Josef Coßman, “Das Fürsorgewesen in Elsaß-Lothringen,” in Das Reichsland ElsassLothringen, 2:242–53, here 245; STIR 1909; SG PBKR 4:275–79 (14 June 1912). On the Caritas federation in Alsace, see Rossé, Das Elsaß, 3:483–97. 83 Adreßbuch der Stadt Straßburg (1914): 454–455. Old Catholics also organized themselves as a special voluntary association, as did conservative Jews with their Jewish Religious Society (Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft) and its community center and synagogue on the Kageneckergasse.

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Frauenbund, 1906). Furthermore, in the 1890s, Strasbourg began to exert its rights as a big city and hosted the annual meetings of major Protestant organizations such as the all-German conference of the Inner Mission in 1899, the Protestant Social Conference in 1907, and the Gustav-Adolf Association in 1908.84 In terms of the overall number of organizations founded in Strasbourg between 1870 and 1914, Protestants were almost as active as their Catholic peers. They developed similar types of organizations (i.e., men’s, women’s and youth groups; charitable organizations; confessional interest associations). On occasion, they even founded some interconfessional groups, like the public morality society (Sittlichkeitsverein). Similarly, religious associations proved to be a particularly rich field for lay activity. Although pastors and priests played influential roles in many of the societies established both before and after 1870, the Inner and Urban Missions’ achievements would have been impossible without the efforts of laymen like Charles Goehrs and Alexander von der Goltz, just as the expansion of Catholic associational life in Strasbourg owed much to Peter Bachmann.85 Protestant and Catholic laywomen, too, made important contributions to their respective communities through their involvement in a wide range of religious associations. At the same time, the high degree of independence and responsibility that women, single and married, enjoyed within these groups enabled them to undermine prevailing understandings of gender roles and public-private distinctions.86 Nevertheless, there were clear differences in Protestant and Catholic approaches to associational life, which challenges the extension of the German Catholic milieu model into the realm of German Protestantism, as Dietmar von Reeken and Jochen-Christoph Kaiser have recently proposed.87 One major difference lay in the Protestants’ avoidance of

Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 19 –20. Catholics, too, promoted Strasbourg as a conference center, most notably with the 1905 Katholikentag, which went off without any interconfessional incident, as Inspector Knittel noted in STIR 1905. 85 Cf. Etienne Jung, “Charles Goehrs” and Christian Baechler, “Peter Bachmann,” in L’Alsace. Dictionnaire du monde religieux dans la France contemporaine, ed. Bernard Vogler (Paris: Beauchesne, 1987), 161–162 and 55, respectively. 86 This is, in part, what scholars have pointed to as the “feminization” of religion during the nineteenth century, as Hugh McLeod argued in his now classic “Weibliche Frömmigkeit,” 144 –52. 87 Kaiser, “Die Formierung des protestantischen Milieus. Konfessionelle Vergesellschaftung im 19. Jahrhundert,” in Blaschke and Kuhlemann, Religion im Kaiserreich, 257–289; and von Reeken, Kirchen im Umbruch, 70 –126. 84

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certain types of associations. There were, for instance, virtually no Protestant equivalents of groups like the Catholic Businessman’s Club (Argentina), the Catholic Teachers’ Associations, or the Catholic Workers’ Association. Nor, with the exception of the Protestant student societies (Verbindungen), did Strasbourg’s Protestants create organizations like the Catholic Casino or Catholic Reading Society (Leseverein), that is, confessionally-oriented social clubs. Indeed, Strasbourg’s Protestants did not try to create a specifically Protestant social environment—whether we call it a milieu or a ghetto—with their associations.88 Rather, Protestant voluntary societies functioned primarily to foster religiosity and morality in the city. Although the youth groups provided opportunities for youth to engage in music and athletics, pastors also took pains to put such activity in a religious context. In particular, it was common practice for all the Protestant clubs and associations—from the Bible Society and the YMCA to the Protestant League and Liberal Protestant Union—to hold their annual membership meetings ( Jahresfeste) as part of a regular worship service, typically on Sunday afternoon.89 A second and related point of difference was the overall pattern of Catholic and Protestant involvement in associational activities. Although many of the Protestant societies targeted the needs of the city’s poor, the membership was predominantly middle-class—pastors and their wives, professors and teachers, businessmen and pensioners, shopkeepers and civil servants—with only modest representation from the lowest ranks of Strasbourg society. Membership figures for the Reichsland period are sketchy, but in his encyclopedic Handbuch für die Innere Mission, Paul Grünberg records that in 1898 the Boy’s Clubs had 495, Girl’s Clubs 352, Men’s Clubs 730, and the Soldiers’ Mission 200 members.90 Priests and the middle class likewise played a prominent role in Catholic associational life. But the church’s intent to involve as much of Strasbourg’s Catholic population in some group or another meant that, as a whole, Catholic associations were much more socially inclusive. Not only were there special societies for Catholic workers (in addition to the Catholic 88 Josef Mooser, “Das katholische Milieu,” and Hugh McLeod, “Building the ‘Catholic Ghetto’: Catholic Organisations 1870 –1914,” in Voluntary Religion. Studies in Church History, ed. W. J. Sheils and Diana Wood (Oxford: Basil Blackwood, 1986), 411– 44. 89 Nevertheless, some pastors were uncomfortable with this practice and argued that the afternoon service was for the entire congregation, not this or that association. Friedrich and Wilhelm Horning routinely opposed requests for such services at Young St. Peter (cf. SPJ PBKR, 3:3 – 5 [22 July 1889]). 90 Grünberg, Handbuch, 55 – 63, 72–73, 100 –102.

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trade unions), which numbered some 550 members in 1908, but there even existed a special organization for Catholic workers of Italian origin—the Circolo Cattòlico Italiano.91 Finally, whereas the Catholic Church enthusiastically and determinedly embraced the voluntary association as a means to organize Alsatian Catholics, down to the end of the Reichsland period, many Protestant pastors continued to have strong reservations about engaging with this form of urban modernity.92 Some viewed it as an act of secularization (Verweltlichung). Others questioned the club’s very efficacy as a model of religious action. Because the new forms of associational activity were popularly viewed as old-German imports, quite a number of Alsatian Protestants—orthodox and liberal, Lutheran and Calvinist—preferred to stay clear of them.93 By the turn of the century, these sorts of objections had essentially disappeared. In 1910, Inspector Metzger even reported that one pastor had admitted: “I had long disliked churchly-religious associations. However, I now realize their necessity. . . . We can no longer sit pat and expect people to come and worship; they are not doing so.”94 While they conceded the assistance that religious associations could and did offer, significant objections to religious action via the association remained within the pastoral ranks. At first glance, this ill will appears to be just another aspect of the turf wars within Alsatian Protestantism. It is especially evident in both orthodox and liberal attitudes towards the Urban Mission, which pastors routinely accused of proselytizing on behalf of pietism. Inspector Höpffner complained in 1905, “It [the Urban Mission] wishes to complement the work of the church and the city’s pastoral corps. But, whether intended or not, this has not often been the case. [At least in the inner city], the Urban Mission serves the club house much more than the church. Many individuals find the association more important than the congregation.”95 Indeed, at the end of this observation, Höpffner puts his finger on the real problem: rival definitions of religious community. The pietist organizations did not just compete with the formal congregations, they devalued the

Romiger, Straßburger Katholisches Jahrbuch, passim. On Catholic developments, see Rossé, Das Elsaß, 3:471–80. 93 Cf. Speech of Philipp Appel (Barr) to the Pastoral Conference in 1876, ASPC 7 (1876): 236–37; NCIR 1877; Michaelis, Grenzlandkirche, 19. 94 SWIR 1910. 95 NCIR 1905. 91 92

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parish as a model for religious community. By contrast, liberal and orthodox Lutherans both defined religious community in terms of the parish. It alone was responsible for caring for its members. Hence, as conservative reformers like Julius Redslob and Emil Sulze in Dresden argued, if the church found itself relying on outside associations to do its work, the parish itself should be reorganized.96 In fact, as the liberal Robert Will realized, the associational wave was challenging definitions of religious community in ways that went well beyond such disputes over the role of the parish. Writing to Inspector Metzger in 1913, Will explained: “[The religious Vereinswesen] represents a leveling and exteriorization of religiosity. Instead of building up churchly community, it has created the dangerous possibility that church members will see associational activities, family socials, and theatrical productions [of the associations] as legitimate substitutes for worship ( gottesdienstliches Handeln).”97 In other words, this effort to use a characteristic element of urban modernity to shore up and compensate for weaknesses in traditional understandings of religious community ultimately promoted altogether new forms. The parish continued to exist and be relevant, because it provided the formal point of entry into the community. That is, it emerged as a specialized religious association in its own right, one that specialized in worship and liturgy, and whose symbolic power was sustained across time and space more and more by Protestant print culture and associational life as well as by other sources of diffusive religion in the big city. Protestant Parish Reform Although the series of experiments in Protestant ministerial practice after 1870 that we have just examined helped Strasbourg’s Protestant churches tend to the needs of their larger and more diverse flock, by the late 1880s it was becoming clear to both pastors and church officials that structural changes would also be necessary if the churches were to fulfill their pastoral and legal obligations. The system of personal congregations might indeed be “a perfect reflection of the Protestant principle of liberty,” as Julius Redslob averred in a speech

96 Julius Redslob “Sulze’s Vorschläge,” ASPC 9 (1891): 553–66 and (“Thesen”) ASPC 10 (1892): 64–67. 97 SWIR 1913.

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before the Pastoral Society in 1890, but they were also responsible for the mounting inefficiencies in pastoral care. More critically, the system prevented the church from ministering to the growing number of Protestants who, for one reason or another, had not registered in any congregation. This was a problem, Redslob continued, because “The Church has an obligation [as a state church] to preach the Good News not only to those who come to her on their own volition, but also to those Protestants who are indifferent or even antagonistic to her. That is, the Church must also minister to the unregistered (Nichteingepfarrten).” His suggestion: Strasbourg needed a “reasonably organized district parish system.”98 The operative word here was “reasonable.” Already in his report for 1884 – 86, Inspector Ungerer acknowledged that geographicallydefined parish districts (like the Catholics had) would make clear to which parish Strasbourg’s Protestants belonged. Likewise, pastors would know precisely whom they should visit and which children they should expect at their religious instruction. But Ungerer feared that such a rationalization of parish structures would come at the cost of personal religious choice, a particularly weighty concern given the stark theological divisions within Strasbourg’s Protestant community. Thus, like many of his colleagues, Ungerer felt that staying with the status quo remained the lesser of two evils: “Protestant liberty, even with its negative consequences for the organized church, is still to be preferred to no choice at all.”99 In 1889, the chairman of the Pastoral Society, Gustav Kopp attempted to have his colleagues take up the question of parish reform. But they were so occupied with religious education and schooling matters that no action was taken.100 Only when the Evangelical Society announced that it would launch an Urban Mission for Strasbourg in mid-1890 did the city’s Lutheran pastors make their first real attempt to address the growing parochial crisis. After a heated discussion of the Urban Mission’s merits in February,

98 PB-SPG, 4:213–14 (28 April 1890), ADBR 172 AL 292. It is worth reiterating that only Strasbourg’s Lutheran parishes faced this quandary, since there were only two Reformed congregations for the entire city and they were defined by language (German and French). I use the general word “Protestant” here, though, because many of the old-German immigrants came from a Union church background. 99 “Denn die evangelische Freiheit mit all ihren großen Schäden für organisirtes Kirchenthum ist immer noch unendlich viel besser als Zwangsschranke.” NCIR 1884–86. 100 PB-SPG, 4:200 (May 1889) ADBR 172 AL 292.

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Redslob made a series of proposals for reform that the Society amended and then approved unanimously on 30 June.101 The Society’s basic recommendation was to maintain the primacy of the personal congregation, but to institute alongside it a set of six pastoral districts, one for each of the inner-city churches.102 Each pastor in the parish would be given his own territory, where he would visit the families who did not yet belong to a personal congregation and invite them to join one within a fixed period of time. Thereafter, he had a right to consider them members of his own congregation, unless they later chose to join another personal congregation. The Pastoral Society’s proposal thus gave the Landeskirche a way to fulfill its duties towards the city’s Protestants, while also preserving the individual’s right to select one’s own minister. That fall, President Petri announced that the Directory was favorably disposed towards the Pastoral Society’s recommendations. However, before approving them, it wanted to hear from the parish councils and consistories. Their reactions were mixed. St. Aurelia and Old St. Peter endorsed the plan without reservation, whereas New Church and St. William rejected it outright. St. Nicholas, St. Thomas, and Young St. Peter were more circumspect. They approved the plan, but also raised doubts over what good it would actually do. The major concern, raised by layman and pastor alike, was that the reform threatened individual religious liberty. The St. William parish council, a hotbed of lay, liberal activism, defamed the proposal as a clerical attack on lay rights. Wilhelm Horning felt that it would subject good orthodox Lutherans to proselytization by “godless” (i.e., liberal and pietist) ministers. For its part, the St. Thomas Consistory thought that the new system might actually increase, rather than decrease its pastors’ ministerial burden. Likewise, individuals at St. Nicholas and Young St. Peter thought that

101 Thus, it received the support not only from pietist and conservative pastors (Kopp, Gustav Haerter, Hertzog; Hackenschmidt and Redslob) but also from moderates and liberals (Blind, Horst, Kromayer, Tubach and Ludwig Will). It should also be pointed out, though, that quite a few influential pastors (e.g., Gerold and Knittel from St. Nicholas, Ungerer and Leblois from New Church, and Horning from Young St. Peter) were absent. Ibid., 213–219. 102 The suburbs of Neudorf, Neuhof and Ruprechtsau were excluded from this arrangement because they already had “closed,” that is geographically-defined, parishes. Similarly, because they already served a well-defined (and shrinking) population, the French-language pastors at New Church (Leblois) and St. Nicholas (Horst) were exempted from participating in the reform project.

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the coexistence of two parochial systems in Strasbourg would create new administrative problems that would also require resolution.103 On 12 April 1892, President Petri informed the Pastoral Society that the Directory still supported the proposed initiative, and asked the pastors to fine-tune the initial proposal to address the practical concerns that had been raised.104 Now, however, the pastors got cold feet. Fearful of appearing to push the reform through against the stated objections of the parish councils and consistories, the Society announced at the particularly well-attended meeting of 9 May 1892 its willingness to participate in the creation of visitation districts, as long as the Directory took the lead and worked directly with the parishes’ official representatives (the councils and consistories) to realize the plans. It also stated for the record that whatever reforms were implemented, they were not to be interpreted as a first stage in the introduction of a full-fledged district parish system.105 Accordingly, President Petri convened a commission in June with representatives from every parish (except New Church who refused to name any) to bring the Pastoral Society’s initial plan to fruition. The commission set the boundaries for the six parish visitation districts (Figure 7.4), and charged the parish councils and consistories to subdivide their respective territories to create subdistricts for each of their own pastors. It also amended the Pastoral Society’s conception of the pastor’s responsibilities vis-à-vis the unregistered Protestants in his subdistrict. Whereas Redslob made the district pastor the de jure minister for those Protestants, according to the final commission proposal, approved by the Directory on 23 November 1894, the district pastor would be charged only with their temporary care. They became his parishioners only if they formally joined his congregation. To promote public awareness of the new arrangements and local church customs more generally, the Pastoral Society also resolved on 25 June 1894 to print a Protestant directory (Wegweiser) for the city. It would contain a complete list of pastors, rectories, and normal hours for worship, as well as the regulations regarding congregational membership and a table indicating which pastor was responsible for which sections of the city. Thanks to the energies of Karl Hackenschmidt, this directory was

103 104 105

AS 45 (1890): 121–22; ADBR 172 AL 143. Petri to Kopp, 12 April 1892, ADBR 172 AL 143. PB-SPG, vol. 4, ADBR 172 AL 292.

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rapidly assembled and ready for publication by the end of November 1894.106 For all the work invested in this effort at reorganizing Strasbourg’s Lutheran parish system, it quickly foundered. Initially several pastors—including Meyer, Redslob, and Paul Grünberg—visited their new districts and made special reports to the Directory and the religious inspectors on their activities. But many others did not, either because they were opposed to the system in the first place (e.g., Horning), or because they simply didn’t have enough time for more work on account of their large congregations (Stern, St. Thomas) or administrative duties (Inspectors Ungerer and Knittel).107 In 1896, Redslob conceded that the new system had not noticeably changed the situation: “People who decided not to join a congregation when they moved into Strasbourg were not readily taking up our suggestion to do so later.”108 Two years later, Inspector Knittel reported that the entire program was dead. Since they saw that district visits were costing them time and energy and bringing little actual gain, he observed, pastors stopped making them and devoted their full attention to their personal congregations.109 Ultimately, the Pastoral Society’s initiative failed for two reasons. On the one hand, because of the intensity of intraconfessional differences in Strasbourg, pastors and laity across the theological spectrum wanted to safeguard individual freedom of conscience. This led them to oppose vigorously any change that might undermine the personal congregation’s status. On the other hand, while the new system aimed to ameliorate the situation with unregistered Protestants, it ignored the other systemic problems entirely. Indeed, far from promoting a more efficient use of pastoral resources to minister to the city, it added to the existing pastoral workload and exacerbated further existing inequities. This consideration was itself reason enough for pastors to keep their distance from the reform experiment. Nevertheless, since the personal congregation system’s shortcomings not only persisted, but got worse with time, the drive to introduce some form of district parish system to Strasbourg continued to gain ground. Just as the Pastoral Society took its first stab at the problem,

106 PB-SPG, vol. 4 (25 June, 2 October and 26 November 1894), ADBR 172 AL 292. The directory appeared as the Kirchlicher Wegweiser in Straßburg. 107 ADBR 172 AL 143. 108 SWIR 1896. 109 STIR 1897 (written in early 1898).

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Julius Redslob made a more energetic pitch for district parishes at the 1891 Alsatian Pastoral Conference. Not only would it facilitate a more efficient ministry in the urban environment, he contended, but it would reorient the relationship between pastor and congregation into a more useful configuration. Urban pastors would be appointed to serve an existing parish, instead of having to gather a congregation after their installation. This too, he observed, would strengthen the sense of religious community in the city and foster higher levels of lay involvement in all aspects of the community’s life.110 Pastors and laity involved with the Urban Mission, such as Gustav Haerter and Paul Grünberg, also endorsed Redslob’s views on district parishes, largely because it would simplify their own work in the city and promote a more harmonious collaboration with the official state Protestant churches.111 At the beginning of the twentieth century, even moderate and liberal clergy in Strasbourg thought that it was time for district parishes. Continued demographic growth, particularly the development of the Neustadt, meant that it was becoming harder and harder for pastors to keep track of their own parishioners, much less reach out to newcomers. Consequently, other aspects of their ministry—most notably religious education and cure of souls—suffered. Robert Will noted in a report to Inspector Metzger, “In the last few days, I have made on average five or six visits per day to sick parishioners, which has taken me to every corner of the city. Over the course of the year, this comes at the expense of my regular house visits. It would therefore be desirable to introduce a limited [district] parish system that would facilitate this work. Indeed, because of this heavy workload, no one has time, thank goodness, to chase after another pastor’s parishioners or interfere with his ministry.” These remarks reveal a critical change in clerical opinion, namely that liberal pastors—still the largest single bloc in the pastoral corps—were realizing that their fears of intraconfessional proselytization paled in significance to the larger ministerial quandary. Thus, as Metzger informed the Directory in 1903, “an entire number of Strasbourg pastors now believes that it is time to implement a system of district parishes as in Dresden, Karlsruhe, and Frankfurt.”112

110 111 112

Redslob, “Sulze’s Vorschläge.” See Grünberg, “Parochialverhältnisse.” SWIR 1903.

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Inspector Knittel corroborated Metzger’s conclusions about growing support in Strasbourg for “the way that Catholics, as well as [Protestants] in an increasing number of German cities, organized their churches.” For Knittel, the main benefit of district parishes lay in their potential to distribute the workload more equitably among pastors. He cited, for instance, the case of St. Thomas, where one pastor (Stern) had threefourths of all parishioners in his congregation while the younger two (Hering and Ernst), despite their best efforts, had little to do. A true, geographically-based parish system, Knittel asserted, would make such uneven distributions of pastoral responsibility rare. Moreover, districtbased parishes would help reinvigorate the sense of parish community. As it stood, the pastor noted, with parishioners living in different parts of the city and seeing each other in the church for only a few hours over the course of the year, they never really developed the sense of solidarity required for an active, dynamic community. By contrast, the district parish could build a sense of religious community on the back of existing social relations within the neighborhood.113 Although in agreement that something should be done, none of Strasbourg’s pastors was willing to venture forward. Neither were the parish councils and consistories so inclined, lacking both an interest to tamper with the long-standing tradition of personal congregations and, equally important, sufficient understanding for how urbanization had affected the pastor’s duties. In 1907, the Directory’s efforts to establish a new pastoral position for Strasbourg-Neudorf, however, forced the pastoral corps to overcome its inertia. As was customary, the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine asked the Directory to demonstrate the need for the new position by providing statistics on the number of parishioners and church rites performed in Strasbourg’s parishes. In the course of this inquiry, the Directory discovered that now roughly 10,000 Protestants did not belong to any Lutheran congregation. Hence, on 21 May 1907, President Curtius wrote the Pastoral Society and charged it to develop a solution to this “grave situation.”114 After a lengthy and often heated discussion, the Pastoral Society resolved on 24 June 1907 to proceed as the Directory wished. Between June and November, a seven-person committee that included pastors STIR 1902. Ferdinand Ménégoz, Personal- oder Quartier-Gemeinde. Referat im Auftrag der Strassburger Pastoralgesellschaft (Strasbourg: Buchhandlung der Evangelischen Gesellschaft, 1908), 3. 113

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of every theological persuasion (liberals: Gerold, Robert Will, Ernst, Schweitzer; pietists: Matter and Grünberg; conservatives: Hackenschmidt) developed a proposal that the Society took up at its meeting of 25 November. Breaking with tradition, the committee advocated making the district parish, rather than the personal congregation, the base of parochial organization in Strasbourg. Accordingly the city, intra and extra muros, would be divided into as many districts as there were official pastors, and each parish would be responsible for as many districts as it had pastors (thus four districts for New Church; two for St. Aurelia). All the Protestants living in the district would belong to the district pastor’s congregation, so long as they had not officially left the church or did not belong to another congregation (e.g., were under the care of a military or jail chaplain or were Calvinist). Under this plan, Lutherans could still choose their own personal minister, but they would now have to withdraw formally from the district congregation and then register in the new one.115 Once more, the proposal generated lively exchanges among the pastors. Most of those present at the 25 November meeting agreed that Strasbourg’s parish system should indeed be based around the district parish and not the personal congregation. The younger clergy warmly supported the change, as did a few of the older pastors. Matter, Grünberg, and Ernst continued to advocate the propositions they had pushed within the committee. Karl Gerold, though sympathetic to colleagues who—like himself—had invested considerable time and energy into building up and maintaining their personal congregations, emphasized that they had to look to the needs of the Protestant community and not just themselves. “The personal congregation system,” he asserted, “had many disadvantages and could no longer be maintained in good conscience.” Most of the dissenting arguments came from the older pastors. Karl Hackenschmidt, for instance, lamented that the proposed reorganization would destroy the existing personal congregations in a single stroke. He also feared that the new system would actually create new difficulties. Not only would it heighten the differences in parish size, as members of a pastor’s former personal congregation opted to remain with him, but it would create divided loyalties as the pastor strove to serve both his loyal parishioners and the new ones of his district. Inspector

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Höpffner seconded Hackenschmidt’s concern for the fate of the existing personal congregations, and for that reason called on the Society to involve the laity in their deliberations. The final speaker of the day, Grünberg, conceded Höpffner’s point; the Society lacked the authority to implement a new ecclesiastical ordinance on its own. But no plan could proceed unless it first had the clergy’s backing, which was why the Directory asked the Pastoral Society to devise such a proposal in the first place. Finally, at its meeting of 3 February 1908, the Society was ready to vote. Thirteen of the twenty-one inner city pastors approved the resolution that asked the Directory to enact this new “ecclesiastical ordinance” for Strasbourg. Two opposed it (Horning and Knittel) and two abstained (Hackenschmidt and Eichler).116 It was a momentous occasion, and not just because the clergy agreed to dismantle the personal congregation system. It also showed pastors from the various theological positions collaborating to promote reforms that would benefit not just one specific theological faction, but the entire Church. Liberal, conservative, and pietist pastors were all satisfied with the arrangements for preserving individual choice. That is, personal congregations would endure, but as adjuncts to the district congregation. They also admitted, with some dismay, that under existing urban conditions, most Protestants would not even recognize the distinctions, which were so important to the pastors. In the grand scheme of things, it was more important to make sure that all Protestants belonged to a congregation that required the introduction of district parishes. As he indicated in a memorandum to his colleagues dated 20 February 1908, President Curtius was quite pleased with the Pastoral Society’s project. He hoped to amend slightly some of its provisions, but his main concern was deciding how to institute the ordinance as formal church policy.117 But even as Curtius sought the opinions of his colleagues, a firestorm broke out over the Pastoral Society’s actions.

116 PB-SPG, 5:73–76 (3 February 1908), ECAAL. Because the minutes never provided a final, numerical vote, it is impossible to determine precisely how the remaining four pastors voted. Bieler (French St. Nicholas) never spoke at the meeting; he was also unaffected by the plan’s provisions. Stern likely abstained or voted no, since he had spoken critically of the plan in the previous session. Herrmann had just been appointed to St. William, so he might have abstained, but, as a younger pastor, may ultimately have voted yes. Hering had expressed doubts about certain parts of the reform but, like Inspector Höpffner, he may well have decided to endorse the draft ordinance. 117 ADBR 172 AL 143.

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First the Straßburger Post, then the Sonntagsblatt published an account of the proposed ordinance, with the latter observing, “Now the Directory must decide if the draft will take effect, but almost certainly the consistories and parish councils will also have to be heard given the incredible significance of the change.”118 Piqued by this display of clerical autonomy, forty-four lay members of the inner-city parish councils and consistories met on 20 February to draft a response to the Pastoral Society’s proposal. In a resolution that appeared in both the Sonntagsblatt and the Kirchenbote, the elders attacked the process by which the pastors—and the Directory—aimed to secure the reform and branded it a fundamental violation of the laity’s rights within the Alsatian Lutheran Church. Furthermore, they argued that the process for selecting one’s own minister was so cumbersome that the guarantee of Protestant liberty would exist in name only. Hence, the elders called on the Directory to table the Pastoral Society’s proposal and keep the existing personal congregation system.119 The laity’s pre-emptive strike against the new ecclesiastical ordinance effectively doomed the entire endeavor. The Sonntagblatt’s editor, Friedrich Federlin (Ruprechtsau), tried to explain to his readers that the Pastoral Society had only done what the Directory had requested. The Pastoral Society, too, published a defense of its actions in March, and even invited the laity to a meeting on 18 March to clear up any and all misunderstandings. The meeting occurred, but the elders boycotted it and informed the Society that they were opposed to any change in the existing parochial system.120 Meanwhile, the elders’ resistance forced Curtius to rethink the entire strategy for introducing district parishes into Strasbourg. Ultimately, any Directorial decision would require the approval of the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine, if not the Superior Consistory as well. In neither case would consent be forthcoming as long as significant majorities in every inner-city parish council were against reform. The solution lay in outflanking the urban opposition, but it remained to be seen how this could be brought about in the near future.

SP 153 (9 Feb 1908); SB 45/7 (16 Feb. 1908): 54 – 55. SB 45/8 (23 Feb 1908): 68 – 69; KB 37/9 (28 Feb 1908): 70. 120 SB 45/8 (23 Feb 1908): 69; PB-SPG, 5:77–85, ECAAL; a short summary of the events of February and March, as well as the speech that Ménégoz delivered on 19 March appears in Ménégoz, Personal- oder Quartier-Gemeinden. 118 119

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The drive to reform Strasbourg’s Lutheran parish system, just like the adaptations of traditional ministerial practices and the extension of religious associational life and print culture, was born from the need for the city’s Protestant communities to adapt to the rapidly changing urban environment. Urbanization after 1870 significantly increased the faith communities’ ministerial obligations and revealed the inadequacies in the existing institutional frameworks for meeting the new demands. Modern times required modern approaches to community care, and over the course of the Reichsland period, Strasbourg’s Protestant leaders both modernized their methods and took advantage of modern conditions to pursue their mission in the city. While demographic growth increased the overall size of congregations, it was precisely this expanded Protestant population that permitted the utilization of more individualized and differentiated means of community care, such as the voluntary association and the newspaper. Similarly, the need to use existing parish resources—financial and personal—more effectively, promoted a Weberian rationalization of community services, as evidenced by the improved division of lay and clerical labor in the traditional areas of Gemeindepflege and, more dramatically, by the efforts to reorganize the city’s Lutheran parishes. This embrace of modernity, however, did not leave the churches unaffected. The proliferation of associations and media provided ways of participating in religious community that did not require regular attendance at worship services. The need to deal with the growing problem of unregistered Protestants also persuaded Lutheran leaders to break with a century of tradition and propose making district parishes the foundation of Strasbourg’s parochial system. This latter development is especially significant, because it points to sentiments that were gaining ground not only in Strasbourg, but in other parts of Alsace-Lorraine. Namely, in both the Lutheran and Reformed churches, outmoded institutional structures stood in the way of a more thoroughgoing revitalization of religious life. Church reform itself would not bring about religious renewal, but religious renewal would be impossible without serious church reform. As this reform discourse unfolded after 1905, Curtius found his opportunity to return to the question of Strasbourg’s parochial system. The key to success, he discovered, lay not in reorganizing Strasbourg alone, but rather, modernizing the entire Lutheran Church of Alsace-Lorraine.

CHAPTER EIGHT

URBANIZING ALSATIAN PROTESTANTISM Although the efforts to reorganize Strasbourg’s parochial system after 1890 were ultimately unsuccessful, the attempt itself was emblematic of the spirit of the times, and not merely within church circles. Throughout the Wilhelmine era, bourgeois reformers took a decidedly structural approach to their visions for social, political, and cultural change. Men like Friedrich Naumann and Werner Sombart argued that existing institutional arrangements, most notably in political life, prevented the development of effective strategies for dealing with contemporary problems like urban poverty and workplace conditions. They also regarded institutional reform as an essential precondition to effective change. Whether this occurred via constitutional reorganization or, as in the case of the antipolitical reformers that Kevin Repp has recently studied, via the creation of think tanks and new bureaucratic agencies, the premise was the same: even if restructuring something like poor relief would not solve the problem of urban poverty, keeping matters as they were would certainly not improve the current state of affairs.1 Similar sentiments also existed within the world of German Protestantism, where the very institution of the church seemed to be increasingly anachronistic. Pastors like Emil Sulze, of Dresden, argued that only by reshaping their public image and removing the structural barriers to involvement in their activities could the churches hope to regain some of their lost attractiveness (especially on the part of men) and carry out their mission effectively.2 After 1890, the notion that church reform would be desirable for pragmatic reasons also caught on in

1 The essential starting point for discussions of bourgeois reform movements in the late Second Empire is now Kevin Repp, Reformers, Critics and the Paths of German Modernity: Anti-Politics and the Search for Alternatives, 1890 –1914 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000), esp. chapter 5, “The Wilhelmine Reform Milieu.” On the narrower question of political reform, David Blackbourn and Geoff Eley, The Peculiarities of German History: Bourgeois Society and Politics in Nineteenth-Century Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984), remains valuable. 2 Emil Sulze, Die evangelische Gemeinde (Gotha, 1891); for a discussion of Sulze’s proposals from the standpoint of liberal Protestantism, see Hübinger, Kulturprotestantismus, 219 –33.

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Alsace-Lorraine. Because of the Fabri Affair (see Chapter Two), many church leaders were still reluctant to pursue changes that would require amending extant church law. The passage of the synodal legislation for the Reformed Church in 1905 effectively removed this obstacle, and from 1906 until the outbreak of the First World War, first the Lutheran, and then the Reformed Church devoted considerable energy to the task of devising churches for modern times. At no time during the reform discussions did either Protestant church lose sight of the practical religious concerns that launched the entire process. The lower instances of the church organization, the parishes and consistories, would be defined as bodies with religious and not just administrative responsibilities. The churches sought to remove many of the obstacles to formal participation in church life, for instance, by allowing younger adults, resident aliens, and even women to vote and be elected to parish boards. Both churches also used the reform campaign to address specific problems or inequities that had cropped up over the years. The Reformed Church, for example, proposed that the Synod be granted the same rights as the Lutheran Superior Consistory to approve materials for religious education in the public schools. The reform proposals generated after 1906 strove to modernize the two churches, above all by urbanizing them. At the most basic level, this meant including provisions that spoke to the particular needs of the territory’s cities, Strasbourg in particular. The Lutherans made the geographically-defined, district parish the norm for the entire church and created a new “Strasbourg Church Commission,” which had the authority to act on behalf of all the city’s parishes. The suggestion that women should have the right to vote and be elected was largely driven by the urban parishes’ need to involve all active parishioners in formal church life. The very spirit of the reform plans was also strikingly urbane. The Churches called their proposals “church constitutions.” They infused them with liberal principles such as due process and governmental transparency. In addition, the reforms strove to remake the church along the lines of a voluntary society, a move that required (in the churches’ eyes) a fundamental rethinking of the relationship between church and state. The progressive, even daring elements of the campaign for Protestant church reform generated considerable controversy in Alsace-Lorraine, and not just within church circles. It attracted the attention of church officials and politicians in other parts of the Empire, in no small part because these discussions unfolded at the same time as negotiations for

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granting the Reichsland a constitution, that is, a more regular position in the Empire. Indeed, just like the beginning of the Reichsland period, so too at the end were government officials intimately concerned about the political ramifications of ecclesiastical change, which is another indication that the late nineteenth-century state was hardly as secular as historians have contended. Hence, while the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine endorsed many of the churches’ proposals, it steadfastly refused to alter the fundamental nature of territorial church law. Nor would it accept such politically charged reforms as enfranchising women or certain groups of non-residents. Ultimately, the fact that the Ministry took responsibility for legislating church reform proved fatal. Just as the bills were being finalized in early 1914, the Reichsland’s government was forced by the Zabern Affair to resign. When war broke out that August, the church reform proposals emerged as one of its many casualties. The Pastoral Conference and the Quest for Church Reform In contrast to the late 1860s and early 1870s, it was not a flare-up in church-state relations but instead specific practical concerns within the Protestant community that revived public discussion of ecclesiastical reform in the 1890s. As we observed in Chapter Four, the Reformed consistories wished to find a more effective way to develop church policy and represent the Reformed community’s interests vis-à-vis the state and other public institutions (e.g., the Lutheran Church and the public schools). Their main priority was the convocation of a territorial synod, essentially as foreseen by the Organic Articles. At the same time, though, several pastors and even a few laymen were beginning to argue that the current organization of the Protestant churches, particularly at the parish level, was partially to blame for public disinterest in matters religious. To reinvigorate the local religious community and, above all, win men back to the church, change was in order. The Reichsland’s Calvinists participated in this second strand of reform discourse but, because they were preoccupied with the synodal question, the debates over how to realize such modifications took the situation within the majoritarian Lutheran Church as their primary frame of reference. Not surprisingly, it was one of Strasbourg’s pastors, Julius Redslob, who first endeavored to make a case for church reform as an instrument of more general religious renewal. Called to discuss Emil Sulze’s

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ideas about Protestant community organization at the 1891 Pastoral Conference, Redslob concluded with the suggestion that the Reichsland’s churches also embrace Sulze’s proposals. He called for the establishment of district parishes. He argued that the parish should be reorganized and made the center for all local associational and charitable activity. He also contended that the best way to revive a sense of community, particularly among Protestant men, was to open up new avenues for lay involvement in parish life. For instance, parishes could set up teams of Christian-minded heads of household (Hausväterverbände) to assist each pastor with the cure of souls and ministry to the community.3 All in all, Redslob’s proposals were conservative. They did not require legislative action for implementation, which respected the post-1870 tradition of regarding extant church law as untouchable. They also defined the basic problems in a manner that was consistent with late nineteenth-century conservative Protestant theology. To improve religious conditions, first, the parish needed to the restored as the elemental expression of local religious community. Second, men needed to be led back to the church, a move that would necessitate, in part, strengthening the position of “good Christian” men within the community.4 Although Redslob’s remarks produced no immediate groundswell in favor of change, his insistence that one of the keys to a strong, vibrant church was a properly organized local community prompted many of his colleagues to think. As they compared the actual state of their parishes against their ideals of what a parish should be and do, these pastors came to realize that reform was in order. Furthermore, they discovered that to accomplish some of these reforms, existing church statutes might have to be amended. This was precisely the point that Karl Hackenschmidt, a Lutheran minister at Strasbourg’s Young St. Peter advanced in his own presentation to the 1893 Pastoral Conference. It was appropriately entitled: “What can be Won for the Renewal of our Protestant Church by Means

3 Redslob, “Sulze’s Vorschläge über die Organisation der evangelischen Gemeinden,” ASPC 9 (1891): 553 – 66. 4 On the conservative bias in the discussion of Protestant community reform, see Hübinger, Kulturprotestantismus, 221–28, as well as Ursula Baumann, Protestantismus und Frauenemanzipation in Deutschland 1850 bis 1920 (Frankfurt am Main: Campus, 1992), 193–94.

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of Constitutional Reform?”5 Hackenschmidt agreed with Redslob about the basic need for religious renewal. But he contended that it was impossible until the institutional dead wood was cleared away. The main problem, Hackenschmidt contended, was that while Protestant (and specifically Lutheran) ecclesiology gave the church specific religious and “Godly” tasks, these attributes were largely absent from the institutions of the Reichsland’s Protestant churches. Parish councils, for instance, were only juridical-administrative bodies. They had no specific religious responsibilities, nor could they make binding decisions. Therein lay the explanation for the laity’s disinterest in parish affairs and, to a large degree, the election of good administrators instead of good Protestants to the parish councils. In short, Hackenschmidt recommended reforming the Lutheran church so that it looked and acted more like a religious and spiritual organization, and less like a bureaucratic office. At the parish level, he advocated charging the parish council formally to encourage religious, spiritual, and charitable activity within the community. He proposed expanding the council’s membership to produce a greater number of parishioners to help tend to the parish community’s needs. Furthermore, Hackenschmidt urged electing parish councilors on the basis of their piety and devotion to the parish, rather than just their social position. By targeting other levels of church government for modification, Hackenschmidt expanded the compass of ecclesiastical reform. He proposed transforming the inspectoral assemblies into inspectoral synods, in which clergy and laity could meet regularly both to discuss theological and practical issues facing the church and to advise the Superior Consistory and Directory on specific policy matters. He recommended abolishing the consistories, because they had already lost most of their duties and needlessly checked parochial autonomy. Hackenschmidt also advised modifying the religious inspector’s duties so that he functioned more as a representative of and mentor to the pastors in his district (and less as the Directory’s local agent). Finally, the pastor from Young St. Peter advocated altering the Superior Consistory’s organization and purview. Not only should pastors have their own representatives there, but the body—which would be renamed the Lutheran Landessynod— 5 Hackenschmidt, “Was kann auf dem Weg von Verfassungsreformen für die Erneuerung unserer evangelischen Kirche gewonnen werden,” ASPC 10 (1893): 109 – 43.

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should be competent to act on any matter that the church’s spiritual well-being ( geistliche Wohl ) required.6 As Hackenschmidt had hoped, his ideas provoked considerable debate at the Pastoral Conference session. Many of the pastors asserted that Hackenschmidt portrayed the current state of affairs too darkly. Others doubted that the reforms would have the desired effect. “The Zeitgeist and not the constitution is responsible for the church’s current difficulties,” Inspector Knittel professed. [In any event,] it is primarily up to the pastor to bring more life into the parish, whether through his personal actions, his sermons or his care of souls. Expanding the parish council will not make a difference.” And although there was support for several specific recommendations—i.e. giving the pastors representation in the Superior Consistory and allowing the inspectoral assemblies to become deliberative bodies—other modifications were regarded with greater circumspection. Several members questioned Hackenschmidt’s efforts to remake the Alsatian Lutheran church in the image of an oldGerman state church, since it certainly could not be maintained that the old-German churches were, because of their organization, more religious. Rural pastors opposed the dissolution of the consistories. Moreover, quite a few members feared that redefining the office of the religious inspector following Hackenschmidt would only exacerbate internal theological divisions and foster discord rather than harmony.7 When the 1893 Pastoral Conference ended, it seemed likely that the talk of church reform would soon die out. Not only did Redslob and Hackenschmidt fail to convince their peers of a pressing need for change, their association with the Lutheran church’s conservative wing made the very call for reorganization seem to be motivated by churchpolitical considerations. Five years later, however, the issue made its way back onto the Conference’s agenda, with notably different results. Triggering this shift was a book that Otto Mühlhäuser published in 1897 to commemorate the dedication of a new Lutheran church in Zabern: Vergangenheit, Gegenwart u. Zukunft der protestantischen Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession in Elsaß-Lothringen (The Past, Present and Future of the

According to the Decree-Law of 1852, the only clergy with seats in the Superior Consistory were the religious inspectors, but they were chosen by the government, not the pastoral corps. 7 Discussion of Hackenschmidt’s talk, ASPC 10 (1893): 94–107, here 94. 6

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Lutheran Church in Alsace-Lorraine).8 Indeed, by the time the Pastoral Conference met in June 1898, the book had been widely discussed in the Reichsland’s newspapers, in parish council meetings, and even by some of the men’s clubs.9 Moreover, much of this attention was highly favorable to Mühlhäuser’s point of view. Emil Burger, a pastor from the town of the Gerstheim, explained some of the reasons for this positive reaction in his own presentation on Mühlhäuser’s book at the 1898 Pastoral Conference: [A main] advantage with Mühlhäuser’s work is that, as a jurist, he is free from dogmatic bias and pursues no church-political goals. He has revealed our church constitution’s shortcomings from a legal standpoint, not just for the sake of criticism, but out of love for the church and [a desire] to promote religious life within it. [Although an old-German], his plans do not introduce radical changes nor do they introduce foreign ecclesiastical practices. Instead, he seeks only to improve what we already have, filling the holes that the laws of 1802 and 1852 left open.

Mühlhäuser’s intervention pushed the discussion of Protestant church reform in new directions. At the same time that Mühlhäuser removed the “orthodox” taint from the idea of reorganizing the church, he interjected a lay perspective into conversations that had until then been almost exclusively clerical. The jurist also introduced a variety of new ideas about what kinds of reforms the Lutheran church should consider. Like Hackenschmidt, he felt that the size of the parish council should be increased, and that it should be explicitly commissioned to promote religious life within the parish community. But he also suggested that the size of the parish council should vary in accordance with the size of the congregation. Similarly, he concurred with Hackenschmidt’s assessment that the current organization of the consistory and inspection (the “intermediary organs” of church government) was defective. But instead of eliminating the consistory, Mühlhäuser advocated reorganizing the existing parishes into fifteen new consistories, giving the consistory president (a pastor) new administrative functions, and abolishing the inspections. This tack would also result in an increased clerical representation in the Superior Consistory. O[tto] F. M. Mühlhäuser, Vergangenheit, Gegenwart u. Zukunft der protestantischen Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession in Elsaß-Lothringen (Zabern: A Fuchs, 1897). 9 See the reports in SB 35/7 (13 Feb 1898): 54–55; KB 27/11 (12 Mar 1898): 89 –90. 8

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Two last propositions deserve mention here. First, and most radically, Mühlhäuser counseled making the Superior Consistory more independent from the Directory by making the government-appointed members of the latter body non-voting members of the former. Second, and here Mühlhäuser’s judicial bent is especially apparent, he asserted that the entire set of church laws needed a thorough pruning. In place of the existing welter of statutes and ordinances, he advised, there should be a fundamental law (a constitution or Kirchenverfassung) that contained only the principles of the church’s organization and then a separate ordinance (Kirchenordnung), in which the specific details of that organization, matters like the actual number of consistories and election practices, were spelled out.10 One of the clearest indications that Mühlhäuser had profoundly altered the pastors’ perspective on the question of church reform was that the Pastoral Conference’s leadership invited Burger, a liberal Lutheran, to lead the discussion on the jurist’s book at the 1898 session. Burger endorsed Mühlhäuser’s argument, although he doubted that everything should be resolved precisely as Mühlhäuser proposed. He also exhorted his colleagues to seize the initiative. It was up to the pastors to act, he argued, because they could not expect the Directory or the government to introduce changes that would diminish their authority. Nor could they expect the laity to weigh in on their own. No, the pastors would also have to convince the laity of the practical advantage of reorganizing the church. Burger moved that the Pastoral Conference appoint a commission to study Mühlhäuser’s (and Hackenschmidt’s) reform proposals and make appropriate recommendations to the Conference at the next session. Tellingly, the Conference adopted this resolution and appointed a nine-member panel to carry out its task under the leadership of the Conference’s incoming president, Karl Theodor Gerold.11

10 At the time, such details were fixed by statute. Because altering them in any form required legislative action, extant church law made it difficult for the Protestant churches (the Reformed Church faced a similar situation) to adapt to changing demographic, social, and religious conditions. 11 Emil Burger, “Mühlhäuser’s Vorschläge betreffend eine Reform der Verfassung unserer Kirche und unsere Stellung zu denselben,” ASPC 11 (1898): 112–29. The committee consisted of seven Conference members (Gerold, Burger, Hackenschmidt, Professor Nowack, Edmund Unsinger [Dorlisheim], Georg Wolf [Winzenheim], and, curiously, Synod President Piepenbring [Strasbourg]), plus two legal specialists from Strasbourg who also sat on the Superior Consistory: Otto Mayer (a university law

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For the next two years, the Conference devoted considerable time to the question of Lutheran church reform. In 1899, the constitutional committee presented its first set of proposals to the body. In them we see the committee’s efforts to marry Mühlhäuser’s institutional insights with Hackenschmidt’s religious goals, while also addressing other wishes expressed in church circles. The committee, for instance, recommended that the doubled parish council, which was created when a pastoral nomination was pending, become a standing institution. It also proposed granting the parish greater autonomy, allowing it to run local church affairs and decide minor financial and administrative matters on its own authority. With respect to the Superior Consistory and Directory, the committee modified only slightly the previous recommendations. It suggested naming two pastors to the Superior Consistory from each consistory and, consequently, increasing the number of lay delegates from each consistory to three in order to retain the laity’s majority there. It then seconded Mühlhäuser’s ideas about the relationship between the Directory and the Superior Consistory and proposed that the Directory president neither chair nor vote in the Superior Consistory. The committee advocated its own solution to the problem of “intermediary” bodies. Rather than creating new consistories from scratch as replacements for the inspections, it advised grouping together three or four existing consistories, with the new unit retaining the title of consistory. Not only would this reduce the number of consistories (and keep Superior Consistory membership down), but it would permit the creation of a single consistory for Strasbourg, a long-standing desire of the city’s clergy. However, in contrast to the present system, lay representation in the consistory would be proportional to parish size. The committee’s members also sought to enhance the significance of this new intermediary body. It would approve (instead of just express an opinion on) certain resolutions passed by parish councils. It would foster and coordinate “inner mission” activity within its territory. It would also play a larger role in church government and gain the right to propose items for the Superior Consistory’s agenda, discuss all matters on that agenda prior to the Superior Consistory’s convocation, and deliberate on the religious inspector’s (that is, the consistory president’s) annual report before it was sent to the Directory.

professor), and Gustav Adolf Riff, a lawyer and notary. Georg Wolf, Die Reform der Verfassung der Kirche Augsburger Konfession (Strasbourg: Schultz, 1907), 12–13.

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Debate on the committee’s report, delivered by Edmund Unsinger (Dunzenheim), was brief. Several members opposed making the doubled parish council a permanent institution. Others felt that it might be too cumbersome to have the Superior Consistory take up issues only after the consistories had discussed them. Professor Nowack also argued that the projected size for the Superior Consistory was excessive. Since the religious inspector (a.k.a. consistory president) was elected by the consistory, there was no need to name a second clerical and a third lay delegate. Following the committee’s recommendation that the Superior Consistory, and not the government select the Directory’s clerical member, a few members opined that the committee sought to eliminate the governmental commissioner position in the Superior Consistory and Directory altogether. Nowack, among others, cautioned against proceeding in that direction, for such radical propositions would likely sink the entire reform project.12 Mindful of such objections, the constitutional committee revised its suggestions and presented a new proposal for discussion at the 1900 Pastoral Conference. Apart from its outward appearance—the text looked more like a constitution with its main sections of parish, consistory, and Superior Consistory—this report differed most from its predecessor in its ideas on the parish government. Hoping to breathe new life into parish communities, it proposed major changes in the parish council’s image and responsibilities. In particular, it altered eligibility criteria for parish councilors, requiring them not only to be men of a certain age (thirty), but to be financially independent, morally upright, and—ideally—heads of household (Familienväter). Similarly, heading the list of the parish council’s functions was a mandate to promote piety, maintain community discipline and morality, and foster a Christian spirit within the parish’s boundaries.13 A full agenda in 1900 prevented the Pastoral Conference from doing much more than talking about the first section—concerning parish councils—of the committee’s latest report. President Gerold intended for the discussion to continue the following year, but his successor as Conference president, Inspector Knittel, was not similarly inclined.

Unsinger, “Vorschläge betreffend eine Reform unserer Kirchenverfassung,” ASPC 12 (1899): 200 –11, the minutes of the discussion itself appeared on 142–48. 13 “Vorschläge betreffend die Reform der Kirchenverfassung,” ASPC 11 (1900): 295–98. 12

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Indeed, as he opened the 1901 Pastoral Conference, Knittel made clear his opposition to the reorganization plans: That changes in time and circumstances have made the constitution of our church in need of amendment is not to be denied. However, I question the need for a radical cure, that is, an overhaul of the entire existing structure. . . . I see no reason why we should get rid of something that, despite its faults, has proven itself in favor of something unknown.14

And, using his authority as presiding officer, Knittel prevented the Conference from taking up the reform project at all in 1901. It did not even figure on the agenda for the 1902 meeting, since Knittel declared that there was no longer significant interest in it. Nonetheless, on the suggestion of Karl Hackenschmidt, the Conference did endorse one seemingly minor change in 1902. Namely, it recommended that the inspectoral assemblies be allowed to deliberate on matters facing the church and not just elect delegates to the Superior Consistory. In 1903, the Superior Consistory agreed that this would be a sensible step and sanctioned the reform, which the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine duly authorized early in 1904.15 The transformation of the Lutheran inspectoral assemblies into deliberative bodies was the only concrete result of the Pastoral Conference’s ten-year engagement with the question of church reform. This said, it would be incorrect to regard this decade-long discussion as “much ado about nothing.” While the Conference never completed a detailed constitutional proposal for the Superior Consistory to consider, the Conference’s deliberations revived the discourse on church reform from its post-Fabri slumber. And while developing a list of the current statutes’ shortcomings, the Conference elaborated a number of potential solutions to them. Indeed, with respect to the local and intermediate levels of church government, a high level of consensus had been reached about the proper direction in which reform should go (even if further discussion on the details was still necessary). Furthermore, interest in reorganizing the church was not quite dead. In his inaugural address before the Superior Consistory in May 1903, President Curtius made lightly veiled references to the need for reform. The Young St. Peter Consistory and most of the inspectoral assemblies

ASPC 11 (1901): 302–03. AS 58 (1903): 42–43, 98–99; “Befugnisse der Inspektionsversammlungen,” 23 Mar 1904, AS 58 (1904): 145–46. 14 15

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discussed the proposals that the Pastoral Conference generated in 1899 and 1900.16 In 1904, Strasbourg’s Pastoral Society even spoke out in favor of the proposal to create an official ecclesiastical council for Strasbourg (a city consistory or a city inspection) that would facilitate the development of policies for matters, like school affairs or cemetery regulations, which required city-wide solutions.17 Ultimately, the most important post-1902 church constitutional development occurred not within the Lutheran, but within the Reformed church. The passage of the 1905 Synodal law demonstrated the Reichsland government’s willingness to revise the ecclesiastical statutes to meet present circumstances and needs. It also showed that the government would not act unilaterally, but would alter the laws only after extended consultations with the church’s legal representatives. Lastly, by supporting an amendment to the law that allowed the Synod—and the Superior Consistory—to meet without the District President or his deputy present, the Landesausschuß revealed that it too could act responsibly on Protestant legislative concerns.18 In short, the Fabri curse was broken. It only remained to be seen when the Protestants would take advantage of the changed situation. The Lutheran Church’s Urban Visions The transformation of the inspectoral assemblies into deliberative bodies was intended to be a straightforward, uncomplicated means for promoting discussion of issues facing the Lutheran Church. In practice, however, the shift created new organizational difficulties. The main problem concerned selecting delegates to the inspectoral assemblies. Before 1904 the assemblies only elected representatives to the Superior Consistory, so consistories normally named the lay delegates whose mandates expired after the assembly concluded. But with the inspections meeting more regularly, a series of questions arose over the viability of this practice and forced the Superior Consistory to act in 1905. After lengthy debate, the Superior Consistory decided that the lay representatives in the inspectoral assemblies should be treated like

AS 58 (1903): 4–6; SPJ PBK, vol. 2 (15 Feb 1904); Agendas for the New Church inspectoral assemblies, ECAAL; STIR and NCIR 1904–06. 17 PB-SPG, vol. 5 (27 June 1904), ECAAL. 18 See the final section of Chapter 4, above. 16

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the parish representatives to the consistory. This meant that they would hold office for three years and that they would be elected henceforth by the parishes and not the consistories.19 Although the Superior Consistory resolved this particular question in favor of the parishes, the future of the consistories and the institutional function of the inspectoral assemblies remained problematic. In short, how were the Lutherans to organize the intermediate organs of church government? At the 1906 Superior Consistory session, Georg Wolf took up Karl Hackenschmidt’s suggestion from a decade earlier. Since the consistories had few meaningful functions anymore, especially in cities like Strasbourg and Colmar, the journalist (and former pastor) contended that they should be disbanded. President Curtius admitted that this conclusion could be drawn from recent inquiries. Eliminating the consistories, however, “would require amending church laws, since the consistory remains the basic unit of church government. . . . If the Superior Consistory wishes to move in that direction, it must say so explicitly.” Several members, including Inspectors Knittel and Höpffner, opposed that course of action. They pointed out that many pastors, especially in the countryside, did not want the consistories to disappear. Before doing anything, the Directory should first consult with the consistories and report its findings back to the Superior Consistory at the next session.20 The body decided to endorse this approach and so, on 22 January 1907, Curtius wrote the consistories, asking them to weigh in on the subject: should the consistory be abolished?21 The consistories roundly denounced this proposition. They argued that, on account of its smaller size, the consistory was better suited to discussing and looking after local concerns than the inspection. But as the consistories deliberated, the scope of the dialogue expanded. On the one hand, many consistories opted to address the broader issue of what kind of intermediary should exist between the parish and the Superior Consistory/Directory. Rather than eliminating the consistories, they contended, the consistory should receive new responsibilities, 19 Effectively, the Superior Consistory argued that, in granting legal existence to the parish, the Decree-Law of 1852 intended for the parish to take over these electoral rights from the consistory. This manner of reinterpreting the Decree-Law had also figured in the deliberations over the creation of the Reformed Synod, which helps to explain why Undersecretary Petri was willing to approve the new voting procedure on 5 April 1906. ADBR W 1049 (2). 20 AS 61 (1906): 49–51 and 118–22. 21 The letter and the consistories’ responses appear in ADBR 172 AL 310.

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such as a larger voice in pastoral appointments and a formal power to consult on business before the Superior Consistory. On the other hand, the question of the consistory’s future spilled out from the confines of the church councils and into the pages of the local press. The confessional papers all devoted attention to the topic. But in a clear sign of the general newsworthiness of “internal” church discussions in Alsace-Lorraine, the secular Straßburger Post itself emerged as a major forum for debate, publishing eleven pieces on church reform between 1 October and 30 November 1907 alone.22 At the Superior Consistory’s 1907 session, Curtius summarized the results of the Directory’s investigations. He noted that while the consistories agreed that there was no need for both inspections and consistories, there was no consensus on how to eliminate the dualism. However, Curtius noted, if one wanted to create a new intermediary body, “this could only occur as part of a more thoroughgoing reform, for amendments to the church’s basic organization should not be made piecemeal.” The committee charged to review the Directory’s report (comprised of four laymen and one pastor) decided this was precisely how the Superior Consistory should proceed. It moved that the Superior Consistory should revise the consistories’ organization and powers as part of a reform of the entire church constitution. It further proposed that the Consistory name a seven-member committee to draft such a text for discussion at the next meeting.23 As debate opened on the first of these motions, the religious inspectors quickly lined up in opposition. While they conceded the weaknesses in the current structure, they maintained that there was no great need to overhaul it. Inspector Wolff noted, “One must be a great optimist to believe that structural changes are going to create more life in our churches.” Inspector Metzger also doubted that from a political perspective the time for church reform was well chosen. Only Inspector Höpffner indicated that he might support change, “if it were clear that we would maintain fully the liberties we already enjoy, or even expand them.” Similarly, the governmental commissioner, Alexander von der Goltz, believed that much could be done to improve religious life within the existing institutional framework. Because it was already underway, Wolf gathered his articles and published them together as Die Reform der Verfassung at the beginning of November. 23 AS 62 (1907): 25–26, 150 –59 and 240. The laymen on the committee were Georg Wolf (spokesman), Höffel, Eisser, and Professor Nowack; Gerold was the lone pastor. 22

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however, the discussion of church reform should continue. The next step, he advised, should be to draft guidelines for reform. In any event, the Superior Consistory should circulate any proposal among the consistories prior to deliberating on it in plenum.24 The majority of the body’s lay deputies, along with the representatives from the St. Thomas Foundation and the Protestant Theological Faculty, endorsed the commission’s recommendation to draft a new constitution. In their remarks, they, too, linked the cause of ecclesiastical reform with church renewal, albeit much more optimistically. Otto Back, the former mayor of Strasbourg, asserted, “The organization of the church is not without consequence. One structure is more likely than another to raise the laity’s interest in the church. And it is from this perspective that we should consider the commission’s recommendations.” Back also urged his colleagues not to worry about how the government might respond. “I personally am confident that if we make proposals that . . . do not disturb or threaten the state’s interests, the government will welcome our efforts.” Likewise, Gerold reminded his peers that the advantages of the current laws lay only in their administration. The statutes, he averred, were “thoroughly illiberal,” the “products of Napoleonic ideas.”25 During the debate, a more expansive vision of church reform emerged. One such voice belonged to Frédéric Abt (Colmar). He characterized reform as an act of modernization: eliminating outdated and contradictory provisions in the constitution, “while retaining, even augmenting its best features.” But the most compelling and influential proponent of this kind of change was President Curtius. In bringing the debate to a close, Curtius advocated developing a constitution that was consonant with both Lutheran ecclesiastical principles and modern legal and administrative practice, which is the urbane outlook of German liberalism.26 “The Church Constitution,” he contended, “should be open and understandable to every member of the church. This is a requirement of liberalism—not in the theological sense, but in a sense in which we all want to be liberal.” Liberal, too, was Curtius’s promotion of a new relationship between church and state. Rather than treat the church as a part of the state with its own particular type of law, he

24 25 26

Ibid., 26–36. Ibid., 36–40. Especially valuable in this context is Palmowski, Urban Liberalism.

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suggested, the church should be regarded as an autonomous corporation whose statutes were merely sanctioned by law. Curtius saw this reform as one way to protect the church from arbitrary action on the part of the state (that is, the illiberalism about which Gerold complained). But since this approach to church constitutions was already common in much of Protestant old Germany we could also say that Curtius was promoting a “Germanization” of Alsatian Protestantism, at least when it worked to the Reichsland’s advantage.27 On 19 November, the Superior Consistory was finally ready to vote. First, it defeated two substitute motions: Knittel’s to table the entire discussion (defeated on a vote of ten to fourteen, with all seven inspectors and only three laymen voting in favor) and von der Goltz’s to charge the committee to prepare only a list of principles for constitutional reform (defeated on a vote of four to eleven, with nine abstentions). Then it voted 13–1–10 to approve the committee’s first motion, simplified to call only for creating a commission to draft a new church constitution. The next day, the body elected the commission’s members, choosing three pastors (Krencker, Metzger, and Gerold) and three laymen (Wolf, Höffel, and Back) to work with President Curtius on the task.28 This result was significant, because with the election of two inspectors (Krencker and Metzger) to the panel, the Superior Consistory ensured that individuals who were critical of reform also had a voice in the commission’s deliberations. Throughout the winter and early spring of 1908, the Lutheran constitutional commission worked diligently to fulfill its charge. Although all of the members participated actively in the discussions, the dominant figure was President Curtius. He sorted through the morass of existing 27 AS 62 (1907): 46–48. Nevertheless, as Curtius’s later writings make clear, his idea of the church as a type of privileged public corporation resembled much more the status of the Austrian Catholic church after 1870 than that of the old German Protestant state churches. Curtius, “Die neuesten kirchlichen Verfassungsarbeiten in Elsaß-Lothringen und der Schweiz,” in Grundfragen der evangelischen Kirchenverfassung. Drei Vorträge gehalten in Darmstadt auf Veranlassung der freien Landeskirchlichen Vereinigung für das Großherzogtum Hessen (Darmstadt: A. Bergsträssers Hofbuchhandlung, 1911), 26–46, esp. 35–40. For the Austrian situation see John W. Boyer, “Religion and Political Development in Central Europe around 1900: A View from Vienna,” Austrian History Yearbook 25 (1994): 13–58, esp. 15–20. 28 All of those who voted to table the question, i.e. the religious inspectors, abstained when the main motion came to a vote. There appears to have been a broad consensus about who should be elected the commission. Gerold, Wolf, and Back were unanimous choices (twenty-three votes each), while Höffel, Krencker and Metzger each received twenty-two. AS 62 (1907): 48–51.

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statutes and regulations to determine what should be included in the draft constitution. He explored the consequences of certain changes, like the administrative supervision of parish councils, in detailed memoranda. He also participated actively in the commission’s discussions, clarifying questions that arose and advancing his views on how the commission should resolve major issues. This was “Curtius’s crusade,” an old-German civil servant’s concerted effort to create something of lasting value for his adopted land of Alsace-Lorraine.29 As the commission labored, it was fully aware of the public’s interest in the draft constitution’s form and content. It was, after all, a momentous occasion for Alsatian Protestantism, as well as German Protestantism more generally. Already in December, the chairwoman of the German Protestant Women’s League (Deutscher Evangelischer Frauenbund ), requested that the commission consider enfranchising women, a proposal that the group had repeatedly made (to no avail) to the other German state churches.30 This suggestion alone generated considerable debate in Strasbourg’s papers, with many liberal and urban Protestants supporting it, and more conservative and rural Lutherans opposing it.31 Other ideas emerged from public discussions. In an article dated 25 January 1908, for instance, the Kirchenbote urged the commission to reduce considerably the number of government-appointed members in the Superior Consistory and Directory.32 When the commission released a working-version of its draft constitution in early May, it triggered considerable favorable discussion within the church and the press.33 However, dissatisfaction with the commission’s plans for reorganizing the consistories was so great that the commission felt compelled to

29 ADBR 172 AL 310. In this respect, Curtius’s efforts to modernize the Lutheran church had much in common with Back’s encouragement of Strasbourg’s urbanization, with one important difference. From the outset, Curtius felt called to build on the basis of Alsatian ecclesiastical traditions and, thus, enjoyed considerable support from the “native” population. Back, by contrast, was more of a “Germanizer,” whose policies the old-Strasbourgeois often greeted with animosity. On Curtius’s relationship to Alsace-Lorraine, see especially, von Thadden, “Friedrich Curtius,” 87–89. 30 ADBR 172 AL 310. 31 E.g., Albert Lienhard, “Das kirchliche Wahlrecht der Frauen,” SP 165 (12 Feb 1908); “Zur kirchlichen Wahlrechts der Frauen,” KB 37/10 (7 Mar 1908): 79–80. 32 “Zur Frage der Verfassung in der elsässische-lothringischen Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession,” KB 37/4 (25 Jan 1905) 28–29. 33 E.g. SB 45/20 (17 May 1908): 159 – 60; KB 37/20 (16 May 1908): 177–78; and ASPC 12 (1908): 372–85; much more critical were the opinions expressed in FB 38 (May–June 1908): 191–97, 205–09, 215–18, 223–26.

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devise an entirely new approach before presenting its final draft to the Superior Consistory.34 What kind of vision for the Church did the commission outline? As Inspector Metzger noted at the beginning of the Superior Consistory’s deliberations in October 1908, the commission strove to keep “what was time tested and true, adopting new elements only after careful consideration.” But, even at this level, the commission’s intent to modernize the Church was evident. The old wasn’t just retained, it was organized and rationalized. In place of the welter of laws, decrees and regulations, the proposal presented a cleaner, codified text of some 158 sections. Modern, too, was the subjection of the church’s internal affairs to legal due process. For instance, if a parish council removed someone from the electoral register for cause (e.g., notorious public immorality), the individual would receive not only a written, justified notification of the decision, but he would also have the right to appeal the decision to the next higher instance of church government (e.g., the consistory). Similarly, the process for hearing appeals within the church would follow prevailing practices of administrative review. Finally, to protect minority interests within the church, the constitution allowed the use of proportional voting to name delegates to church bodies.35 The proposal simplified the basic workings of church government. It made the parish the nucleus of the entire church organization and endowed it with considerable autonomy, echoing a similar trend in Alsatian communal law.36 Certain parish resolutions still required review, notably financial and liturgical matters, but now the Directory would do this without the intervention of the consistories. The commission recommended eliminating the inspections entirely. The consistories would operate as the sole mediator between the parish and Superior Consistory, charged primarily to encourage works of the “inner mission”

The commission had proposed creating consistories with roughly equal populations, so that the representatives to the Superior Consistory could be elected by the consistories. Clergy and laity objected to the plan’s disregard for the ties between many of the parishes in the “old” consistories. They also wanted to keep the consistories from the discord and infighting that elections often generated. ADBR 172 AL 310. The final commission draft was published in late August 1908, with each parish council and consistory—as well as the Superior Consistory members—receiving a copy: Entwurf einer Kirchenordnung für die Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession in Elsaß-Lothringen (Strasbourg: Heitz, 1908); AS 62 (1908): 299. 35 Section 105. 36 On the expansion of municipal autonomy in the 1895 Gemeindeordnung, see Wittenbrock, “Auswirkungen,” 254–57. 34

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and deliberate on matters set before them by either the parish councils or the Directory. The religious inspectors would continue to carry out their traditional duties, but henceforth as “agents” of the Directory. That the commission endeavored to address some of the specific problems of urban religious life was equally apparent in the draft constitution. To outflank the objections to parochial reform of Strasbourg’s parish councilors, it made the district parish the basic church unit for the entire territory. In cities like Strasbourg, individuals could still opt to select their own pastor, but by default, every Lutheran would belong to the neighborhood parish. In light of the parish’s newly stated responsibility to promote piety and public morality, the commission wanted to maximize the number of people who could vote in parish elections and serve in the parish council. It eliminated residency requirements and enfranchised foreigners who had a fixed domicile in the parish. To encourage young adults, especially young men, to retain ties to the church, it recommended reducing the minimum age from thirty to twenty-five. More controversially, the commission endorsed enfranchising women. During the Superior Consistory debates of 1908, Curtius acknowledged that not everyone was ready for this change. Nevertheless, he pointed out that women were among the most active parishioners and had considerable knowledge of parish religious life. It made sense to open up opportunities for them to be officially involved in church government, for instance, by having a formal voice in the selection of pastors. It may well be, he concluded, that sentiment in the rural parishes will prevent women from making use of these rights. Women may decide not to register; they may not run as candidates for office. “But the enlightened, urban populations should not have to give up their more enlightened views for the sake of the farmers.”37 Curtius’s remarks leave no doubt that the decision to enfranchise women was intimately tied to what scholars have often termed a “feminization” of religion.38 But they also show how the commission sought to create greater flexibility within the church, authorizing changes that would benefit urban congregations without, however, forcing the rural communities to follow suit.

AS 63 (1908): 36–37. For a more extensive discussion of this topic, see Steinhoff, “A Feminized Church? The Campaign for Women’s Suffrage in Alsace-Lorraine’s Protestant Churches, 1907–1914,” Central European History 38 (2005): 218–49. 37 38

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Finally, the draft constitution strove to give the Church considerable freedom to govern its own affairs. It significantly reduced the state’s preponderance in the highest organs of church government. Thus, while the president and the inspectors were appointed by the state, only the president would retain his seat (and vote) in the Superior Consistory and Directory. In place of the religious inspectors, each consistory would elect a clerical deputy to serve in the Superior Consistory. Similarly, the President would remain the only governmental appointee in the Directory. The governmental commissioner and the religious inspector would lose their seats in favor of two clerical delegates from the Supreme Consistory, chosen—like their lay counterparts—for six year terms. In this fashion, the commission responded to a long-held concern that the clerical element in the Directory was too weak. Above all, the constitution declared the Superior Consistory competent to regulate the church’s internal affairs without state intervention. Only in those areas where the state had legitimate interests, such as pastoral training, the appointment of pastors and religious inspectors, and the administration of church property and investments, would the church’s decisions continue to require state approval.39 Overall, the Superior Consistory’s response to the commission’s proposal was highly positive.40 Members praised the commission for drawing up a text that took account of wishes expressed by many different groups within the church. Frédéric Abt praised the commission for giving the church a structural unity that it previously lacked. He also lauded the text for organizing the church, in accordance with Protestant principles, from the ground up, rather than the top down. Nevertheless, if the body was largely satisfied with the draft’s underlying spirit, a spirited debate unfolded over several of its provisions. One area of concern was the parish franchise. Several deputies opposed lowering the voting age and argued that adults under the age of thirty lacked the necessary maturity to vote or be elected to church office. Proponents of the change, however, noted that many of these individuals were already living on their own. If they were mature enough to vote in civil elections (for which the voting age was already twenty-five), then they should be for church elections as well. Furthermore, as Professor These ideas are expressed most clearly, not in the draft constitution itself, but instead in the section of the accompanying rationale entitled “The State Sanction of the Church Constitution,” Entwurf einer Kirchenordnung, 50–54. 40 AS 63 (1908): 10 –103. 39

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Nowack pointed out, in Prussia the minimum voting age was set at twenty-four and that did not create any special difficulties. While the Superior Consistory ultimately voted to lower the voting age, it did not fully embrace the recommendation to enfranchise women. By a vote of thirteen to nine, it decided to allow women to vote in parish elections (the so-called active franchise) without restriction. However, the members opted, twelve-to eight, to prevent women from being elected (the “passive” franchise) to the parish council. The members also remained dissatisfied with the organization of an intermediate body between parish and Superior Consistory. Many continued to object to the election of delegates to the Superior Consistory from the consistories, fearing that electoral agitation would negatively affect their ability to function. There was also concern that the proposed number of consistories (seventeen) would create an excessively large Superior Consistory. As a compromise, Georg Wolf suggested expanding the number of consistories to twenty-one and then grouping the consistories into seven electoral colleges, where the election of lay and clerical delegates to the Superior Consistory would occur. Although Nowack and Curtius both observed that this suggestion effectively recreated the old inspectoral assemblies, the body adopted Wolf ’s motion by a vote of thirteen to nine. Another area of concern was the future of the religious inspectorship. In its desire to lessen the state’s influence in the Directory and Superior Consistory, the commission had proposed that the consistory presidents, and not the state-appointed inspectors, represent “clerical opinion” in the Superior Consistory and that the Superior Consistory, and not the state, name the clerical deputies to the Directory. Alexander von der Goltz disparaged this change, saying that it removed a desirable element of conservatism within the church. Otto Back also spoke out against it, saying that it made little sense to exclude from the Superior Consistory’s deliberations the men who had the widest knowledge of what was going on in the church. Here too, the body was able to reach a compromise. They restored the inspectors’ membership and voting rights in the Superior Consistory, but like the other delegates, inspectors would be elected by the new electoral colleges (a.k.a. inspectoral districts) and subject to confirmation by the Statthalter for six-year terms. Finally, to ensure that laymen remained in the majority, the electoral colleges would each elect three lay deputies to the Superior Consistory. Von der Goltz’s misgivings about the draft constitution’s “lack of conservative elements” also had consequences for the deliberations on

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the Directory’s composition. Supported by Otto Back and Inspector Knittel, he moved to restore the governmental commissioner’s seat and vote in the body, pointing out that since the Lutheran church was still a state establishment, the state had a right to representation in it. By the narrow vote of eleven to ten, von der Goltz’s motion carried. At the same time, however, the members roundly endorsed a motion to grant the Superior Consistory a formal role in the selection of the Lutheran President. It also approved an amendment that prevented the government from dismissing the President without the Superior Consistory’s consent.41 On 9 October 1908, the Superior Consistory finished its deliberations on the proposal. It then renewed the mandate of its constitutional commission and charged it to prepare a second draft of the text in accordance with the amendments and other suggestions that the body had endorsed. The draft would then be debated in an extraordinary session the following year. In the interim, public interest in the reform discussion picked up, fueled by the fact that there was still no consensus for several of the most significant changes. In Strasbourg, a moderate group calling itself the “Protestant Coalition” (Evangelische Vereinigung) was created. It urged the Superior Consistory to collapse the consistories into inspections (thereby dispensing with the new inspectoral districts), create a single inspection for Strasbourg, and give women the passive franchise.42 Contributors to the Straßburger Post and the Friedensbote, however, encouraged the Superior Consistory to restrain the advance of liberalism within the church, not just by maintaining the existing provisions relative to the governmental commissioner and the religious inspectors, but also by denying any vote to women.43 Even the Reformed Church decided to enter into the debate on women’s suffrage. Although conservative-pietist sentiments within the Church were strong, the Synod

41 It is curious that the commission’s proposal did not address the issue of how the president might be dismissed from office, since only one year before the government had tried to force Curtius from his post for his role in the publication of (former Statthalter and Imperial Chancellor) Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst’s memoirs. Thadden, “Friedrich Curtius,” 84–87. 42 See the report in SP 82 (22 Jan 1909). 43 Cf. “Zur Frage der Verfassungsreform der Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession,” SP 1255 (12 Nov 1908) and 1302 (3 Dec 1908); and Thedor Hickel, “Die Stellung der Frau in der christliche Kirche,” FB 39 (1909): 83–85, 91– 92, 99 –100.”

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voted in June 1909, eighteen to seven, to grant women both the active and passive franchise.44 Although the Lutheran’s constitutional commission completed its work in early May, Curtius postponed discussion on the revised draft until the ordinary Superior Consistory session in October. This would give the members, he reasoned, ample time to reflect on the proposal before a final vote. In contrast to the previous year, however, the Directory did not invite formal comment on the text from the parish councils and consistories. Von der Goltz later criticized this move, for while the commission proposed few new reforms, it opted to discard the previous session’s compromise on the consistories. Indeed, after much deliberation, the commission had returned to the idea, recently revived by the Protestant Coalition, of merging the consistories with the inspections, so that the religious inspector would also serve as consistory president. To facilitate the conduct of (new-style) consistorial business, each consistory would be provided with a standing committee composed of the president, a lay secretary, and an additional two clerical and three lay representatives. And to keep the size of the new consistories manageable, the number of lay representatives would vary according to the number of registered parishioners.45 By the time the Superior Consistory convened in October, the religious newspapers, papers like the Post, and even many church groups had devoted considerable attention to the questions at hand, including the newest solution to the “consistory” problem.46 And in the course of the proposals’ two readings, consensus was readily reached on the outstanding issues.47 First, keeping in mind that the old consistories were already “cadavers” and that, according to the new constitution, the parish community would be the true heart of the church, the Superior Consistory agreed by a vote of 24–0–1 to endorse the commission’s resolution of the consistory question. The existing inspections would be renamed “consistories,” whose presiding officers would double as

1909 Synod Proceedings, ADBR 147 AL, P. 4. AS 64 (1909): 170 –75. 46 Cf. “Zur Verfassungsreform,” KB 38 (15 May 1909): 153–54; “In Sachen der neuen Kirchenverfassung”; KB 38, supplement to 26 Sep 1909; and the articles in SP 534 (18 May), 912 (20 Aug), 1080 (3 Oct), 1088 (5 Oct) and 1099 (7 Oct). During the debates, several of the members, including Inspector Knittel and Jean Höffel, indicated that they were acting in accord with the expressed wishes of their consistories and inspections. 47 AS 64 (1909): 6–68. 44 45

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religious inspectors.48 The body also revisited the issue of women’s suffrage. It defeated Georg Roth’s effort to deny women the franchise altogether, but also Gerold’s motion to restore the passive suffrage. However, by a vote of 13–9–3, the members approved Inspector Metzger’s suggestion to allow women to be elected to the parish council, with the limitation that women could comprise no more than one-third of the total membership. Discussion also returned to the question of the Directory’s composition. Several delegates pointed out that the previous year’s decision created a body with an equal number of members (six), which was inadvisable. Adolf Götz thus proposed that the position of governmental commissioner be eliminated, as the commission had originally recommended. Inspector Knittel and von der Goltz argued against this modification, regarding the commissioner as an important element of stability and a safeguard against intraconfessional partisanship. When the vote was taken, the “liberal” position claimed victory, with seventeen members in favor of eliminating the position, and only three opposed. Götz’s group tried to follow up on this success, proposing that, just like the Reformed Synod, the Superior Consistory also name its president, subject to state confirmation. However, the debate quickly showed that there was no support for this position. After all, the state still regarded the Lutheran president, whose powers were much more substantial than his Reformed counterpart, as equal in rank to a Catholic bishop, who was also formally chosen by the state. Having completed the second reading of the constitutional proposal on 14 October, the Superior Consistory proceeded to a vote. Twenty-three members voted to approve the document and send it to the Ministry for action. Only Inspector Wagner voted against it, because he could not bring himself to endorse enfranchising women in any form.49 Now the members could focus on the question of how the new constitution should take effect. It was here that the Superior Consistory ventured most boldly, developing ideas that, if accepted by the government, would fundamentally change the nature of Protestant church law in Alsace-Lorraine.

48 After much discussion, the Superior Consistory also decided that since the title “inspector” had become a part of local church tradition, the heads of the new consistories would carry two titles: consistory president and inspector. 49 Ibid., 66.

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As he had announced back in 1907, Curtius thought that the state should just pass a law that sanctioned the constitution, without incorporating the constitution into the law itself. This approach, he noted, had two benefits. On the one hand, it would give the church, rather than the state, the sole right to initiate changes to the constitution. On the other hand, by requiring that the state also approve any future amendments, the church would be protected from rash changes to its constitution. Significantly, Curtius’s sentiments were seconded by two of the most prominent old-German civil servants in the body: von der Goltz and Back. Although he had frequently defended the government’s interests throughout the deliberations on the constitution, von der Goltz now averred, “We must strive to have the greatest degree of freedom to alter the constitution as we see fit.” Back, who also tended to exhibit great confidence in the government, concurred: “The principle is that the State should not be allowed to amend the constitution without the Superior Consistory’s approval.”50 At the end of the discussion, Back enumerated the basic points that should be included in the law that sanctioned the new church constitution. Curtius then worked this list into a formal resolution, which the Superior Consistory endorsed without objection on 3 November. Accordingly, the Superior Consistory stated its wish that the constitution be sanctioned as a whole, and that the law declare that the state could not change it unilaterally. It also asked that the law specify which amendments might take effect with only the Statthalter’s approval, and which ones would require the consent of the legislature.51 With the resolutions of 14 October and 3 November, the Superior Consistory took a step that would have been unthinkable just five years previously. Capitalizing on the hallmark democratic and liberal ideals of urban modernity, it articulated a plan to make church institutions conform better to Protestant principles. It reestablished the parish community as the foundation of the entire organization. It reasserted the religious responsibilities of the organs of church government. It strove to give the church, at every level, greater autonomy from the state, so that decisions within the church were made from a properly religious and ecclesiastical, rather than political standpoint. Moreover, 50 In fact, most of the discussion of these issues took place at the end of the first reading, on 13 October. Ibid., 53–55. 51 Ibid., 218.

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to encourage greater participation in the church’s affairs and breathe new life into it, the Superior Consistory endeavored to give the church a more modern appearance. It made the entire constitution more rational and straightforward. It applied contemporary standards of due process and respect for minority opinions to internal church procedures. Above all, it embraced reforms, like the district parish and women’s suffrage that promised to ameliorate religious conditions in urban areas like Strasbourg. Now all the Superior Consistory could do was to wait and see how the Reichsland’s political authorities would respond. Negotiating Change: Lutherans, Calvinists and the Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine Although Curtius sent the Superior Consistory’s resolutions to the Ministry for review on 10 January 1910, the Ministry was unusually slow in replying. 52 We should not interpret it as a sign of the state’s disinterest. The papers of the Division of Justice and Religious Affairs reveal that the Ministry considered the Lutherans’ proposal quite carefully, and that both Undersecretary Petri and Statthalter Wedel were intimately involved in the internal discussions.53 Rather, the delay reflected the Ministry’s preoccupation with a particularly busy legislative session, as well as the flurry of activity caused by Berlin’s announcement that the government intended to grant the Reichsland a constitution, a plan that the Reichstag passed into law one year later, on 6 May 1911.54 Nevertheless, by the end of August 1910, Petri finally sent the Directory a set of remarks that ran to some thirty-nine printed pages.55 With this memorandum, the Ministry signaled that the movement for modernizing Alsatian Protestantism had entered a new phase. It would support church reform for both the Lutherans and the Calvinists. But the Ministry would not relinquish its right to direct the process. Even at the end of the long nineteenth century, ecclesiastical change was not without wider social, cultural, and political ramifications, and this

Curtius to the Ministry, ADBR 136 AL 15/47. ADBR 136 AL 15/47. 54 For the history of the 1911 constitution, see Silverman, Reluctant Union, 133–50, and Jean-Marie Mayeur, Autonomie et politique en Alsace: la constitution de 1911 (Paris: Armand Colin, 1970). 55 “Äußerung des Ministeriums zu dem Entwurf einer Kirchenordnung für die Kirche A.K.,” ADBR 136 AL 15/47 and printed in AS 65 (1910). 52 53

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was precisely what concerned the Reichsland’s officials in the charged political climate of the late Wilhelmine period.56 In many respects, Petri led off his comments with the most important point. He confirmed that the government was ready to work with the Superior Consistory to amend the Lutheran church constitution. The Ministry recognized that many of the proposed reforms were indeed urgently desired within the church, especially the changes enhancing the status of the parish, which were already commonplace in most of the other German Protestant churches. It admitted that both the church and the state would benefit from cleaning up and modernizing Protestant church law. Petri even conceded that there were certain prerogatives that the state no longer needed to exercise and could renounce without damage to its interests. This said, Petri emphasized that the government had serious reservations about several pieces of the reform project, particularly in light of the debates within the Superior Consistory and the orthodox Lutherans’ attempt to have Statthalter Wedel reject the entire proposal.57 Before the Ministry began formal negotiations with the Superior Consistory as the content and form of a future reform bill, Petri asked the Lutherans to take the government’s concerns into consideration and revisit several parts of their proposal. One major set of concerns revolved around the treatment of state interests in the Lutherans’ text. The Ministry opposed how the Superior Consistory wanted the new constitution to receive legal sanction. In a remarkable defense of Alsatian particularism, the Ministry pointed out that it was not appropriate to use old-German practices as precedents, because the Reichsland had a different system of church law and the Ministry was not prepared to change it.58 This was not just objection 56 Helmut Walser Smith’s discussion of the confessional dimension of the late Wilhelmine political crisis remains exemplary; Smith, German Nationalism, 115–66. 57 At the end of January, the orthodox camp sent a petition with the names of pastors and laity from over seventy parishes to Wedel, requesting that he reject the excessively liberal and “un-Lutheran” constitution out of hand. “Eingabe von Geistlichen und Mitgliedern von Presbyterialräten an den Statthalter in Elsaß-Lothringen betr. den Entwurf einer neuen Kirchenverfassung der Kirche A. K. in Elsaß-Lothgringen,” 25. January 1910 (printed copy of the petition, BNUS M33726); ADBR 136 AL 15/47. 58 Indeed, a similar validation of the French contributions to Alsatian regional identity had characterized the revival of regional particularism since the turn of the century that Prussian conservatives and integral German nationalists preferred to see as evidence of Alsace-Lorraine’s refusal to become part of the German nation. Vogler, Histoire culturelle, 364–77; and, as in indicator of contemporary German sentiment, the comments in “Die Verfassung für Elsaß-Lothringen,” Preussische Jahrbücher 143 (1911): 175–79.

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for form’s sake. Substantive concerns were also in play. In the French tradition, which the Germans maintained in Alsace-Lorraine, many elements of church law were rooted in texts that were common to all of the recognized faith communities. Altering the situation for one community would require changes for all, and the Ministry did not want to cross that Rubicon. This same line of thinking, however, had ramifications for the content of the new constitution itself. On the one hand, the Ministry wanted to maintain, as far as possible, the existing parallels in the organization of the two Protestant churches, especially at the parish level. Petri thus took the liberty of sending the Reformed consistories copies of the Lutherans’ proposal and his response to it, so that the Synod could take action on them. On the other hand, the Ministry suggested that the new church laws only lay out the fundamental features of church organization and the churches’ relation to the state; less central provisions, such as voting regulations, could be fixed by means of special ordinances. The Ministry also expressed misgivings about enfranchising women. It opposed permitting women to be elected into bodies like the parish councils. In part, the Ministry didn’t feel that there was enough of a desire within the church itself to justify this change, through which women would exercise a “certain coercive power” over other members of the community. But the real fear was that women might use this reform to justify a right to hold local public office, “something that virtually every state in Europe prohibits.” Petri hinted, however, that if sufficient demand for it existed, the government could conceive of allowing women to vote, although there, too, political considerations required proceeding cautiously. Once more, the problem lay in the church’s status as a public institution: even if giving women the vote made ecclesiastical sense, it threatened to create a precedent for enfranchising women in all public elections.59 On the question of the enhancing the church’s freedom of action, above all at the level of Superior Consistory and Directory, the Ministry was of two minds. Petri informed the Lutherans that the state was willing to permit the Superior Consistory to nominate men to the Lutheran presidency. It was also ready to abolish the position of

59 Richard J. Evans, The Feminist Movement in Germany 1894 –1933 (London and Beverly Hills, CA: SAGE Publications, 1976), esp. 71–114, remains a useful starting point for the history of the women’s suffrage movement in Imperial Germany.

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governmental commissioner in the Directory and Superior Consistory. But the Ministry stressed that it did not wish to relinquish its right to convoke the Superior Consistory and set its agenda. It also wanted to retain its unlimited prerogative to issue ordinances and regulations for the church. Moreover, it hoped to restore the government’s right to send representatives to attend the Superior Consistory session, not with the goal of “monitoring” the church, but to ensure that the government’s views were known on issues before the body. At the same time that the Ministry indicated the general direction in which it was willing to pursue church reform, it used its memorandum to help the Superior Consistory strengthen its proposal. Many of these suggestions were of a technical nature. Others were more significant. For instance, to ensure that a strong consensus existed for several reforms—e.g., the reorganization of the consistories and the position of the religious inspector—Petri suggested that the inspectoral assemblies be convened to discuss them once more. The assemblies could then also express their views on the question of women’s suffrage as well as the equally radical notion, raised by Jean Höffel at the end of the 1909 session, that the entire parish, and not just the expanded parish council participate in the election of pastors. Since the creation of a special Strasbourg consistory remained unlikely, Petri proposed instead establishing a special city church commission (Ausschuß), composed of delegates from each of the city parish councils that would be empowered to represent the collective interests of the city’s parishes. Petri’s remarks arrived at the Directory just one month before the Superior Consistory was scheduled to convene. On the recommendation of Karl Gerold, therefore, the Superior Consistory decided to postpone acting on the government’s response for a year. This would enable the inspectoral assemblies to meet, as the Ministry requested. It would also give the body’s constitutional committee time to review both the Ministry’s comments and the results of the assemblies’ deliberations before developing a plan of action for the Superior Consistory to consider.60 In the interim, public debate on several of the Ministry’s suggestions continued. The Pastoral Society, in particular, decided to pursue the government’s suggestion as to how Strasbourg’s parishes could achieve common representation. Although Inspector Metzger argued that a city church council would fulfill this function admirably, in January 1911 the

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Society voted again to pursue the erection of a city consistory. To this end, it also requested that the Directory have the inspections consider this question when they met later that spring.61 On 5 May 1911, the inspectoral assemblies deliberated on the eight questions posed by the Directory: three regarding women’s suffrage, three on the consistories and inspections, and two on the nomination of pastors.62 The responses to the franchise question surprised no one. Despite the efforts of Curtius and the local chapter of the German Protestant Women’s League,63 only the urban consistories of Colmar, St. Thomas and St. William favored giving women both an active and passive franchise. The three rural consistories and the conservative New Church inspection opposed any enfranchisement of women. The inspections also returned a clear verdict on the issue of pastoral nominations: no one wanted direct election by the congregation. Consensus on the organization of the consistories, however, remained elusive. None of the inspections wanted only seven consistories. One desired things to be left as they were, another supported an earlier suggestion that there be twenty-one consistories, grouped into electoral “colleges” to name delegates to the Superior Consistory. The remaining five felt that somewhere between 10 and 15 consistories would suffice. And although the Directory decided not to put the question of a Strasbourg consistory on the agenda, five inspections discussed it anyway. Four were in favor, one (New Church) was against.64 Armed with these results, the Superior Consistory’s constitutional commission prepared a series of recommendations that the body took up and approved, with few modifications, at the Fall 1911 session.65 The Lutherans accepted many of the recommendations the Ministry made, although sometimes with additional tweaking. For instance, it endorsed

PB-SPG, vol. 5 (Sep 1910 – Jan 1911), ECAAL. A complete summary of the results appeared in SB 48/20 (14 May 1911): 159–60. 63 Curtius, Für das Recht der Frauen in der Kirche (Berlin: Karl Curtius, 1910). On the activities of the Women’s Alliance, see “Das Frauenwahlrecht in der Kirche,” SB 48/5 (28 Jan 1911): 35–36. 64 The Directory preferred to ask Strasbourg’s parish councils and consistories to take up the matter on their own, which they did at the end of May. This revealed that, once again, most of Strasbourg’s lay elders opposed the idea. Only Old St. Peter, Young St. Peter and, with reservations, St. Thomas passed resolutions in favor of a city consistory. ADBR 172 AL 310. 65 For the text of the commission report, see AS 66 (1911): 239–99, the proceedings for 2 and 3 November were printed in ibid., 11– 48. 61

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the notion of creating a special church council for Strasbourg. It also specified that laymen were to be selected to serve as parish council secretaries, and that a consistory had to select its representatives to the Superior Consistory from among its voting members. Based on the inspections’ deliberations, it returned to its original 1908 recommendation for reorganizing the consistories, creating thirteen such bodies that would also serve as the basis for representation to the Superior Consistory. Similarly, the body decided to separate once more the offices of consistory president and inspector. However, in a rare borrowing from local Calvinist practice, the latter functions would be assumed by one of five “visitors,” whom the Superior Consistory would name for six-year (renewable) terms. The Lutherans also decided to hold their ground in their effort to modernize the church and rework the basis of church-state relations. They reasserted their wish that the new constitution be sanctioned en bloc and that it be amended in the future only on the church’s initiative. The Superior Consistory likewise challenged the Ministry’s contention that only it could issue regulations for the church, pointing out that this was an interpretation rooted in post-1852 administrative practice rather than the laws themselves. Nor was the Superior Consistory inclined to endorse the government’s suggestions about how the body should conduct its business. It contended that there was no longer a reason for the state to approve its agenda, and still less ground to reinstate the practice—abolished in 1905—whereby a representative from the government could participate in the body’s debates. Lastly, the constitutional committee recommended enfranchising foreigners (which the government opposed on strictly political grounds) and, above all, women. It noted that if one added up the votes on the questions in the three Strasbourg-based inspections, there was actually a slight majority in favor of women’s suffrage. Thus, in consideration of urban interests, the committee affirmed its support for the decision reached in 1909: an unrestricted active franchise and a limited passive franchise. After a lengthy debate, the Superior Consistory ratified the first of these positions by a vote of fourteen to seven. Von der Goltz then moved to remove the restriction on women’s eligibility to serve on the parish council, observing that “if men are so indifferent that a majority of women are elected, they don’t deserve anything better.” This amendment also passed, by a margin of thirteen to six. By the time the Lutherans completed their constitutional labors, the Reformed Synod also developed a proposal for the Ministry to

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consider, albeit one that was admittedly less mature than its Lutheran counterpart. Already in June 1910, before the Ministry had even drafted a response to the original Lutheran proposal, the Synod had formed a committee to determine to what extent the Lutherans’ ideas might also be applied to the Reformed Church.66 The committee had wanted to wait and see how the Lutherans reply to the Ministry’s remarks. But when the Superior Consistory voted to delay its discussion until 1911, the Calvinists decided that they should go ahead and produce a draft that could be discussed at the Synod meeting slated for May 1911.67 The committee met its deadline, but because it finished late in April, many of the consistories lacked sufficient time to examine the draft before the Synod convened, which meant that the Synod’s deliberations would serve only as a first hearing. In many respects, the Calvinists’ proposal, as modified during the May Synod session, did exactly what the Ministry had hoped.68 The constitutional committee borrowed liberally from the Lutherans’ 1909 proposal and made modifications to it only where the special conditions within the Reformed church demanded. The Calvinists reorganized their church’s entire structure on the basis of the local religious community. They empowered the parishes to administer their affairs independently, within the limits established by the law and the constitution. The committee chose to state the parish council’s obligation to promote piety and religious order. It followed the Lutherans’ lead in eliminating many of the restrictions on eligibility for suffrage and election to parish office and in varying the size of the parish council according to the parish’s population. It even decided to grant parishes greater influence over the selection of their pastors, by allowing them to nominate a single candidate when a vacancy occurred, rather than three. To the Ministry’s chagrin, the Calvinists sided with the Lutherans on the question of clarifying the relationship between church and state. As Synod President Piepenbring observed when he sent the Synod’s project to the Ministry in July:

66 MSV 19 (October 1910): 140–41. The committee consisted of Eppel (Bischweiler); Schultz (Markirch); Hoffet and Fath (Metz); Kuntz, Sandoz, and Scheer (Mulhouse); and Freudenfeld, Nieden and Piepenbring (Strasbourg). 67 MSV 20 ( July 1911): 143. 68 “Entwurf einer Kirchenordnung für die reformierte Kirche in Elsaß-Lothringen,” MSV 20 (1911): 154–73; June 1911 Synod proceedings, ADBR 147 AL 7/4.

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The church can only carry out its duties fully, which is also in the state’s interest, when it is free of the state’s political concerns. Nothing damages the church more in the eyes of the public than the suspicion that it is the faithful servant of a given ruler. . . . The Synod’s wish that the powers that the church exercises on its own authority, and those for which the state has a right of oversight, should not be seen as a sign of distrust towards the state, . . . but rather the church’s will to do justice to the needs of the modern world and to fulfill its mission in the same.69

The Synod thus claimed the right to determine its rules of order and set its own agenda. It would have the power to make regulations that were necessary for implementing the new constitution. The Calvinists also maintained their support for women’s suffrage, which the Synod had endorsed back in 1909, viewing the reform as a purely religious and not a political matter. “For this reason,” Piepenbring later noted, “the Synod has not been convinced by the Ministry’s objections. . . . The Gospel recognizes no difference between men and women within the religious community.” The Synod was similarly in favor of extending suffrage rights to resident foreigners (essentially restoring the pre-1872 status quo), in light of the large numbers of Swiss Calvinists who had taken up residence in and around Mulhouse. The Ministry’s desire for maximum uniformity between the Lutheran and Reformed church structures, however, was not the driving force behind the Calvinists’ reliance on the Lutheran example. Rather, the decision was a matter of practicality and prestige. Lutheran and Reformed parishes coexisted in cities like Strasbourg and Bischweiler, which made it essential that the basic definition of the parish and parochial voting rights, for instance, be as similar as possible. Moreover, to bolster its claims for equal status in the eyes of state and society, the Calvinists wanted to ensure that their church looked as modern and had the same types of privileges as did the Lutheran church. Hence, taking advantage of the situations the Lutherans created, the Calvinists’ constitutional committee gave the Synod the power to approve materials for the schools’ religious education classes, a power the Superior Consistory enjoyed since 1802. Nevertheless, the Calvinists departed from the Lutheran model. Many of these “variations” reflected the differences in the churches’ respective situations. Because of its large diaspora population, the Reformed church had been forced to establish auxiliary parishes—parishes for 69

Piepenbring to Petri, 22 July 1911, ADBR 1125 W 2.

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which the state assumed no financial responsibility—and it now proposed that these parishes have the same legal rights and representation in the consistory as state-supported parishes. Likewise, because the Reformed consistories had more responsibilities and formal authority than their Lutheran equivalents (e.g., they, and not the Synod appointed pastors), the Calvinists decided to retain the practice of electing half of the parish council and consistory members every three years (the “partial election” system), although the Lutherans had opted to do away with this. Led by the delegates from Metz, where unionist sympathies of the largely immigrant population were strong, the Synod also and endorsed two “deviations” that were more problematic, for the Lutherans and the state. First, the Synod resolved to define as members of a Reformed parish those “Protestants” living in a district where there was a Reformed church (unless those Protestants were members of a military parish). The difficulty here, as several members observed during the debates, was that in Alsace, this definition would make many Lutherans members of a Reformed parish. Then, the Synod resolved that all parishioners who met the stated requirements be automatically placed on the parish’s electoral rolls. This too had the potential of making Lutherans electors in the Reformed church. Furthermore, as the debates in the Superior Consistory had already revealed, in the absence of reliable data from police authorities, this policy—however desirable—could not be implemented. Clearly, the Protestant churches had not endorsed all of the government’s positions in the texts they sent to the Ministry.70 Nevertheless, Undersecretary Petri was satisfied with how the reform discussions were proceeding that he worked closely with the churches over the second half of 1912 to reach mutually acceptable compromises on the outstanding issues. In July, he sent Piepenbring the Ministry’s initial reactions to the Reformed Church’s proposal, so that the Synod could act on them when it met in October. Petri advised the Calvinists to reconsider their definition of the local community and their approach to church registration. He also thought that the Calvinists should follow the Lutherans’ lead in modernizing many of the Church’s bureaucratic procedures. In addition, Petri questioned the wisdom of retaining the

70 The Superior Consistory’s materials did not arrive at the Ministry until the end of January 1912.

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system of partial election and the recommendation that pastors be eligible for appointment as parish council secretaries in cities like Metz and Mulhouse.71 Petri also accepted President Curtius’s request for a private meeting in July, in which the Lutheran President defended the Church’s rationale behind enfranchising women’s suffrage and how the new constitution would take effect.72 Most critically, Petri asked one of Germany’s foremost experts on public law, Otto Mayer of the University of Leipzig, to provide a formal legal opinion on the Protestant churches’ reform proposals.73 Although Petri could easily have asked someone in Strasbourg to do this, his choice of Mayer made sense. Prior to arriving in Leipzig in late 1902, Mayer had taught at Strasbourg, where he also completed one six-year term on the Superior Consistory (serving two of those years with Petri himself ).74 Mayer’s brief supported the Ministry’s position on two major points. He, too, believed that the government should “clearly and resolutely retain the foundations of ecclesiastical law [in the Reichsland],” believing this law to be in the best interest of both church and state. He also supported the Ministry’s reluctance to enfranchise women, a position he reaffirmed in a letter to Petri dated 27 September 1912: “I believe it would be best if this experiment were held elsewhere first . . ., for if women decide to take full advantage of their rights, it could get very uncomfortable. And at that point the church’s representatives would be unwilling to approve revoking it.”75 Mayer contended, however, that the state could be more accommodating of the churches’ concerns. He recommended that the new law include provisions that expressly gave the churches a role in the creation (or amendment) of church law. He also advised the state to renounce the power to make ordinances for the church, at least as they concerned internal matters. In a follow-up letter dated 11 August, Mayer explained that this practice actually resulted from an abuse of 71 “Ministerialverfügung, betreffend den Entwurf einer Kirchenordnung für die reformierte Kirche in Elsaß-Lothringen,” 15 July 1912, printed in MSV 21 (Nov 1912): 180 – 88. 72 Curtius met with Petri on July 5, but saw Geheimrat Lentze, who was then in charge of the portfolio for Protestant church affairs, three additional times that month, on 19, 20 and 23 July. ADBR 136 AL 15/47. 73 Mayer’s report is dated 1 August 1912, which meant that Petri made his request sometime in July. ADBR 136 AL 15/47. 74 On Mayer’s specific interests in church law, see Heyen, “Otto Mayers Kirchenrecht.” 75 Mayer to Petri, (undated but clearly September 1912), ADBR 136 AL 15/47.

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the 1852 Decree-Law, which intended to grant the state the power to make such regulations only temporarily.76 In light of these reflections, Mayer suggested that Petri’s next course of action should be to draft a law that would “articulate the church’s major elements, enumerate the basic functions of the different organs of government, and declare the state’s rights vis-à-vis the church.” Everything else, Mayer emphasized in a letter dated 17 August, the churches should settle by decree (subject in certain instances to governmental approval). In short, Mayer argued, there should be only two sources of law for the Reichsland’s Protestant churches: formal laws (Staatsgesetze) and the ordinances of the Superior Consistory and Synod.77 That Petri decided to follow Mayer’s counsel emerges clearly from the undersecretary’s dealings with the Lutheran and Reformed churches that fall and winter. On 23 October 1912 he informed the Superior Consistory (having already alerted its constitutional commission informally back in September) that church reform would proceed, but only as the current provisions of church law dictated, that is, via a bill drafted by the state. Nevertheless, he promised that this law would grant the Superior Consistory the power to regulate those ecclesiastical matters not covered in the law. Likewise, the government agreed to relinquish its right to convene the Superior Consistory and approve its agenda. Petri also expressed the state’s satisfaction with the latest approach to organizing the consistories and with the transformation of inspectors into visitors, and he considered those issues settled. On the issue of women’s suffrage, Petri announced the government would not budge, especially since there was no absolute majority in favor of it in the 1911 inspectional assemblies.78 When the Superior Consistory met in November 1912, it expressed gratitude for the Ministry’s readiness to work with the church to legalize the reforms it desired, even if it also regretted the government’s unwillingness to modernize further Alsatian church law. The constitutional commission’s report recommended endorsing most of the compromises that the Directory proposed.79 However, the commission urged the

Mayer to Petri, 11 Aug 1912, ADBR 136 AL 15/47. Mayer to Petri, 17 Aug 1912, ADBR 136 AL 15/47. Mayer actually focused his comments on the Lutheran situation, but they applied in equal measure to the Reformed church. 78 AS 67 (1912): 149 –79; ADBR 136 AL 15/47. 79 Ibid., 190 – 97. 76

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Ministry to reconsider its stance on women’s suffrage, proposing that each parish council be allowed to introduce active and passive voting rights for women with a two-thirds majority vote. It also objected to some of the regulatory areas over which the Ministry intended to exert oversight privileges, for example, the validation of electoral registers and church elections. “These have nothing to do with citizenship rights [which would have made them a legitimate state concern],” the commission report declared, “since it is membership in an ecclesiastical corporation and not one’s status as citizen that confers the right to vote.” After a brief debate, the Superior Consistory voted on 20 November to adopt the commission’s recommendations, which concluded the lengthy negotiations between the Lutherans and the Ministry on the content of the church reform legislation.80 It now remained to arrive at a similar consensus with the Calvinists. The October 1912 Synod session had not been as productive as Petri had hoped. Not only did the Synod fail to resolve questions like the definition of the local parish community, but it also decided to reorganize its consistories without settling that matter either.81 In a latter dated 13 November, he encouraged the Synod to continue its work. He also used the opportunity to inform the Synod that the Ministry would resolve the church and state issues raised by the Calvinists’ proposal in the same manner as it did with the Lutherans. The state would grant the Calvinists a role in future changes to the church constitution. It would also give the Synod similar rights to regulate all church affairs not mentioned in the law that the Ministry would draw up. However, out of respect for the differences between the churches, the Ministry decided to draft two separate—yet still fairly similar—pieces of reform legislation, one for each Protestant church.82 In early February 1913, Petri met with the Synod’s constitution committee to help it hammer out solutions to the outstanding issues. The committee agreed to recognize only three types of local communities: parishes, auxiliary parishes and independent missions. On the issue of how to define the local community, the committee remained deadlocked, but it later decided to endorse Petri’s compromise (and somewhat circular) suggestion as well: “The members of a church who

80 81 82

Ibid., 10. “Ergebnis der Synodaltagung,” MSV 21 (1912): 188–91. Petri to Piepenbring, 13 Nov 1912, W 1125 6/2.

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reside in the district of a parish comprise a Kirchengemeinde.” And after Petri indicated that the government would not oppose a reduction in the number of Reformed consistories, the committee proposed that Strasbourg and Bischweiler be combined into a single body, and that Markirch be invited to join either Mulhouse or Strasbourg-Bischweiler (on the principle that no consistory should be composed of a single parish).83 When the Synod convened in June, it endorsed its committee’s recommendations on the definition of the local church community. It seconded the proposal to reduce the number of consistories, such that each consistory would have the same minimal representation in the Synod (namely five pastors and five laymen). Consistories with more than 20,000 parishioners would then be entitled to additional representation in the Synod. In keeping with this change, the Synod increased the size of the Synod’s executive committee to seven: two members from each consistory plus the president. At long last, as the newly elected president, Karl Albert Kuntz (Mulhouse) wrote Petri on 1 August 1913, the Reformed Church was ready for the Ministry to transform its proposals into legislation.84 While the Calvinists were finishing their deliberations, the Ministry drew up a draft of the law for the Lutheran church. The Directory received a copy of this text on 29 May 1913, which the Superior Consistory reviewed at its November 1913 session. As Petri noted in his introductory comments, the Ministry strove to reproduce as much as of the form and content of the proposal as possible, which the Superior Consistory had approved in 1911 (with the additional refinements of 1912). As promised, the Ministry included language that gave the church a formal role in any future change to the church constitution (the Superior Consistory had to act on any amendment proposed by the government). It also confirmed the right to issue ordinances for the church’s internal administration (section 74). The content areas of ordinances that would require ministerial approval were also enumerated (section 75). Lastly, the bill repealed the Organic Articles for the

83 “Notz zur Besprechung mit der Abordnung der Synode,” ADBR 1225 W 6/2; “Bericht über die Verhandlungen der Verfassungskommission,” and “Ministerielle Schreiben über Verfassungsfragen,” MSV 22 (Apr 1913): 196–201. Neither Markirch nor Bischweiler supported this reform, but they were outvoted. ADBR 1225 W 2. 84 “Ergebnisse der Synodaltagung,” MSV 23 (1913): 207–10.

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Protestant Churches (the first eight excepted, which paralleled laws binding on the Catholics) and the Decree-Law of 1852.85 When the Superior Consistory convened on 13 November, it voted unanimously to inform the Ministry of its general satisfaction with the proposed legislation. However, it did suggest a few amendments. Some were technical in nature, others were more substantive and touched on issues that drove the reform movement from the very beginning. For instance, the Superior Consistory wanted the bill to state the parish councils’ and consistories’ specific religious and ecclesiastical obligations, in order to emphasize that these were inherent rather than subsidiary attributes of the two bodies. The Superior Consistory also asked the Ministry to amend the section dealing with Strasbourg’s church council to allow the individual parish councils to convene sessions of the council, since they and not the consistories were the parish’s legal representatives. The Superior Consistory then concluded by charging the Directory to draft regulations to cover the items not included in the law (but mentioned in Sections 74 and 75), so that these texts would be ready for promulgation once the bill became law.86 By the time the Superior Consistory endorsed the language for the Lutheran law, the Ministry had prepared the corresponding draft of the bill for the Reformed Church that was sent to President Kuntz on 20 December 1913. This text contained few surprises, since the Ministry strove to be faithful to the agreements reached with the Synod. However, to hasten the review process—the Ministry wanted to present the two Protestant bills as a package before the Landtag as soon as possible—Petri drafted language to cover a few issues where a final consensus was still outstanding. In this way, the Synod could resolve these matters and present the Ministry with any further requests for amendment at the same time.87 When the Synod convened on 29 June 1914, it also ratified the Ministry’s draft, albeit with a few comments and recommendations for amendment. It expressed its satisfaction that the bill allocated the same types of regulatory prerogatives to the Synod that the Lutheran Superior Consistory enjoyed. Nonetheless, it too was disappointed that the Ministry had not allowed the Synod greater autonomy in exercising “Entwurf eines Gesetzes betreffend die Verfassung der Kirche Augsburgischer Konfession,” AS 68 (1913). 86 AS 68 (1913): 6, and 214–21. 87 Petri to Kunz, 20 Dec 1913, printed in MSV 24 (1914): 235. 85

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these rights. It took issue with the Ministry’s steadfast refusal to deny voting rights to women and foreigners, although only in the latter case did it ask the Ministry to reconsider its decision.88 It also requested a series of minor modifications, like reinstating a one-year residency requirement for voting in the parish and requiring each consistory to name one lay and one clerical delegate to the Synod’s executive committee. In addition, the Synod moved to merge the existing consistories of Strasbourg, Bischweiler, and Markirch into a single consistory, along with parishes in two Lorrainer counties (Rappoltsweiler and Saargemünd). Then, as its final act, the Synod approved the texts that Kuntz prepared to implement the new church law, thereby getting a jump on the Lutherans.89 After almost twenty years of discussion, debate and controversy, the Lutheran and Reformed Churches achieved most of their primary goals in pursuing church reform. The two bills reorganized both churches on the basis of the local community, which also gained greater independence and autonomy. Both bills promoted a modernization—above all in the sense of an urbane embourgeoisement—in the churches’ organization and their relations to the state, even if, in the latter instance, the churches did not obtain as much as they had hoped.90 By accentuating the authority of the central instances of church government, respectively the Superior Consistory and Synod, the bills also enhanced the degree to which Strasbourg’s urban culture influenced religious life in the rest of the Reichsland. At the same time, the legislative proposals promised to facilitate the churches’ efforts to maintain healthy urban religious communities. They reasserted the parish councils’ and consistories’ religious character, and removed some of the barriers to men’s participation, at least, in their activities. The Lutheran text established

88 Indeed, the Synod had consistently had a sizeable majority in favor of enfranchising women, which, according to the Ministry’s position in 1910, should have allowed women to vote (although not be elected). Here, however, the Ministry’s need to treat the Lutherans and Calvinists in the same manner worked to the disadvantage of the latter. 89 The texts for both the draft law and the draft ordinances were printed in the “Einladung zur Synodaltagung die am 29. Juni d. Js. [1914], um halb drei Uhr nachmittags, im Betsaal der reformierten Kirche zu Straßburg eröffnet werden wird,” ADBR 1125 W 2. 90 Frank-Michael Kuhlemann has made similar arguments, at least with respect to the pastors, about the Protestant church in Baden, see idem, Bürgerlichkeit und Religion, esp. 22–37.

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a municipal church commission for Strasbourg, which made it easier for the city’s parishes to take action on areas of common concern, like religious education in the schools. Above all, the Lutheran text introduced district parishes to Strasbourg, promising relief to the problem of unregistered Protestants. In fact, Curtius was so eager on this point that in April 1914 he already began the process of establishing parish boundaries for Strasbourg.91 We can only speculate on how these reforms might have improved religious conditions in Strasbourg and the rest of the Reichsland, because the Protestant church reform bills never made it before the Landtag. Just as the Ministry was completing its draft of the bill for the Reformed Church, a political maelstrom broke over the military’s handling of an incident between Alsatian youth and soldiers garrisoned in the town of Zabern. When Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg and Emperor Wilhelm II decided to uphold the army’s decision not to punish the flagrant instance of military insubordination, Statthalter Wedel, State Secretary Zorn von Bulach, and the four undersecretaries of state—Petri included—tendered their resignations in late January 1914.92 This development suspended ministerial action on the legislation. The new Statthalter and State Secretary, respectively Hans von Dallwitz and Siegfried von Roedern, were conservative Prussian civil servants who opposed the concessions that the Empire made to Alsace-Lorraine since 1900. Furthermore, Petri’s successor as Undersecretary for Justice and Religious Affairs, Joseph Frenken, was not only unfamiliar with the complex political and religious issues the reform bills raised, he was also a Catholic (from Cologne) and did not accord the legislation the same sort of urgency as had Petri.93 Then, in August, war broke out. The first casualty of the Reichsland’s militarization was President Curtius, who resigned in September after Statthalter Dallwitz announced that he would maintain in peacetime the military’s ban on French-language religious services in the German

91 Circular letter to the Strasbourg city parish councils and consistories, 11 April 1914, copy in SPJ, vol. 4 (23 April 1914). 92 A German lieutenant insulted Alsatian army recruits by calling them “wackes” (roughly the equivalent of calling Poles “Polacks”). The standard accounts of the “Zabern Affair” are Wehler, “Der Fall Zabern”; Silverman, Reluctant Union, 190–98; and David Schoenbaum, Zabern 1913: Consensus Politics in Imperial Germany (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1982). 93 Schoenberg, Zabern, 164–67.

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language zone.94 Upon taking office in 1915, the new Lutheran President, Hans von der Goltz (the son of the long-serving governmental commissioner), persuaded the Ministry to resume work on the church reform bills. The records from the Division for Justice and Religious Affairs, however, reveal that the Ministry was already planning on scaling back the autonomy it would grant the churches.95 But even this effort brought no results. On 9 January 1917 Undersecretary Menge (Frenken had departed in 1916) had the civil servant responsible for Protestant church affairs, Friedrich Lentze, cease work on the bills. Later that year the government informed the Directory and the Synod that, on account of the disruptions caused by the war, the churches’ councils had become incompetent to pass judgment on such a critical matter as ecclesiastical reorganization. Church reform would have to wait until peacetime.96 Peace returned to Alsace-Lorraine in 1918, but so too did the French, who were too busy reintegrating the “lost provinces” into the secular French Republic to concern themselves with the specific organizational needs of the eastern Protestants.97

Printed explanation of Curtius’s resignation, ADBR 172 AL 253. ADBR 136 AL 15/47. 96 Michaelis, “Die evangelische Kirche in Elsaß-Lothringen, ihre Verfassung in ihr innerer Werdegang 1870 bis 1918,” in Das Reichsland Elsaß-Lothringen, Verfassung und Verwaltung, 2:509 –10. 97 Bernard Vogler provides a good introduction to the messy history of AlsaceLorraine’s return to France in idem, Histoire politique, 215–50. On the situation within the Protestant churches, see now Catherine Storne-Sengel, Les Protestants d’Alsace-Lorraine de 1919 à 1939: Entre les deux règnes (Strasbourg: Publications de la Société Savante d’Alsace, 2003). Both Protestant churches, however, continued to push for changes in the electoral regulations. In 1922 the French state reduced the voting age to 25, but it rebuffed once more the request to enfranchise women. Ibid., 54–55. 94 95

CONCLUSION With the outbreak of the First World War, the high season of European urbanization came to an end. Europe’s evolution into a land of city dwellers, of course, did not stop in 1914 or even 1918. But the dizzying pace of demographic and physical expansion, which gave rise to scores of big and giant cities during the final decades of the long nineteenth century, was over and the reorientation of European life around urban standards essentially accomplished. Urban modernity continued to spread in Europe, but in a much more leisurely fashion. Strasbourg’s position on the front lines was especially fatal to its urban renaissance. Military authorities took control of the city and diverted its resources for wartime needs. The development of the new port and commercial facilities ceased, and university enrollments dropped. Seminaries and schools became hospitals and clinics, while clergy left their parishes to serve the soldiers as chaplains. War also halted population growth. Not only did more than three thousand residents lose their lives between 1914 –1918 (roughly 1.75 percent of the total population), but thousands more departed the city between 1918–1920 due to the French government’s decision to expel virtually everyone of old-German descent from Alsace-Lorraine after the war.1 Alsace-Lorraine’s return to France did result in the immigration of French men and women “from the Interior,” but when the census was taken in 1921, Strasbourg still had roughly twelve thousand fewer inhabitants than in 1910.2 One vestige of German rule, however, remained: the tradition of local, ecclesiastical law. Although church and state had been separated in France since 1905, the French government opted to retain the ecclesiastical status quo in the “lost provinces” during the transition period. Whereas the French state had little to do with the churches in the rest of France, it renewed its involvement in the Catholic, Jewish, and Protestant communities’ affairs in Alsace and Lorraine. It approved 1 Livet and Rapp, Histoire de Strasbourg, 4:397; a good overview of the French government’s “purification” policies (which also led to the voluntary emigration of many Germanophile native Alsatians, such as Strasbourg’s Mayor Schwander), appears in David Allen Harvey, Constructing Class and Nationality in Alsace, 1830 –1945 (De Kalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2001), 130–40. 2 178,891 inhabitants in 1910 as against 166,767 in 1921; Statistique de Strasbourg, 14.

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their internal regulations. It confirmed clerical appointments and paid clerical salaries. The state also maintained the faculties of Protestant and Catholic theology at the University of Strasbourg. In February 1924, Premier Édouard Herriot moved to end the exceptional situation in the East to promote the region’s full reintegration into the French nation. The Alsatians and Lorrainers were content to see the provisional political authority dismantled; nonetheless, they energetically protested against the plan to disestablish the regional churches. Ultimately, the remonstrations succeeded. At the beginning of 1925, the Conseil d’État confirmed the validity of the Concordatary legislation in Alsace-Lorraine. Then the rising tide of public discontent forced Herriot and the Cartel des Gauches from power in April. The politicians of Republican France made no serious attempt to annul the Napoleonic ecclesiastical regime in Alsace-Lorraine, which made the French departments of Moselle, Lower-Rhine, and Upper-Rhine the only places in France where, even today, church and state are not formally separated.3 The arousal of such passion in Alsace-Lorraine in response to the Herriot government’s ecclesiastical politics testifies to the vigor of religious culture in the region and its evolution during German rule. Far from dying out, religious identities were so reenergized after 1871 that the web of confessional institutions, practices, and relationships became key elements in a powerful definition of regional identity. The regionalist dimension of German nationalism helped encourage this development, just as the changes at work in the Reichsland’s urban centers did, especially Strasbourg. Urbanization permitted religious culture to develop in new ways in the cities and enhanced the ties between urban and rural faith communities. The emergence of a more professionalized, urbane clergy trained at the modern University of Strasbourg was partially responsible, but improvements in regional transportation and communications networks also enhanced access to the city’s cultural offerings. Newspapers like the Protestant Kirchenbote and the Catholic Volksfreund spread news about religious events in the city to smaller towns and villages. Trains and trams enabled the faithful in outlying areas to hear lectures, concerts of religious music, or participate in celebrations connected with a major church conference

3 Useful on the religious situation in Alsace (and Lorraine) after 1918 are Rossé, Das Elsass, 1:648–88 and 3:382–92; Strohl, Protestantisme, 345–46; and Storne-Sengel, Protestants, 282–98.

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in Strasbourg, such as the 1899 Congress for the Inner Mission and the 1905 Katholikentag. Indeed, these urban confessional networks played a large role in making Alsatian Catholic and Protestant protests so effective in 1924–25. In many respects, the American Congregationalist minister Josiah Strong had it right when he predicted that the twentieth century would be a decidedly urban one.4 Modernity, at least in the Western sense, is largely equivalent with urbanity, particularly as represented by conditions in the big city. Yet, we still have much more to learn about what urbanization actually entailed in terms of modernization. This book has sought to contribute to this project by calling attention to developments in a particular type of big city, namely, the regional administrative and cultural center, which has not figured significantly in the scholarly literature on late nineteenth-century European urbanization. Moving away from the bright lights of Europe’s biggest cities, furthermore, makes it possible to take up a question that has long demanded rigorous analysis: did urbanization also result in secularization, at least in the big cities themselves? The evidence from Strasbourg suggests that, here too, a reappraisal is in order. Europe’s big cities were complex places, sites where a wide range of developments unfolded and at varying rates. Rather than assuming that religion ceased to play a significant role in this environment, as contemporary sociologists and other observers have asserted, this study proceeds from a different logic. By focusing on Strasbourg’s Protestant community, it makes the evolution of this group and its religious structures legible in the midst of the rapid social, cultural, and political changes that accompanied urbanization between 1870 and 1914. It identifies the challenges that urbanization posed, while also highlighting the opportunities that the new conditions offered both to revitalize existing understandings and to promote alternative visions of religious community. Strasbourg’s competitive confessional environment and the state’s influence over Protestant church affairs may have constrained some of the choices available to the city’s Lutheran and Calvinist communities, but both churches repeatedly sought out ways to adapt to the new circumstances and members’ needs. They pursued modifications to the institutions of church government and parish organization. They

4 Josiah Strong, The Twentieth Century City (New York: Library of American Civilization, 1898; New York: Arno Press, 1970), 53. Reference is to the Arno edition.

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made innovations in the areas of liturgy and public ministry. Above all, Strasbourg’s Protestant community exploited the conditions of modernity to effect a more idealistic realization of core principles in order to become more Protestant. This is especially evident in the constitutional discussions after 1905, but it also appears in the expansion of options that made being Protestant in Strasbourg less reliant on the structures of the visible church. In short, Strasbourg’s Protestant communities were not in the least relics, incapable either of change or making positive contributions to modern urban culture. Instead they were social groups that evinced considerable dynamism and vitality. In keeping with this effort to see, à la Ranke, how things really were with religion in a big city like Strasbourg, this book also dispenses with essentialist notions of religion that have long stood at the heart of secularization theory and, by extension, most understandings of European modernity. Instead of maintaining that religion could only influence social or cultural life in one way, or that religion could only be a meaningful sociocultural agent if it dominates an entire social system, the present study prefers to assess religion’s place in modern, urban society as if it were a sociocultural force like class, gender, or capitalism. In other words, religion was competitive in the complex modern, urban environment and this work inquires to what extent. Did individual men and women claim, actively or passively, membership in religious groups? Did they read Protestant newspapers or attend concerts of religious music? What kind of influence did values of religious provenance have on notions of public morality? Viewed from this vantage point, there is little question that religion, even the “official” forms privileged throughout this study, held its own in the urban environment. In 1914, for instance, more people belonged to Strasbourg’s established churches than all of the political parties combined. Organ concerts and performances of sacred music, such as the Good Friday programs at St. William, were among the highlights of the city’s cultural life, and groups like the Urban Mission were at the forefront of municipal efforts to combat social evils such as drunkenness and prostitution. Another important indication of religion’s modernity at the end of the nineteenth century was that churches no longer stood alone as sources and disseminators of transcendence. This may well reveal that churches lost ground as sociocultural institutions in the big cities, but it should not be viewed as secularization. The new public school systems, for instance, provided their charges multiple hours of religious instruction each week. Secular newspapers reported on major ecclesiastical events

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such as appointment controversies, church-state difficulties, and public commemorations of famous religious figures such as Martin Luther. But dailies like the liberal-leaning Straßburger Post also printed the weekly service schedule for the city’s Protestant and Catholic parishes, as well as reflections on the meaning of such holy days as Christmas or Easter. The German state, too, did its part to promote religious values, even while it encroached on the churches’ traditional prerogatives. It required that the schools, primary and secondary, provide religious instruction. It provided funds to support new church construction. And until the end of the Kaiserreich, Germany’s political rulers continued to maintain an image of Germany as, if not a Protestant nation, at least a Christian state. Men like Emperor Wilhelm II and Statthalter Manteuffel participated visibly in Protestant church affairs, and state events like the Emperor’s birthday continued to be celebrated as religious festivals. Lastly, the survival of religious community and culture in the big city helped promote the vitality of faith communities far beyond the city’s limits. Urban modernity, in short, failed to promote secularization in the smaller towns and rural villages because, as in the cities, it was not unilaterally secular. As we noted earlier, the big cities’ universities, in Strasbourg, Berlin and Leipzig trained lawyers, scientists, and sociologists, as well as the clergy that ministered in urban and rural parishes. Likewise these clergy took their “marching orders” from the church establishments located in places like Strasbourg, Frankfurt, Berlin, and Hanover. Berlin, Cologne, Leipzig, Strasbourg and Stuttgart were also centers of a vibrant religious media industry, whose products made their way across Germany via the growing network of railways, roads and postal stations. When religious organizations like the Protestant League or the Inner Mission organized their national meetings, they turned to big cities to serve as hosts, since the necessary resources for such large events were only readily available there. Conditions in the metropolis not only revitalized and made possible new forms of local religious organization, but they also helped Alsatians and Germans imagine themselves as members of supra-local—regional and national—faith communities. The present work on Protestantism and religious culture in late nineteenth-century Strasbourg indicates how we might begin to think about the encounter of religion and modernity in Europe’s big cities. The signs are clear that the time has come to dismiss the notion of the “secular city” as an urban legend. On the one hand, we are discovering there was a lot more to urban religion, in Strasbourg and elsewhere,

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than old-fashioned Kirchlichkeit. In a number of important aspects, it is evident that religious impulses continued to shape life in the big city. Because urban religious communities were indeed alive and well and because faith communities contributed significantly to the big city’s expanding cultural offerings, the city’s pull on the surrounding areas was not just secular but also sacred in nature. In short, while it would be foolish to suggest that early twentieth-century Strasbourg, much less Berlin or Paris, was a “city of God,” neither were they populated completely by religion’s cultural despisers. The modern big city was a large place where secular and sacred influences coexisted and were, to an important degree, codependent on one another.

APPENDICES A. The Members of the Directory of the Church of the Augsburg Confession (Lutheran Church) of Alsace-Lorraine, 1870 –1914 President

Religious Inspector

Théodore Braun

1850 –1871

Johann Friedrich Bruch (acting) J. L. Eduard Kratz

1871–1872

Christian Friedrich Petri

1885–1903

Friedrich Curtius

1903–1914

1872–1885

Johann Friedrich Bruch (ST) Karl Gustav Ungerer (NK) Daniel Christian Teutsch (Buchs.) Martin Krencker (Lützelstein)

1866–1874 1874–1891 1892–1903 1903–1918

Governmental Commissioner

General Secretary (non-voting)

Frédéric-Charles Rau 1850 –1870 Heinrich Richter 1872–1880 Alexander Freiherr von der 1880–1913 Goltz Adolf Goetz 1913–1918

Eugen Webb Andreas Weber Friedrich K. Emil Küß Otto Stübel

Superior Consistory Delegates J. L. Eduard Kratz Edouard Goguel Christian F. Petri Eugen Boeckel Emil Petri Georg Roth Jean Höffel Charles Bergmann Theodor Renaud Wilhelm Nowack

1850 –1872 1868–1889 1872–1880 1880 –1896 1889–1898 1896–1912 1898–1902, 1908–1914 1902–1904 1906–1908 1912–1914

1868–1872 1872–1874 1874–1910 1910 –1918

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appendices B. The Membership of the Lutheran Superior Consistory, 1870–1914

(*indicates Strasbourg resident) New Church Inspection Religious Inspector

St. William Inspection (founded 1877) Religious Inspector

Karl Ungerer (NK) 1868–1892* Karl Kromayer (Westhofen) 1892– 98 Theodor Höpffner (NK) 1898–1913* Edmund Unsinger (Schiltigheim) 1914–1943

K. Friedrich Riff (Str.-Ruprechtsau) 1877–1883* Philipp Weltz (Baldenheim) 1884 –1900 Georg Metzger (Str.-Neudorf) 1901–1932*

Lay Delegate I Eduard Gog uel, 1870 –1889* Rodolphe Reuss, 1889–1896* Charles Bergmann, 1896–1904* Georg Wolf, 1904–1914* Lay Delegate II Eugene Boeckel, senior 1870 –1896* Georg Roth, 1896–1912* Michel Baerst (Mundolsheim), 1912–1914 St. Thomas Inspection Religious Inspector Johann F. Bruch (SND), 1850 –1874* Karl Heinrich Heintz (ST), 1874–1892* Michel Knittel (SND), 1892–1914* Johann Adam (Dorlisheim), 1914–1936 Lay Delegate I Friedrich Wilhelm Bergmann, 1870–1886* Charles Kern, 1886–1892* Karl Scheer, 1892–1914* Lay Delegate II Charles S chützenberger, 1870 –1880* Eugen Boeckel, junior, 1880 –1899* Paul Luc ius, 1899 –1902* Wilhelm Nowack, 1902–1914*

Lay Delegate I August Schneegans, 1877–1881* Michel Anton, 1881–1892* Georges Flach, 1892–1898* Adolf Riff, 1898–1914* Lay Delegate II Georges Frick, 1877–1912* Julius Weirich, 1912–1914* Delegates from the St. Thomas Foundation Eduard R euss, 1870 –1872* vacant, 1872–1875 Reuss, 1875–1880* August C unitz, 1880 –1886* Emil Heitz, 1886–1892* Karl Theodore Gerold (pastor), 1892–1914* Delegates from the Protestant Theological Faculty Eduard Reuss, 1886–1890* Heinrich Julius Holtzmann, 1890–1896* Wilhelm No wack, 1896 –1902* Paul Lobs tein, 1902 –1908* Friedrich S pitta, 1908 –1914*

appendices Buchsweiler Inspection Religious Inspector Heinrich L. Kunlin, 1850 –1886 Daniel C. Teutsch, 1896–1903 Emil Wolff, 1903–1922 Lay Delegate I Eugen R euss, 1870 –1892 Jean Höffel, 1892–1914 Lay Delegate II Friedrich P ierron, 1870 –1884* Emil P etri, 1884 –1898* Jakob Michael North, 1898–1900 Strelen, 1900–1914 Lützelstein Inspection Religious Inspector Ludwig B üchsenschütz, 1853 –1882 Martin K rencker, 1883 –1918 Lay Delegate I Jules S engenwald, 18 70 –1891* Otto Back, 1891–1914* Lay Delegate II Paul Le hr, 1870 –1874* August K üss, 1874 –1892 Schmidt, 1892–1896 Otto M ayer, 1896 –1902* Karl Friedrich Eissen, 1902–1910* Hans v. d. Goltz, 1911–1914* Weissenburg Inspection Religious Inspector Karl F. Weber, 1864 –1873 Friedrich B astian, 1874 –1893 Johann F ischer, 1894 –1902 Ludwig W agner, 1903 –1902

439

Lay Delegate I Christian F. Petri, 1870 –1885 Jean H öffel, 1885 –1892 Theophil H auth, 1892 –1900 Victor Ne ssmann, 1900 –1902* Adolf Götz, 1902–1904* Helmbold, 1904 –1910 Eugene de Dietrich, 1910 –1914 Lay Delegate II Eduard von Türckheim, 1870–1909 Adolf Götz, 1909–1912* C. E. Hoff (Str.-Ruprechtsau), 1912–1914* Colmar Inspection Religious Inspector Friedrich S challer, 1853 –1874 Louis H orst, 1874 –1889 Friedrich S chäffer, 1889 –1896 Johann M auler, 1896 –1909 Karl K lein, 1909 –1935 Lay Delegate I Jean R uhland, 1870 –1874 Frédéric H artmann, 1874 –1877 Karl Sandherr, 1877–1885 Camille S chlumberger, 1885 –1890 Jeremias Jakob Oberlin, 1890 –1906 Frédéric Chrétien Abt, 1906 –1914 Lay Delegate II Christian L. Ostermann, 1870 –1882 Charles Helbig, 1882–1888 Eugen O stermann, 1888 –1892 Theodor R enaud, 1888 –1910 Karl Zwilling, 1911–1914

440

appendices C. The Pastors of Strasbourg’s Lutheran Parishes

Inner-city New Church Franz Haerter Georges Louis Leblois Karl Gustav Ungerer Ludwig Gustav Kopp Gustav Wilhelm Haerter Theodor Eugen Höpffner Eduard Hickel Ernst Reinhard Eichler Paul Grünberg Christoph Emil Albert Schadé

1829 –1874 1853 –1897 1861–1892 1866 –1898 1874 –1903 1893 –1926 1897–1908 1898 –1919 1903 –1919 1908 –1932

Old St. Peter Karl Theodor Fuchs 1844 –1883 Christian Karl Krieger 1849 –1881 Karl Friedrich Bögner 1867–1892 Johann Albert Courvoisier 1881–1882 Ludwig Will 1882–1914 Heinrich Albert Blind 1883 –1909 Paul Grünberg 1892–1904 Paul Theodor Matter 1904 –1934 Johann Klein 1909 –1943 St. Aurelia Wilhelm August Schmidt Karl Christian Meyer Friedrich Julius A. Kromayer Friedrich Heinrich A. Jäger Georg Emil Schweitzer St. Nicholas French Friedrich August Eschenauer Karl Albert Schillinger Johann Theodor Beck Philipp Adolf Freydinger Johann Gottfried Roser Louis Horst Karl Gustav Bieler Ferdinand Ménégoz

1836 –1872 1867–1896 1872–1896 1896 –1922 1897–1915 1866 –1872 1870 –1872 1872–1880 1876 –1889 1880 –1889 1889 –1895 1896 –1904 1904 –1915

St. Nicholas German Johann Friedrich Bruch Gottfried Dürrbach Georg August Schaller Karl Theodor Gerold Michel Knittel August Ernst

1831–1874 1831–1870 1853 –1877 1871–1928 1877–1914 1914 –1918

St. Thomas Johann Wilhelm Baum 1847–1878 Karl Heinrich Heintz 1856–1892 Friedrich Adolf 1864 –1887 Bühlmann Philipp August Lambs 1879 –1899 Johann August Eugen Stern 1887–1926 Hermann August Hering 1892–1937 August Ernst 1900 –1914 St. William Gottfried Friedrich Redslob Heinrich Wilhelm Kienlen Gustav Adolf Riff Eugen Albert Engelmann Karl Tubach Julius August Redslob Robert Will Gustav Lasch Georg Eugen Herrmann Young St. Peter Friedrich Horning Gustav Adolf Kreiss Heinrich Ludwig Scheffer Emil Nied Wilhelm Horning Christian Karl Hackenschmidt August Ernst Hertzog Paul Wagner

1840 –1871 1858–1876 1860 –1871 1872–1898 1872–1906 1877–1905 1899 –1922 1905–1932 1906–1938 1845–1882 1854 –1870 1859 –1885 1871–1890 1882–1908 1885 –1915 1890 –1918 1908–1916

appendices Hospital Chaplain Ange Theophil Sommerau 1869 –1893 Albert Lindner 1893 –1909 Michael Spack 1909 –1940 (The chaplain was a member of the ST Consistory) Suburban Königshofen Karl Braun (Pfv.) Karl Braun Kronenburg Paul Bruns

1903–1905 1905–1919 1904–1918

Neudorf Julius Rathgeber Georg Metzger Hermann Störmer Eugen Zier

441 1879–1893 1893–1932 1901–1919 1911–1919

Neuhof August Kayser 1868–1873 Johann Bresch 1873–1890 Karl Friedrich Neidhardt 1891–1922 Ruprechtsau Karl Friedrich Riff Alfred Schaller Karl Bach Friedrich Federlin Eduard Eugen Kuck

1865–1883 1884–1902 1892–1897 1897–1919 1903–1919

D. Officials of the Reformed Church of Alsace-Lorraine Synod Presidents Karl Buhl (Mulhouse), 1895 –1898 Karl Piepenbring (Strasbourg), 1898 –1913 Albert Kuntz (Dornach, Strasbourg), 1913 –1935 Synodal Secretary Leonhard K. Jakob Schwendener (Bischweiler), 1898 –1926 Visitors Lorraine Ludwig J. Gustav Hallier (Diedenhofen), 1904 –1919 Lower Alsace Heinrich Ernwein (Thann), 1896 –1910 Karl Stricker (Mulhouse), 1910 –1920 Upper Alsace Eduard Stricker (Strasbourg), 1896 –1910 Karl Eppel (Bischweiler), 1910 –1920

442

appendices

Strasbourg Officials Pastors: German-language parish Adam M aeder, 1816 –1872 Heinrich R öhrich, 1 873 –1879 Camille T ournier, 1879 –1883 Eduard S tricker, 1883 –1919 French-language parish Christian Karl Paira, 1862–1872 Camille T ournier, 1873 –1879 Karl P iepenbring, 18 79 –1914

Consistory Presidents Adam Maeder (Strasbourg), 1827–1872 Paul Eugen Witz (Koßweiler), 1872–1873 Heinrich Röhrich (Strasbourg), 1873 –1879 Camille Tournier (Strasbourg), 1879 –1883 Karl Piepenbring (Strasbourg), 1883 –1912 Eduard Stricker (Strasbourg), 1912–1918

E. The Political Administration of Alsace-Lorraine 1. The General Government and Superior Presidency, 1870 –1879 General-Governor Friedrich Alexander von Bismarck-Bohlen, Aug 1870 – Sep 1871 Oberpräsident Eduard von Möller, Sep 1871– Sep 1879 Civil-Commissioner Friedrich von Kühlwetter, Aug 1870 –May 1871 2. The Government of Alsace-Lorraine, 1879 –1914 The Statthalter Edwin von Manteuffel, Oct 1879 – Jun 1885 Chlodwig von Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, Nov 1885 – Oct 1894 Hermann von Hohenlohe-Langenburg, Nov 1894 – Oct 1907 Karl von Wedel, Nov 1907–May 1914 Johann (Hans) von Dallwitz, May 1914 – Oct 1918 Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine State Secretaries Karl Herzog, Oct 1879 – Jul 1880 Karl von Hofmann, Aug 1880 –Mar 1887 Max von Puttkamer, (acting) Apr 1887–1889, (definitive) 1890 – Jul 1901 Ernst von Köller, Oct 1901–Aug 1908 Hugo Zorn von Bulach, Dec 1908 –Jan 1914 Siegfried Count von Roedern, Feb 1914 –Apr 1916 Undersecretaries of the First Division (Interior Affairs, Education and Religious Affairs; education portfolio spun off in 1881, religious affairs in 1882) Albert von Pommer-Esche, 1879 –1883 Karl von Hoffman, 1883 –1887 Konrad von Studt, 1887–1889

appendices

443

Ernst von Köller, 1889 –1894 von Puttkamer, 1894 –1901 von Köller, 1901–1906 Karl Wilhelm Mandel, 1906 –1914 Siegfried Count von Roedern, 1914 –1916 Undersecretaries of the Second Division ( Justice, after 1882 Justice and Religious Affairs) Max von Puttkamer, 1880 –1894 Heinrich Hoseus, 1894 –95 Eduard Rassiga, 1895 –1898 Emil Petri, 1898 –1914 Joseph Frenken, 1914 –1916 Civil servants in the II. Abteilung with the Referat for Protestant church affairs (chronological order): Heinrich Richter Eugen Dursy Heinrich Hoseus Alexander Freiherr von der Goltz Heinrich Hildebrand Maximilian Schwalb Friedrich Lentze Directors of the Oberschulrat Heinrich Richter, 1882–1901 Paul Albrecht, 1901–1914 3. The District Presidency of Lower Alsace District Presidents (Bezirkspräsidenten) Friedrich von Luxburg, 1870 –1871 Adolph Ernst von Ernsthausen, 1871–1875 Karl Ledderhose, 1875 –1880 Otto Back, 1880 –1885 Joseph von Stichaner, 1885 –1889 Julius von Freyberg-Eisenberg, 1889 –1897 Alexander Halm, 1897–1907 Otto Pöhlmann, 1907–1918 Advisors for Religious Affairs Johann Albert Roffhack, 1873 –1895 Hermann Ledderhose, 1895 –1914

444

appendices 4. The Mayors of Strasbourg (* indicates municipal administrator)

Émile Kuss, 13 Sep 1870 –1 Mar 1871 Jules Klein (acting), 1 Mar 1871–8 Oct 1871 Ernst Lauth, 9 Oct 1871–7 Apr 1873 Otto Back, 12 Apr 1873–24 Apr 1880* Georg Stempel, 24 Apr 1880 –25 Jul 1886* Otto Back, 23 July 1886–29 Oct 1906 Rudolf Schwander, 11 Oct 1906 –2 Nov 1918

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INDEX Abitur 137n42, 300 –1, 303n32, 316 Abt, Frédéric Chrétien 403, 408, 439 Agende 51, 272. See also Kirchenbuch, (Lutheran) Agulhon, Maurice 10n31 Albecker, Christian 15 Albrecht, Paul 302n29, 326, 332 –34, 443 Alsace administration and occupation of (1870 –71) 57 – 62, 68–72 intendancy of 26 Alsace, Lower district of 44 – 45, 56, 74–75, 135, 191, 194, 218, 325 district presidency of 76, 91, 176, 203, 215, 324, 441, 443 Alsace, Upper 26, 107, 127 district of 44 – 45, 74–75, 135, 184, 191, 194, 215, 218, 222, 441 Alsace-Lorraine 3, 12 –15, 18, 74 administration 72–77, 86 – 92, 176–79, 190 (see also Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine) annexation of 55 – 57, 64 constitution of 1911, 414 ecclesiastical policy 73–77, 81, 177 – 86, 203 – 8, 214, 219, 222 – 24, 414 – 28 return to France 430 – 32 See also Germanization; Reichsland Altgeld, Wolfgang 8n21 Althoff, Friedrich 75n172, 185 Amtliche Sammlung 79, 217. See also Recueil officiel Anderson, Benedict 296 Anderson, Margaret Lavinia 7n19 Anrich, Gustav 141 anti-Semitism. See interconfessional relations antiurban discourse, nineteenth-century 2 Apostolische Gemeinde 129 Applegate, Celia 17, 25n5, 94 Arbeitskreis für kirchliche Zeitgeschichte, Münster 9n26 Aretin, Felicitas von 297 Augsburg Confession 37, 41, 51, 54 Augsburg, Peace of 26 Augustana. See Augsburg Confession

Bachmann, Peter 374 Back, Otto 88, 182, 443 as mayor of Strasbourg 13, 93 – 94, 96, 98, 444 role in Protestant church government 153n92, 163, 199, 222, 403 – 05, 409 –10, 413, 439 Baden 49n79, 100, 106, 111–12, 122, 207 Baechler, Christian 15n43 Baldensperger, Wilhelm 141 baptism 225, 280 – 83. See also church rites (Protestant) Barmen 12 Barr 192 Bartholomé, Charles 216n136 Bas-Rhin, department of 28. See also Alsace, Lower, district of Bastian, Friedrich 439 Baum, Johann Wilhelm 51, 135, 139, 141, 167, 440 Baumeister, August 299, 303 Baumeister, Reinhard 90n19, 96 Bavaria 100, 150, 296 Beck, Johann Theodor 181, 440 Beck, Thomas 134n34 Bell, Catherine 227n7 bells, church 229, 253 – 55, 257 Benzler, Willibrord (Bishop of Metz) 182n29 Bergmann, Charles 197, 437 – 38 Bergmann, Friedrich Wilhelm 438 Berlin 135, 183, 435 as big city 2, 10, 12, 83, 87n14, 102 as German political capital 66 – 69, 75, 78, 90n17, 176, 190, 193, 214, 220 – 22, 320, 414 religious situation in 113, 123, 225, 274, 285 – 86, 291, 339, 345 Besier, Gerhard 66n137 Bezirkspräsidenten. See district presidents Bible stories 311–15, 325, 335. See also religious education Bieler, Karl Gustav 440 big cities 3, 10 –12, 18, 22, 24, 82 – 83, 433 – 35. See also urbanization Bildung 139, 314, 317 Bildungsbürgertum 100n50, 136 – 39

498

index

Bischweiler 74, 133, 134n36, 187 Lutheran consistory of 42n61, 45, 192, 421 Reformed consistory of 42n61, 44, 205 – 6, 209n110, 211, 220, 420n66, 421, 426, 428, 441 Bischwiller. See Bischweiler Bismarck, Otto von 347 and administration of the Reichsland, 1871–79 75–76, 88, 90n17 and formation of the Reichsland 56 – 57 involvement in Alsatian religious matters 63 – 64, 67–72, passim, 130, 151, 174, 233 involvement in Reichsland school policies 300, 320 Bismarck-Bohlen, Friedrich von 38, 56–73, 298, 320, 442 Blackbourn, David 7n16 Blaschke, Olaf 6, 7n15, 8n21, 9n26, 123, 157, 172n1, 350 Blessig, Lorenz 50 Blind, Heinrich Albert 135, 138, 167, 440 Bloch, Louis 60 Bochum 9, 12, 111n79, 114, 345 Boeckel, Eugen, junior 438 Boeckel, Eugen, senior 196, 437 – 38 Boeckel, Johann 51, 155 Bögner, Karl Friedrich 72n89, 69n154, 167, 351, 359, 440 Bonaparte, Louis-Napoleon. See Napoleon III Bonaparte, Napoleon 28 – 29, 39, 40n53, 229 – 30, 403 Bouxwiller. See Buchsweiler Braun, Eugen Adolf 210, 219 Braun, Karl 441 Braun, Théodore 51, 62, 68, 437 Bremen 103, 105n63, 345 Brentano, Lujo 101 Breslau 105n63 Brown, Callum 6n12, 8, 226, 274n139 Bruch, Johann Friedrich 94n26, 135, 138, 240, 440, 437 – 38 and Alsatian liberalism 51, 132, 166 and the Faculty of Protestant Theology (Strasbourg) 60, 79 – 80, 141 as Lutheran ecclesiastical leader 66, 67n144, 69 –71 Brumath 192 Bruns, Paul 324, 332, 441 Bucer, Martin 20, 25, 119, 240, 317

Buchsweiler (Lutheran inspection) 43n65, 45, 74, 77, 136, 194, 196 – 98, 439 Buhl, Karl 441 Bühlmann, Friedrich Adolf 72n89, 351, 440 Bülow, Bernhard von 220 Bundesrat (German) 73, 90n18, 221 – 22 Burckhardt, Leonhard 81 Burger, Emil 395 – 96 burial, Christian 50, 280, 285 – 90. See also church rites (Protestant) Busch, Norbert 226 Buß- und Bettag 189, 239. See also holy days, Alsace-Lorraine Bussière, Léon de 71 Calvin, John 20, 240 candidacy, Protestant ministerial. See ministerial preparation, Alsace (-Lorraine) Caritas-Verband 116, 373 catechism, and religious education 310 Cathedral of Strasbourg 27, 61, 103, 129 Catholic community, Strasbourg 13 –14, 23 – 24, 26, 28, 31, 33, 36, 61, 85, 110, 118 church construction for 114, 117, 240 demographic evolution after 1870 110 –13, 116, 345 military and 61, 91, 93 parochial organization 27, 41, 89, 114 –17, 127n14, 378, 384 relations with Protestants 13, 27 – 28, 34 – 38, 242n57, 254, 287 – 88 (see also interconfessional relations) and schooling 21, 32, 35, 296, 303 – 4, 307 – 9, 311– 17, 322n77, 323 worship practices 229, 435 Catholicism, Alsace and the annexation 58, 60, 63 – 64, 81 clergy 137, 144, 150n84, 151, 154 ecclesiastical organization 13, 24, 29 – 30, 40 – 41, 64, 76, 174, 176, 431 political influence 127, 152 – 54, 222, 310 use of the press 360 – 61, 367 – 68, 432 relations with political authorities 22, 56, 63, 76, 129, 173–74, 177–78, 180, 185 – 86, 301, 427, 431

index and schooling 295, 299, 301, 310 –11, 318, 320 – 21, 331, 333, 337 use of voluntary associations 340, 370, 373–76 See also confessionalization; interconfessional relations Catholicism 157, 223, 228, 283 Germany 7, 16, 64, 113, 318, 350, 358 cemetery policies (Strasbourg) 156, 289 – 90 censorship, in Alsace-Lorraine 108, 357 Central consistory, Jewish 81. See also Jewish community, Alsace (-Lorraine), organization Chamber of Commerce, Strasbourg 106, 199, 234 chapels, Lutheran (Strasbourg) 252 – 53 chaplains, Protestant (Strasbourg) German military 24, 58, 130 – 31, 257, 315n55 hospital 134, 281, 289, 441 prison 132 choirs, Protestant church 261 – 62, 373 Christliche Welt 184 church constitutions. See church law, Alsace (-Lorraine) church construction 19, 85, 113 –17, 159 – 60, 435 financing 117 –18, 154n96, 230 design considerations 117–18, 189, 243 – 44 See also New Church, rebuilding of church going 40, 225, 230 – 35, 245 – 49, 254 – 57, 274, 291, 339, 355, 391 and social class 225, 232 – 33, 245 church law, Alsace (-Lorraine) French approaches to 25, 29 – 30, 40, 46 – 48, 185, 200, 431 – 32 German approaches to 173 – 90 passim, 200–01, 212 –17 1870–73 discussions of 58, 61 – 64, 76–77, 80 – 82, 206 Protestant efforts to reform 389 – 91, 396 – 99, 401 – 30 passim See also Concordat of 1801, DecreeLaw of 1852, Organic Articles (1802), Synodal Law of 1905 church leaving 130, 154 church reform (Protestant) as modernization 390, 402 – 428 passim, 434 See also under Lutheran Church, Alsace (-Lorraine); Reformed Church, Alsace (-Lorraine)

499

church rites (Protestant) 40, 49 – 50, 111n80, 131, 274–76, 339. See also under the individual rites church tax, Protestant 130, 154, 189, 200 Catholic opinion of 154 church-state relations (Alsace) Catholic 76, 81 – 82, 301, 318, 321, 331 during French period 28 – 29, 46 – 48 431 – 35 Lutheran 47 – 48, 76–79, 124, 128 – 30, 190 – 204 Protestant 39 – 42, 46 – 47, 65, 70–73, 152 – 55, 171 – 90, 222 – 23, 319 – 20, 390 – 91, 396 – 428 passim Reformed 47, 80 – 81, 147 – 49, 205 – 22 Reichsland period 143 – 44, 296, 321 – 24, 333 – 34 during transition to German rule 61 – 65, 76 – 81 See also church law, Alsace (-Lorraine); church reform (Protestant); culture wars churches, renovation of Protestant 61, 253, 255 – 57 city-building 103 – 4 civil commissioner for Alsace 56, 58, 62 civilian-military relations 100n50 and Protestant churches 61, 91, 93, 111n80, 118, 122, 130 – 31, 247, 256 – 58, 315n56 Clark, Christopher 7n15, 157 Claude, Viviane 96 clericalization 6, 156, 350 clerical-lay relations (Protestant) 362 within higher church councils 47n72, 68, 71, 393 – 97 and parish reform efforts 379, 382, 387 within parishes 49, 123, 156 – 61, 165, 340 – 42, 350 – 54 See also Superior Consistory, membership club house, Protestant (Strasbourg) 115 –16, 371–73 Cohen, William B. 10n31 Colani, Timothée 51n84 collège épiscopal (Strasbourg) 32, 35 Collegium Wilhelmitanum. See Stift (Protestant) Colmar 57, 74, 84n5, 92, 136, 183 – 84, 299n20, 401, 418

500

index

Lutheran inspection 43n65, 45, 194, 198 – 99, 439 Cologne 93n25, 102, 107, 111 Comité du culte français (Strasbourg) 114, 117n96, 128, 373. See also Free Church, on St. Martin’s Bridge Communion (Protestant) 40, 50, 131, 146, 157, 159, 275–79 individual chalices and 157, 280, 362 liturgical practices and 235, 252, 261, 276 – 80, 284 Lutheran and Reformed approaches to 274n140, 276 statistics for 275–79 See also church rites (Protestant) communion, first (Catholic) 20, 227, 243, 293, 315, 324, 328 – 30 Concordat of 1801 29, 64, 180n21 confessional age, idea of 6, 11n34 confessional identities. See confessionalization confessionalization 6 – 9, 15, 17, 26, 129, 144, 172, 223, 434 via the clergy 127n14, 133, 137 via ecclesiastical arrangements 40 – 41, 176–77, 378, 384, 412 via liturgical practices 20, 228 – 30, 237 – 43, 259, 279, 287 – 88, 291 via ministerial activity 342 via the press 358, 360 – 89 via schooling 21, 293 – 96, 304, 307 – 21, 331, 336 – 37 in Strasbourg 13 –14, 33 – 36, 110 –14, 118 –19 via voluntary organizations 340 – 41, 358, 370–77 See also interconfessional relations confessions of faith 41, 50 – 51, 158. See also Augsburg, Confession of Confino, Alon 17, 94 confirmation (Protestant) 20, 35, 131, 227, 280, 282 – 85, 350, 352 and schooling 293, 315, 319 – 20, 328 – 30 See also church rites (Protestant) congregations, personal (Strasbourg) 21, 49 – 50, 126, 128, 151, 160, 167, 247, 274, 327, 344, 348, 353 efforts to reform 379 – 88, 390, 429 See also parochial organization (Protestant) Conrath, Geoffrey 90n19, 92, 95 – 96

Conseil central 47, 67, 205 – 6. See also Reformed Church consistorial church. See consistories, Protestant consistories, Protestant 13, 41 – 47, 78, 123, 164, 322n76, 323 – 24 efforts to reorganize 390, 393 – 402, 405 –11, 417 –19, 422 – 28 Lutheran 41, 43, 45 – 48, 160, 164, 166, 168, 192 – 94, 200, 205, 323 Reformed 30, 41 – 42, 44, 47 – 48, 67, 80, 141, 147, 164 – 65, 204 – 21 passim, 422, 425 – 28 See also Lutheran Church, Alsace (-Lorraine); Reformed Church, Alsace (-Lorraine) consistories, Jewish. See Jewish community, Alsace (-Lorraine), organization of Coulaux, Charles-Louis 31, 37 Courvoisier, Johann 134, 440 Cox, Jeffrey 6n12, 20n56, 226n4, 295 Craig, John E. 18n53 culture wars 20n55, 223, 293, 331 and education 294, 336 See also Kulturkampf Cunitz, August 438 curricula, school (Alsace-Lorraine) primary schools 310 –11, 324, 335 Protestant churches and 323, 332 – 35 secondary schools 316, 332, 335 See also Normallehrplan; schooling, Alsace-Lorraine Curtius, Friedrich as advocate for church reform 399, 401–14, 418, 423, 429 as editor of Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst memoirs 184 – 85 as Lutheran president 116n90, 183 – 884, 197, 200 – 4, 437 and parochial organization in Strasbourg 384 – 87 and religious education 326, 333 – 35 Dallwitz, Hans von 176, 185, 442, 429 Danzig 103 deaconates, parish 351 – 53 deaconesses 21, 351 in Strasbourg’s Protestant parishes 353 – 54 Deaconess House Strasbourg (pietist) 52 – 53, 132, 353 Ingweiler (orthodox Lutheran) 353

index Decree-Law of 1852 German application of 58, 175, 180, 424, 427 implementation 46 – 48, 55, 424 and Lutheran parishes 157, 160, 401n19 and pastoral appointment process 164 and the Reformed consistories 205, 214, 22n76 and the Superior Consistory 199, 394n6 Delbrück, Rudolf von 68n149, 70 –72, 75 Delegation for Alsace-Lorraine. See Landesausschuß Deutsche Architekten- und Ingenieur Verein 83, 96 Deutsche Evangelische Kirchenkonferenz. See Eisenach Church Conference Dietrich, Albert von 71 diffusive Christianity 20n56, 226, 295, 367, 434 – 35 Directory (Lutheran) 30, 80, 141 – 43, 153, 159, 191, 268 – 69, 320, 356 and church reform discussions 191 – 94, 393, 396 – 417 passim, 427, 430 composition 43, 50, 77, 164, 178, 183, 190, 195 – 98, 335, 437 and feast days 230, 236 – 240 Friedrich Fabri and 65 – 68, 71–72 and ministerial candidates 143, 146 – 48 and parish administration 156, 401, 406 –7 and parochial organization 116n90, 124 – 27, 160, 253, 379 – 88 passim and pastoral appointments 48, 55, 78, 127 – 28, 134, 164 – 69, 186 – 88, 345 powers of 43, 46, 48, 199 – 200, 397 and religious inspectors 181 – 82, 187, 195 and schooling 325 – 26, 332 – 33 as target of orthodox Lutheran polemics 54 during transition to German rule 61 – 63, 69, 77–78 See also Lutheran Church, Alsace (-Lorraine); Superior Consistory, delegates to the Directory discipline, ecclesiastical (Protestant) 40, 286

501

district parishes 379 – 80, 383 – 88, 407, 414, 429. See also parochial organization, reform efforts district presidency, Lower Alsace. See Alsace, Lower, district presidency of district presidents 75, 302, 324 – 25 divorce 286, 347 Dominicus, Alexander 306n41 Dreier, Armin-Müller 16 Dresden 285 Durkheim, Emile 3 Dursy, Eugen 75n172, 176, 212, 215, 443 Dyos, H. J. 4n7 Edel, Frédéric-Guillaume 51, 119, 155, 267 Eichelmann, Karl 105 Eichler, Ernst 128, 136, 244, 440 Eisenach Church Conference 189 –90, 206, 209, 240, 260n104, 332 Eissen, Karl Friedrich 439 Engelmann, Eugen Albert 139, 158, 181 – 82, 440 Entkirchlichung 140n49, 391 and fees associated with church rites 290 Erfurt Program 121n1 Erhebungskommission. See pastoral appointments (Lutheran) Erichson, Alfred 132, 360 Erlangen 53 Ernst, August 127, 272, 283, 440 Ernsthausen, Adolph Ernst, von 76–77, 443 Ernwein, Heinrich 218, 441 Erziehung. See schooling Eschenauer, Friedrich August 134n34, 440 Evangelical Society 52 – 53, 116, 128, 238 and ministerial care in Strasbourg 227, 241, 342, 359, 367 – 368, 370–72, 378 See also Inner Mission Evangelical Lutheran Society 54, 370 Evangelische Gemeinschaft 129 Evangelische Gesellschaft. See Evangelical Society Evangelischer Bund. See Protestant League Evangelischer Gottesdienstlicher Verein. See Comité du culte français extra muros. See Strasbourg, extra muros Ez Chaim. See Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft

502

index

Fabri, Friedrich 65–73, 81 – 82, 175, 220, 222, 390, 399 Faculty of Catholic Theology (Strasbourg) 137n42, 186n41, 432 Faculty of Protestant Theology (Strasbourg) 13, 15, 29 – 30, 32, 60, 65, 92, 333, 432 and Lutheran Church 35, 48, 79, 179 – 80, 403, 438 professors of 18, 50, 54, 65, 139n48, 141 – 42, 258, 259n100, 366 and Reformed Church 47, 79, 149, 196, 258 representation in higher church councils 179 – 80, 196, 198, 221, 403, 438 role in ministerial preparation 79 – 80, 136 – 40, 142, 144, 148, 208 and Strasbourg 13, 35 Falloux Law (1850) 301, 322n75 Federlin, Friedrich 387, 441 feminization of religion 21, 225n2, 250, 252, 276, 351, 352, 374, 407. See also religion, and gender Fisch, Stefan 97n38 Flach, Georges 165, 438 Law of Separation, French (1905) 223 Franco-Prussian War 23, 38, 55, 63 Frankfurt am Main 32, 83, 87n14, 102 – 3, 123 Frankfurt, Treaty of (1871) 73, 86, 191 Free Church, on St. Martin’s Bridge 114, 129, 240, 373. See also Comité du culte français free churches (Strasbourg) 19, 114, 122, 132 Freiburg 111 French Empire, Second 39 French Revolution 28 Frenken, Joseph 178n15, 429 – 30, 443 Frey, Max 212 Freyberg-Eisenberg, Julius von 215, 443 Freydinger, Philipp Adolph 153, 440 Frick, Georges 158, 182, 192, 438 Friedensbote, Evangelisch-Lutherischer 360 – 66 Friedrich, Martin 350 Fritzen, Adolf (Bishop of Strasbourg) 137n42, 144, 154n97, 182 Frommel, Emil 24, 38, 58 – 60, 62, 65 Fuchs, Karl Theodor 148, 206, 351, 440 funerals. See burial, Christian

garrison churches Catholic 91, 93, 114 –15, 118 Protestant 61, 91, 93, 114 –15, 118, 247n65, 256 – 58 See also civilian-military relations Geary, Dick 8n23 Geigel, Fernand 154n97 Gemeindeordnung of 1895 94. See also Strasbourg, administration of General Consistory 30, 42 – 43, 47, 50 – 51. See also Lutheran Church, Alsace (-Lorraine), organization General Government of Alsace 55 – 60 Geneva 53 Gerhardt, Paul 270 Germanization 18, 174, 238, 330, 365, 368, 405 via administrative and political measures 93 – 94, 175 – 85 via cultural and educational policies 79, 85, 86, 92, 94, 140 – 42, 294 – 303, 320, 336 via immigration of old Germans 57, 86 – 87, 99 –103, 210 via introduction of old-German religious customs 80, 100, 130, 140, 144, 154, 172–79 passim, 186 – 89, 201 – 2, 228, 239 – 40, 275, 394, 404, 415 via language policies 79, 85, 128, 143, 162 – 63, 185, 299, 429 via old-German Protestantism 174, 189 – 90, 244, 332, 373–74 via urbanization 84 – 87, 90, 96 – 98 See also national identity, German; native-immigrant relations Gerold, Karl Theodor 138 – 39, 287, 347, 335, 346 – 47, 438, 440 and liberal Protestantism 166, 195 – 96, 362, 365n65 and parish reform in Strasbourg 379n101, 385 role in hymnal reform 269 –71 role in Lutheran church councils 200n83, 396, 398, 402 – 4, 412, 417 Gerstheim 192 Giddens, Anthony 5, 11n33 Goehrs, Charles 371, 374 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang 27 Goetz, Adolf 178, 198n81, 437 Goguel, Edouard 69, 71–72, 76n175, 76n180, 196, 437 Goldberg, Ann 8n23

index Goltz, Alexander von der 178, 183, 196, 202 – 203, 374, 402, 409 –13, 419, 437, 443 Goltz, Hans von der 97, 185, 197, 430, 439 Good Friday (Alsace-Lorraine) 237 – 38, 284. See also holy days, Protestant Görres, Joseph, von 31 Götz von Olenhusen, Irmtraud 157 Götz, Adolf 412, 439 governmental commissioner. See Directory, composition; Superior Consistory, composition Grimm, Daniel 211, 215 Gross, Michael J. 16n46, 17n51, 24n4, 56n98, 172n1 Großstadt. See big cities Grünberg, Paul 101 – 2, 128, 136, 139, 152, 167, 169, 241, 272, 349, 375, 382 – 83, 386, 440 Gustav-Adolf Association 373–74 Gymnasium 294, 303, 307 Gymnasium, Catholic. See St. Stephan’s school Hackenschmidt, Christian Karl 160n115, 272, 279, 344, 368, 440 and church reform efforts 392 – 95, 399 and parochial organization 380, 385 Haerter, Franz 69n154, 132, 138, 240, 270, 351, 353, 440 and Alsatian pietism 52 – 54, 59, 284, 366 and the Evangelical Society 52 – 54, 342, 370 Haerter, Gustav 52, 136n39, 138, 166, 169, 249, 261, 383, 440 Haffner, Isaac 50 Halle 12, 102 Hamburg 12, 83, 87n14 Hammerstein-Loxten Hans von 210, 215, 218 Handlungen. See church rites Hanover 114, 285 Harp, Stephen 297 Hatten 186 Heintz, Karl Heinrich 166, 195, 197, 230, 325, 438, 440 Heitz, Emil 438 Hering, Hermann August 134n35, 272, 278–79, 356, 440 Herrenschmidt, Alfred 69n154

503

Herrenschmidt, Suzanne 100n50 Herriot, Édouard 432 Herrmann, Georg Eugen 440 Hertzog, August Theodor Ernst 160n115, 167 – 68, 195, 351, 440 Herzog, Karl 75, 77n182, 90n17, 320, 442 Heuss-Knapp, Elly 100n50, 121n3 Hickel, Eduard 440 Hildebrand, Heinrich 178, 212, 214, 443 Hoff, C. E. 439 Höffel, Jean 196 – 98, 404, 437, 439 Hoffet, Fritz 367 Hofmann, Karl von 188, 442 Hohenlohe-Langenburg, Hermann von 178, 184, 187, 195, 197, 220, 222, 442 Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, Alexander von 184 Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, Chlodwig von 90n20, 178, 184, 442 holidays, public (Alsace-Lorraine) 228 – 30, 233, 236 – 38 Hölscher, Lucian 9, 121n4, 274n139, 275, 341, 369 Holtzmann, Heinrich Julius 438 holy days, Alsace (-Lorraine) 228, 230 – 240 passim Protestant 238 – 41, 252, 258 Holy Roman Empire 25 Höpffner, Theodor Eugen 133, 181, 195, 196, 232, 344, 346, 376, 386, 438, 440 Horning, Friedrich 38, 53, 62, 132, 135, 138, 159, 267 – 68, 270, 322n77, 351, 353, 359, 372, 440 Horning, Wilhelm 54, 138 – 39, 159 –160, 169, 235, 249, 372, 386, 440 Horst, Louis 128, 440 Hoseus, Heinrich 177n13, 443 hospital chaplains, Protestant (Strasbourg) 134 and baptisms 281, 289 – 90 and funerals 289 – 90 house visits, by Protestant clergy (Strasbourg) 340 – 45, 380, 383, 385 Hübinger, Gangolf 16 Hueber, Louis 76n175 Humann, Théodore 31 hymnals, Protestant 14, 20, 157, 171, 189, 200, 272 Pastoral Conference Hymnal of 1850 51, 54, 264, 267–70

504

index

Pastoral Conference Hymnal of 1899 258 – 59, 262, 264 – 66, 269–71, 349 and religious instruction 324 – 25, 327 – 28 Rittelmeyer 264n116, 268–71 identity Alsatian 17, 94, 257, 292, 297, 368, 415, 432 – 433, 435 Alsatian Protestant 122, 173–74, 216, 223 – 24, 236, 274, 285, 342, 365, 394 See also confessionalization; Germanization; national identity, German Igersheim, François 56n96 Ihme, Friedrich August 360 Ihme, Gottlieb 371n79 Ihme, Hans 272 Iltis, Johann 138 Imlin, Jean Daniel 76n175 immigrant-native relations. See native-immigrant relations; old Germans Imperial Chancery Office (German). See Reichskanzleramt industrialization 4, 12, 32, 105 – 6, 298 infallibility, papal 38 Inner Mission 117n96, 339, 341, 349, 365–74 passim, 433, 435. See also Evangelical Society inspections, Lutheran 19, 43, 45, 47n72, 51, 199, 409. See also names of individual inspections inspectoral assemblies 43, 78, 181n24, 187, 393 and church reform discussions 399 – 401, 409, 417 –18 inspectors, religious (Lutheran) 50 – 51, 68, 128, 146, 192, 196, 382 appointment of 43, 48, 78, 176, 180 – 81, 187, 195, 198 church reform plans and 382 – 86, 393, 397 – 98, 407 –12, 417 –19, 424 comparison with Reformed visitors 217 –18 duties of 48n73, 165 – 66, 261, 275, 284n161, 333 – 34 membership in Superior Consistory and Directory 43, 47, 190, 195 – 97, 200, 204, 273, 324, 394, 402 – 4, 437 – 39 interconfessional relations 26 – 29, 33 – 49, 58, 110 –14, 142, 150n84, 153, 171, 233, 237, 254

and church-state relations 172–74, 180, 182, 185 – 86, 222 – 23, 412, 427, 429, 431 – 33 and clerical salary reforms 152 – 54 and schooling 298 – 99, 308 – 9, 333n111 and territorial politics 127, 175, 178n15, 320 See also confessionalization; marriage, mixed Interior, Division of (Alsace-Lorraine) 90, 176–77, 442 – 43. See also Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine intra muros. See Strasbourg, intra muros intra-Protestant relations (Alsace) and church reform discussions 64 – 65, 69 –72, 213, 392, 395, 405– 6, 412, 415n57 and hymnals 54, 267–71 and Lutheran church government 187, 192 – 97 and ministerial care in Strasbourg 348 and nineteenth-century revivals 52 – 55 and parish life 49, 55, 123, 159 – 60, 235n33, 279, 349 – 51 and parochial organization 378 – 86 and pastoral appointments 48, 55, 62, 166 – 69, 186 and press activities 36, 359 – 60, 365 – 66, 368 – 69 and ritual practice 49, 236, 269, 273 and voluntary associations 54, 160, 370–73, 376–77 See also Lutheran Church, relations with Reformed Church; Reformed Church, relations with Lutheran Church Jäger, Friedrich Heinrich 152n90, 440 Janz, Oliver 16, 122, 138, 150, 155 Jenkins, Jennifer 94n29 Jewish community, Alsace (-Lorraine) 174, 177, 293, 295 organization of 25, 29 – 30, 81, 151 – 53, 180, 336, 431 Jewish community, Strasbourg 13 –14, 24, 28 – 29, 33 – 36, 291, 341, 370 demographic evolution of 1870 –1914 85, 109 –13 and public schooling 35, 304 – 5, 308 – 9, 312, 333 relations with Christians 35 – 36, 287 responses to annexation 58

index separatist tendencies within (see Israelitische Religionsgesellschaft) synagogues 61, 89, 112 –18, 373n83 voluntary associations of 341, 370, 373n83 Joseph II (Austria) 40n52 Jugendgottesdienst. See youth, worship services for Jung, Philippe 135 Justice and Religious Affairs, Division of (Alsace-Lorraine) 90, 175, 177, 179, 196n75, 212 –18, 414. See also Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine Kaiser, Jochen-Christoph 374 Kaiserplatz (Strasbourg) 90 – 95, 103, 116, 118 Kaplan, Marion A. 16n47 Kaufmann, Suzanne 7n16 Kayser, August 134n34, 139n48, 441 Kaysersberg 127 Kienlen, Heinrich Wilhelm 124, 128, 135, 440 Kirchenaustritt. See church leaving Kirchenbote, Evangelisch-Protestantischer 202, 360 – 65, 432 Kirchenbuch (Lutheran) 51, 272–73 Kirchenzeitung, Evangelische-Lutherische 64 – 69 Kirchlichkeit. See piety, church-based Klein, Johann 155n101, 356, 440 Klein, Jules 71, 76, 444 Knapp, Georg Wilhelm 100n50, 101, 121n3 Knittel, Michel and church reform debates 231, 379n101, 384, 386, 394, 398 – 99, 401, 404, 410, 412 as pastor 127, 138 – 39, 166, 440 as religious inspector 1 – 2, 195 –96, 197n98, 339, 347, 353 – 54, 382, 438 Koch, Christophe-Guillaume 28n14 Koch, Gustave 15n42 Köller, Ernst von 326, 333, 335, 442 – 43 Königshofen 89, 91, 101 – 2, 115 –17, 125 – 27, 136, 372, 381, 441 Kopp, Ludwig Gustav 53, 206, 241, 249, 378, 440 Krabbe, Wolfgang 10n31 Kratz, J. L. Eduard 69, 71, 77–78, 182, 187, 196, 320, 325, 437 Kreiss, Gustav Adolf 62n125, 72n89, 440 Krencker, Martin 197, 404, 437, 439

505

Krieger, Christian Karl 148, 440 Krieger, Franz Joseph 97 Kromayer, Friedrich Julius Augustus 152n90, 440 Kromayer, Karl Desiré 195, 198, 438 Kronenburg 89, 91, 101– 02, 115 –17, 125 – 27, 136, 372, 381, 441 Kuhlemann, Frank-Michael 7n15, 9n26, 16, 122, 138, 155 Kühlwetter, Friedrich von 56 – 63, 68, 297 – 98, 442 Kulturkampf 64, 172, 223, 286, 294, 301, 318, 336. See also culture wars Kulturprotestantismus 52n85, 183 – 84, 365 Kuntz, Karl Albert 216n136, 426 – 28, 441 Küss, August 71, 144, 204, 439 Küss, Emil 145n66, 437 Kuss, Émile 444 La Petite Pierre. See Lützelstein Ladd, Brian 83n1, 96 Lambs, Philipp August 128, 134, 138, 166 – 67, 440 Landesausschuß 90, 127, 153, 196, 220 – 22, 237, 320, 400 Landeskirche 18, 40n52, 49n79, 65, 79, 111, 130, 174, 189, 191, 330, 332, 379. See also Protestantism, German language policies, in Alsace-Lorraine 33, 79, 85, 299 –300, 429 and the churches 129, 143, 162 – 63, 180 See also Germanization Lasch, Gustav 344, 440 Lässig, Simone 16n47 Lauth, Ernst 76, 88, 444 lay-clerical relations (Protestant). See clerical-lay relations (Protestant) Leblois, George Louis 51n84, 129, 153, 159, 248, 260, 440 Ledderhose, Karl 96, 327, 443 Lehmann, Hartmut 8n20, 17, 23 Lehr, Paul 198n80, 439 Leipzig 107, 114, 183 Lentze, Friedrich 430, 443 Lepp, Claudia 16, 385 Lepsius, M. Rainer 9n26 liberalism, religious Alsace 36, 48 – 53, 65, 69 –71, 128, 140, 159, 172, 193, 195 – 97, 261, 359 – 61, 365, 370–73 Germany 49n79, 52n85, 143, 365n65 See also intra-Protestant relations (Alsace) libraries, parish 367

506

index

library, territorial (Alsace-Lorraine) 90 Liebersohn, Harry 16 Liedhegener, Antonius 9, 17 Lienhard, Marc 15n42 Lindner, Albert 134, 441 List, Friedrich 31 liturgical practices in Alsace (Protestant) 20, 51, 122, 157, 227 – 29, 258 – 80 passim, 285, 290 – 92, 434 Lobstein, Paul 196, 438 Löhe, Johann Konrad 53 London 2, 10, 225, 339 Lord’s prayer 254 Lorraine 42, 44 – 45, 55 – 57, 74–75, 106, 136, 149n75, 194, 210, 285, 293 Lutheran Church in 210n114, 219n145 See also under Metz Löscher, Albert 132 Loth, Wilfried 8n19, 22 Louis XIV (France) 23, 26 Lourdes 7 Lucius, Paul 438 Luhmann, Niklas 11n34 Luther, Martin 54, 121, 156, 270 1883 commemoration of birth 239 – 40, 245, 435 Lutheran Church, Alsace (-Lorraine) 54 – 55, 190 – 91, 238, 320, 379, 390 importance of Strasbourg 29 – 30, 48, 197 – 99 liturgical practices within 51, 261, 276 – 86 passim organization 29 – 30, 39 – 43, 45 – 48, 191 – 204 presidency 47n72, 51, 71, 180, 182 – 85, 187, 196 public image of 171–74, 191, 201, 224 reform discussions within 391, 399 – 431 passim relations with Reformed Church 51, 140, 145 – 49 passim, 155, 205 –11, 213, 216, 219, 274n140, 322n76, 332 – 34, 416, 422 theological divisions (see also intra-Protestant relations) and transition to German rule 61, 63–72, 76–79 urban dimension of reform proposals 397, 400, 407, 410, 417 – 19, 427, 429 vicars and 48, 145 – 48, 151, 155, 168, 170

See also church-state relations, Lutheran; church-state relations, Protestant; Directory; inspectors, religious (Lutheran); Superior Consistory Lutheran community, Strasbourg 25 – 28, 33 – 35, 41 – 43, 47, 49, 123 – 31, 235, 274n141, 256, 276 Franco-Prussian War and 59, 61 – 62 See also parish (Protestant); parish councils, Protestant; parochial organization (Protestant); pastoral corps, Protestant (Strasbourg) Lutheranism, confessional. See orthodoxy, Lutheran Lützelstein (Lutheran inspection) 43n65, 45, 74, 183, 194, 196 – 99, 204, 210n114, 437, 439 Luxburg, Friedrich von 56, 62 – 63, 443 lycée (Strasboug) 29, 32, 35, 136, 303 – 4, 307 – 8, 315, 329 – 30. See also schooling, secondary Lyzeum (Strasbourg). See lycée (Strasbourg) Maeder, Adam 48n76, 67n144, 80n190, 134n34, 208, 442 Magdeburg 93n25, 105n63 Magnus, Johann 54 Mandel, Karl Wilhelm 443 Mannheim 12, 87, 105 Manteuffel, Edwin von and the Reichsland’s churches 178, 181 – 82, 186 – 89, 196, 435 and schooling in Alsace-Lorraine 301– 2, 310, 314n54, 320, 331 as Statthalter 90n17, 176–79, 301– 2, 320, 331, 442 Marbach, Johann 54 marriage 225, 280, 285 – 86 civil 285 – 86 mixed 34 – 35, 189, 287 – 88 See also church rites (Protestant) Matter, Paul Theodor 440 Maurer, Karl 273 Mayer, Otto 97, 183, 199, 396n11, 423 – 24, 439 McLeod, Hugh 8n20, 10n30, 225n2 Ménégoz, Ferdinand 139n48, 440 Merriman, John 10n31 Mertz, Georg 187 Methodism 48n77, 129, 373 Metz 31, 56n96, 57, 74, 93n24, 134 349n29

index Reformed consistory of 42n61, 44, 147, 205–6, 209 – 21, 332, 420n66, 422 – 23 Catholic diocese of 111, 180n21, 182 Metzger, Georg 196, 198 and church reform 402 – 6 passim as religious inspector 187, 197n78, 225 – 26, 231, 281, 334 – 35, 355, 376–77, 383, 438, 441 Meyer, Karl Christian 55n95, 138, 152n90, 372, 382, 440 Michaelis, Otto 15, 207, 349n29 milieu, sociocultural 17 as analytical concept 9, 17, 123, 157, 226n4, 358, 374 –75 military church system 19, 60, 111n80, 130 – 31. See also garrison churches (Strasbourg), Protestant ministerial care, Strasbourg (Protestant) 21, 170, 340 – 56 passim, 368–77, 382 – 88 ministerial preparation, Alsace (-Lorraine) 79 – 80, 136 – 37, 140 – 48, 170, 206–7 and military service 143 – 44, 201 financing of 141 Reformed Church and 148 – 49, 206–7 See also theological exams (AlsaceLorraine) Ministry for Alsace-Lorraine 86n9, 90 – 91, 94, 163, 175–79, 185, 442 – 43 and clerical salaries 152 – 55 and parochial organization in Strasbourg 116, 127 – 29, 384, 387 and the Protestant churches 140 – 49, 152, 168, 173, 179 – 80, 184 – 85, 189, 200 – 4, 209 –18, 238 and Protestant church reform 218 – 22, 391, 399, 412 – 30 passim and schooling 293, 302, 326, 330 See also Alsace-Lorraine, administration missionary societies, Protestant 52, 65, 343. See also Inner Mission missions, Protestant 227, 241, 366 Mitteilungen des Synodalvorstandes 217 Mittelschulen 306 modernity (European) 1, 5, 7, 11, 22, 85, 142, 172, 223, 226 – 28, 291, 339 – 41, 358, 403, 433 and Alsatian Protestantism 140, 155, 157, 169–70, 199, 204, 222, 255, 272–73, 390, 403 – 6, 413 – 28 passim

507

and big cities 2 – 5, 83 – 84, 225, 331, 362, 376–77, 431– 35 and religion 2, 5 –10, 22, 84 – 85, 119n103, 140, 223, 225 – 28, 291, 358, 388 – 90 and schooling 296 – 98, 305, 336 – 37. See also secularization Möller, Eduard von and civilian-military relations 130 – 31, 143 and pastoral appointments 78, 80, 168, 187 – 88 and clerical salaries 151 and the Protestant churches 78 – 81, 125, 147, 162, 176 –79, 185, 190, 193, 200 –1, 206 – 8 and schooling 300 –1, 320 – 21, 324 – 25 as Superior President 72 – 81, 88, 98n44, 442 Moltke, Helmut von 86 Mommsen, Wolfgang J. 7n18 Monatschrift für Gottesdienst und kirchliche Kunst 227, 259, 272, 368 Montauban 35n35, 47, 136n41 Montbéliard (Lutheran inspection) 43n65, 191 Motz, Thomas 302, 305, 312, 323 Mühler, Heinrich von 58n108, 66, 68, 297 – 98 Mühlhäuser, Otto F. M. 394 – 96 Mulhouse 31, 48n76, 57, 74, 134, 148n75, 165, 183, 216n136, 293, 299n20, 302n30, 421, 423 Reformed consistory of 42n61, 44, 205 – 6, 208, 220, 420n66, 426, 441 Muller, Claude 15n43 Munich 12, 83, 87n14, 113 Münster 9, 12 Musau 127n14 music, Protestant church. See choirs, Protestant church, church; hymnals, Protestant; organs (Strasbourg) Napoleon III (France) 23, 46 – 47, 229 natality, and baptism rates (Strasbourg) 281 – 83 national identity 8, 431 German 17, 23 – 24, 77n78, 84 – 85, 173–74, 296 – 98, 432, 435 and religion 8, 17, 24, 77n78, 173–74, 223, 435 See also Germanization native-immigrant relations, Strasbourg 60, 86, 92 – 94, 99 –100, 230, 348

508

index

and religious life 82, 123, 130 – 31, 136 – 37, 139, 162 – 64, 182 – 84, 201, 210, 269, 376, 394 – 95, 413 and schooling 303, 306, 308, 321, 324, 327 – 28, 330 See also civilian-military relations; old Germans Naumann, Friedrich 389 neo-Lutheran. See orthodoxy, Lutheran Neudorf 89, 91, 101– 2, 115 –16, 124 – 27, 136, 187, 198n79, 235, 305, 367, 379n102, 381, 384, 441 Neuhof 101– 2, 124, 139n48, 343, 370 –71, 379n102, 441 New Church 41, 46, 126 – 27, 152, 157n106, 160 – 63, 168 – 69, 178, 379 – 80, 440 dedication of 260 – 61 destruction of 59 – 60 inspection 43, 45, 51, 77n180, 181, 192 – 99, 418, 438 intra-Protestant relations at 51n84, 52 – 53, 136, 159 parish life 49, 61, 124, 129, 153, 166, 343n11 rebuilding of 89, 95n30, 114 –15, 117, 159, 240 – 46, 252 – 54 ritual practice at 229, 235 – 36, 239 – 41, 249 – 52, 254 – 57, 269, 276 – 80, 285 “New urban history” 4 Nied, Emil 62, 139, 156n102, 167, 279, 351, 366, 440 Nietzsche, Friedrich 6 Nohlen, Klaus 93, 59 Nöldeke, Theodor 101 nonconformism, British 7 Normallehrplan 299, 300n23, 310, 335 Nowack, Wilhelm 164, 196 – 97, 199, 396n11, 398, 409, 437 – 38 Oberkirchenrat (Prussian) 65, 239 Oberlin, Jean-Frédéric 317 Oberrealschulen 105n65. See also schooling, Strasbourg, secondary Oberschulrat 177, 221, 302–3, 324, 326, 328, 332 – 35 occupation and Alsace. See Alsace, occupation old Germans 18, 68n147, 82, 90, 92, 139n4, 140 and church going 230, 371–72 and intraconfessional relations in Lorraine 210, 213 –15

participation in Protestant church government 77, 163 – 64, 178, 184 – 85, 199 and Strasbourg demography 97 –103, 110 –13 See also native-immigrant relations, Strasbourg Old St. Peter (Lutheran) 41, 43, 45 – 46, 89, 133, 152, 157n106, 192, 194, 326, 356, 379, 440 intra-Protestant relations at 89, 136, 167 and Kronenburg 127, 372 parish life 126, 148, 161 – 62, 346, 350 – 51 parochial cohabitations at 61, 130, 242, 247, 256 – 58 ritual practices at 229, 235, 247, 250 – 54, 279, 285, 290 simultaneum at 27, 31, 242n57 option and emigration for France 98n44, 132n31 Organic Articles of 1802 240 and French administration 29, 37, 39 – 42, 46 – 47 under German rule 58, 64, 79, 180 and Reformed synods 205, 212 –14, 391, 426 organs (Strasbourg) 117, 229, 253 and church music 259, 269, 272 and organists 157, 271, 290 Orth, August 96 orthodoxy, Lutheran (Alsace) 26, 48, 69, 261, 359 – 60, 365 – 66, 372 Paira, Christian Karl 48n76, 132, 442 Palatinate (Bavarian) 100, 106, 111 – 12, 207, 135 Palmowski, Jan 10n30 Pappus, Johann 54 Paris 2, 10, 43n65, 47, 225, 339 parish (Protestant) 46, 48, 122, 169, 171, 343 auxiliary 421, 425 classification of 133n33, 150, 153, 187 clerical-lay relations within 123, 165 closed 124 finances 123, 151–52, 249–51, 290–91 military 111n122, 130 – 31 newsletters 258, 349 personal (see congregations, personal) registration, and problems with (Strasbourg) 126, 348, 371, 378, 382 – 88

index role of women in 351 – 52 socials 349 – 50 worship schedules 228 – 35, 254 – 58, 348 – 49, 362, 367 See also parochial organization (Protestant) parish councils, Protestant 38, 200, 202, 240, 253, 351 church reform discourse and 372, 380, 387, 393 – 98, 405–7, 417, 419 – 28 passim composition 46, 157n106, 158 – 61, 166, 169, 183, 208 duties of 41, 78, 123, 164 – 69, 343, 351 elections to 61, 78, 157, 160 – 64, 195n71, 362 and parish administration 21, 54, 79, 125 – 28, 156 – 60, 162 – 63, 188, 251, 255 and schooling 325 – 27 See also parish (Protestant); suffrage, parochial parity, confessional (Alsace). See interconfessional relations parochial instruction 156, 295 – 96, 328 – 30, 344, 354 – 56, 378, 383 parochial organization (Strasbourg) 14, 19, 21, 49 – 50, 111n80, 344, 376–77 and urban growth 123, 125 – 31, 345 – 48 efforts to alter 160, 377 – 90, 392, 407, 414, 429 See also congregations, personal; parish, closed pastoral appointments, Lutheran Church 40, 47 – 48, 55, 88, 133, 146 – 47, 149, 164, 185, 201 and church reform debates 402, 417 –18, 422 political factors in 176 –77, 180 – 81 revisions to process (1872) 78 – 80, 165 – 66 revisions to process (1894) 168 – 69 role of laity in 78, 164, 168 – 69 and Strasbourg 55, 62, 78, 128 – 29, 133, 166 – 69, 366 Statthalter Manteuffel and 186 – 88 and transition to German rule 62 – 64, 70, 71, 76, 78 pastoral appointments, Reformed Church 40, 47, 149, 164 – 65 and Strasbourg 136, 165 Pastoral Conference, Alsatian 51, 53, 155 – 56, 233, 368, 370

509

and church reform 70, 81, 383, 391 – 400 and hymnals 54, 258, 267–72, 328 and liturgical questions 53, 238 – 39, 278 and schooling 324, 332 Pastoral Conference, Strasbourg. See Pastoral Conference, Alsatian pastoral corps, Protestant (Strasbourg) characteristics of 122 – 26, 132 – 35, 345, 376, 385 material conditions of 140, 149, 151, 154 old Germans and 136 professional organizations of 155 recruitment to 135 – 36 Reformed 132, 134 – 35 retirement and 150, 154 – 55 salaries 125, 140, 149 – 52 socio-cultural background of 135 – 39 vicars and 145 – 46, 148, 151, 170 See also under ministerial preparation, Alsace (-Lorraine); pastoral appointments, Lutheran Church; pastoral appointments, Reformed Church Pastoral Society, Strasbourg 156, 160, 234, 281, 289, 417 –18 and reform of parish system 378, 380, 382 – 87 and urban ministerial care 341, 348, 353, 356 pensions, clerical 19, 140, 150 – 55, 170, 189 pericopes, Protestant 189, 260, 365 petit consistoires 42, 46 Petri, Christian Friedrich 78, 182 – 83, 187, 193n66, 196, 204, 238, 379, 380, 437, 439 Petri, Emil and campaigns for Protestant church reform 218 –19, 401, 414 – 26 passim as Superior Consistory member 196n75, 437, 439 as Undersecretary for Justice and Religious Affairs 86n9, 155, 175, 177, 178n15, 197n78, 202 – 4, 218 – 21, 429, 443 pew rentals, Protestant 159, 248 – 52 Pfeffel, Théophile 270 Piepenbring, Karl 134n34, 207, 211, 216, 219, 221, 279, 396n11, 420, 422, 441

510

index

pietism, Alsatian 48, 52, 53, 261, 349, 365, 359, 370–72, 376 piety 7, 19, 350, 366, 369, 388, 434 church-based 9, 226, 291, 341, 339, 377, 435 individualization of 121n4 Pöhlmann, Otto 443 Pommer-Esche, Albert von 177, 442 poor relief Protestant 340 – 53 passim Strasbourg system for 346 Portalis, Jean-Étienne-Marie 40n53, 41 Prass, Hermann 299n18, 302, 305, 311, 325, 327 preaching, in Protestant churches. See sermons; venia concionandi prefect of Bas-Rhin 28, 47 of Lower Alsace 75–76 See also Alsace, Lower, district presidency of press 21, 36, 75, 107 – 8 Catholic 36, 359n58, 360 – 61, 367 – 68 and religious culture 226, 340 – 41, 357 – 59, 432, 434 Protestant 14, 36, 349, 359 – 69. See also names of individual newspapers priests, Catholic 127, 137. See also under Catholicism, Alsace Probepredigten. See sermons, for pastoral vacancies professionalization, clerical 6, 19, 122, 140, 145, 155 – 56, 170, 432 Progrès religieux 36, 69–71, 164, 201, 202, 359–360, 364 – 65 Pron, Marie-Joseph-Auguste 38 Protestant Gymnasium 25, 27, 29, 32, 35, 37, 48, 58, 132n30 and pastoral preparation 136 – 37, 142 during the Reichsland 186n41, 200 –1, 303, 307 – 8, 315n59, 329 – 30 See also schooling, Strasbourg, secondary Protestant League 187, 368 – 69, 375, 435 Protestant Seminary 37, 48, 50, 54, 60, 79, 141, 179 – 80, 186, 191, 193 Protestant Social Conference 374 Protestant Women’s League, German 373, 405 Protestant Worship Society. See Comité du Culte français

Protestantenverein 365n65, 373. See also liberalism, religious Protestantism, Alsace (Lorraine-). See under Lutheran Church, Alsace (-Lorraine); Reformed Church, Alsace (-Lorraine) Protestantism, German and Alsace (-Lorraine) 27 – 28, 33, 39, 58, 67 – 68, 80, 82, 111, 144, 154, 172–74, 189 – 90, 332 – 33, 373–74, 404 – 5, 415 –16 church-state relations 50n80, 63, 65, 154, 178, 223 clergy 122, 138 – 44 passim, 150 – 51, 155, 187 – 88, 435 historiography on 16 –18, 374–75 and national identity 24, 38 – 39, 64, 173–74, 432, 435 organization of 25n5, 40n52, 157, 189 – 90, 202, 207, 345, 348, 389 – 90, 394, 404 piety 267, 274–75, 281, 285 – 89, 291, 330 theological developments 49, 52n85, 53 Protestant union, tendencies toward Alsace (-Lorraine) 67, 173, 186, 205, 207 Lorraine, Reformed Consistory of 209 –14, 218, 422 and orthodox Lutheran polemics 54, 218, 270 Prussia 38 – 39, 50n80, 86, 174, 218, 294, 296 – 97, 429 and annexation of Alsace-Lorraine 56 – 58, 65 – 67, 73 Protestantism in 122, 138, 143, 150, 155, 221, 239, 409 and schooling 297, 300 – 2, 333 and Strasbourg’s military churches 118, 130, 239n46, 257 and Strasbourg’s urbanization 92, 97, 100, 111, 207 Puttkamer, Max von 148, 177, 188, 197, 201, 210 –11, 214 –15, 218, 332, 442 – 43 Puttkamer, Robert von 177n13 Raess, André (Bishop of Strasbourg) 37, 63, 182, 301 Rahden, Till van 10n30 railroads 87, 92, 106, 108 Rassiga, Eduard 177n13, 443

index rationalism, religious 50 – 51, 65 Rau, Frédéric-Charles 61n123, 437 Realschulen 105, 294, 303, 307 at St. John 314 –17, 327 See also schooling, Strasbourg, secondary Recueil official 79, 200. See also Amtliche Sammlung Redslob, Gottfried Friedrich 72n89 Redslob, Julius August 139, 256, 268 – 69, 281, 322, 344, 440 as advocate for church reform 377 – 83, 391, 393 appointment to St. William 128, 133, 166 – 67, 366 Reeken, Dietmar von 9, 17, 157, 289n177, 374 reform movements, in Wilhelmine Germany 389, 415 Reformation, Protestant 25 Reformation Day 51, 230, 235, 240 Reformed Church, Alsace (-Lorraine) 141, 143, 172, 190 – 91, 204 – 5, 210, 238, 240, 319, 332 liturgical practices within 239 – 40, 276 – 86 organization 19, 29 – 30, 39 – 42, 44, 46 – 47, 205 – 8 public image of 171–74, 208 –11, 216 –17, 222 – 24 post-1905 reform debates 390 – 91, 410 –11, 419 – 28 passim relations with Lutheran Church 51, 140, 145 – 49 passim, 155, 205 –11, 213, 216, 219, 274n140, 322n76, 332 – 34, 416, 422 and the transition to German rule 67, 78 – 81 synodal movement 179, 211 – 22, 291 vicars in 146, 149, 151, 155 See also church-state relations, Protestant; church-state relations, Reformed; Synod, Reformed Reformed community, Strasbourg 28, 33 – 35, 41, 46, 79, 124 – 29, 161 – 63, 206–7, 240 – 42, 254, 258, 276, 421 relations with Lutherans 27, 235, 274n141, 256 See also parish (Protestant); parochial organization (Strasbourg); pastoral corps, Protestant

511

Reformed consistory (Strasbourg) 30, 41, 44, 48, 62n124, 147, 165, 205, 208 – 9, 211, 213, 239, 319, 426, 428 Reichard, Max 59, 69n154 Reichskanzleramt 70, 73, 75–76, 90n17, 176, 190, 207, 320 Reichsland 3, 18 idea of 56 – 57, 73 See also Alsace-Lorraine Reichstag 88, 233, 320, 347 religion and gender 121n2, 295, 389 – 90, 416, 428 (see also feminization of religion) official 9 –11, 291, 434 (see also piety, church-based) and politics in the Reichsland 390 – 91, 414 –16 (see also under church-state relations, [Alsace]) popular 10 Religionsgesellschaft, Israelitische 112, 114, 117n96. See also Jewish community, Strasbourg Religious Affairs, Ministry for (French) 42, 58, 175, 185 religious culture 13 –14, 18 – 21, 24, 49, 82, 85, 228, 432, 435 church institutions and 171–72 parish life and 122, 132, 139, 170 press, and 337, 362 – 67 schools and 295, 318 religious education 20, 156, 293 – 95, 318, 336 – 37, 429, 434 – 35 church inspection of 321– 23, 331 – 34 in the parish (see parochial instruction) in primary schools 305, 311 –14 325, 329, 335 – 36 and school curricula 305, 307, 309 –11, 334 – 36 in secondary schools 307, 314 –17, 328 – 335 and social class 314 –17 See also textbooks, and religious education (Protestant) religious inspectors. See inspectors, religious (Lutheran) religious renewal discourse, Protestant 51 – 53, 389 – 93, 402–03, 413 –14, 427 – 28 Renaud, Theodor 198, 199n82, 335, 437, 439 Repp, Kevin 389

512

index

Reulecke, Jürgen 4n8, 10n31 Reuss, Eduard 51, 80, 141, 143, 201, 366, 438 Reuss, Rudolf 372, 438 Richard, Matthias 48n76 Richter, Heinrich 75n172, 176, 320, 330, 443 as head of Oberschulrat 177, 302n29, 443 and Lutheran Church government 77, 178, 190, 193, 437 Riff, Adolf 438 Riff, Karl Friedrich 52, 138, 139, 355, 368, 438, 441, 198n79 rites of passage 227, 274, 280 – 85, 289, 292. See also church rites (Protestant) Rittelmeyer, Georg Heinrich 54, 268 ritual experience, Protestant 51, 227, 241, 258, 260 – 66, 272–74, 278, 280 – 85, 287, 290 – 92 Roedern, Siegfried von 429, 442 – 43 Roffhack, Johann Albert 443 Röhrich, Heinrich 134n34, 136, 442 Roser, Johann Gottfried 128, 159n112, 440 Roth, Georg 163, 199, 412, 437 – 38 Rothau 195 Ruff, Mark Edward 8n22 Ruprechtsau 41n58, 89, 91, 101– 2, 115, 124 – 27, 134, 198n79, 235, 305, 367, 379n102, 381, 441 Saarland 106 sabbatarian laws 233 – 34, 237 Sachse, Arnold 177n12, 303n33 sacralization 6n13, 11, 19, 110, 118 –19, 433, 435 sacraments, in Alsatian Protestantism 50, 54, 274 Sacred Heart, Cult of 10 sacristans (Protestant) 157, 159, 289 – 90 sacristies (Protestant) 253. See also church construction salaries, clerical 19, 140, 149 –152, 170 in Germany 150 and pastoral appointments 152 reform of (Alsace) 153 – 54 Salomon, Émile 117, 245 – 46 Salvation Army (Strasbourg) 129, 373 Salzmann, Jean-Daniel 27 Saxony 150, 155, 297 Schadé, Christoph Emil 135, 440 Schaller, Georg August 125, 138, 440

Scheffer, Heinrich Ludwig 440 Schieder, Wolfgang 6n12 Schillinger, Karl Albert 71n162, 359, 440 Schleiermacher, Friedrich 50n80 Schneegans, August 438 Schollenbruch, Hermann 300, 320, 325 – 26 schooling 6 – 8, 294 – 96, 434 – 5 and the churches 294, 336 – 37 in Germany 294 – 96, 300 and national identity 86, 296 – 98, 301, 336 schooling, Alsace-Lorraine and the churches 318, 321– 28, 331 – 32, 335 – 36 compulsory 20, 293 – 309 passim, 319 – 321, 328, 336 German reorganization of 297 – 303 primary 299 – 300, 302 and Protestant confirmation 35, 284, 319 – 21 secondary 299 – 301, 303 state administration of 72, 176–77, 301 – 3, 442 – 43 See also under religious education schooling, Strasbourg 25, 29, 35 – 36, 60, 76n175, 101,105, 322, 331, 336 – 37 primary 31, 105, 122, 302–7, 321 reorganization of primary (1872) 303 – 5, 322n77, 323, 327 – 28, 336 secondary 29, 32, 105, 136 – 37, 303, 307 – 9 See also parochial instruction (Protestant); religious education Schrenk, Elias 227, 241, 366 Schutzenberger, Georges-Frédéric 31 Schwalb, Maximilian 443 Schwander, Rudolf 13, 84, 98, 431n1, 444 Schweitzer, Albert 141, 151, 166, 196 Schweitzer, Georg Emil 152n90, 440 seating arrangements in Protestant churches 247 – 50 sects (Strasbourg) 19, 122, 129, 373 secularization 3 –11 passim, 19 – 22, 172, 223 – 26, 228, 238, 376, 391 and schooling 295, 331, 336 and urbanization 85, 109, 119, 170, 225 – 26, 274–75, 339, 433 – 35 Seelsorge (Protestant). See ministerial care in Strasbourg (Protestant) Sengenwald, Jules 199, 244, 249, 253, 439

index sermons for pastoral vacancies 187 – 88 Protestant theology on (Alsace) 54, 227, 263 – 66, 279, 291, 342 sick, aid to the. See ministerial care, Strasbourg (Protestant) Silverman, Dan 297 simultaneum 27, 37, 242n57 Smend, Julius 227 – 28, 244, 258 – 66, 273, 279, 334, 368 Smith, Helmut Walser 6n13, 8n20, 16, 17, 24n4, 172n1 sociability bourgeois 358 religious 350 Social Democratic Party 121n1 social question 7 socialism 142, 347 and religion 121, 130 Société Évangélique. See Evangelical Society Sombart, Werner 389 Sommerau, Ange Theophil 134, 441 Sonntagsblatt, Elsässiches Evangelisches 36, 61, 69, 164, 202, 359 – 60, 363, 365, 387 Sonntagsruhe. See sabbatarian laws space, liturgical, Protestant conceptions of 241 – 53 Spener, Philip Jacob 118n101, 317 Sperber, Jonathan 6n13, 358 Spitta, Friedrich 228n8, 259, 262, 269 – 71, 280, 368, 438 St. Aurelia 41, 43, 45 – 46, 61, 89, 157n106, 158n107, 192, 194, 379, 385 and Königshofen 127, 372 parish life 78, 126, 161 – 62, 326 pastors at 55n95, 152, 440 ritual practices at 235, 250, 254, 276, 280, 283 St. Nicholas 41, 61, 89, 124, 126 – 27, 161, 166, 192, 194, 343n11, 351, 370, 379 French-language parish 46, 51n84, 79n188, 128 – 29, 159n112, 163 – 64, 181 German-language parish 46, 125 – 27, 152, 161, 166, 196, 440 ritual practices at 229, 235, 240, 255 – 56, 280, 440 St. Stephan (Strasbourg) 61 St. Stephan’s school 303, 307 – 8. See also schooling, Strasbourg, secondary

513

St. Thomas 41, 43, 45 – 46, 61, 89, 157n106, 379 inspection 45, 51, 192, 194 – 95, 199, 230 – 31, 341, 418, 439 military presence at 24, 130, 256 – 58 parish life 124, 126 – 27, 161, 168, 346, 384 pastors at 49, 53n89, 127, 134 – 35, 152, 167, 382, 440 ritual practices at 204, 235, 247 – 58 passim, 272, 276 – 80, 284 – 5, 290n181 St. Thomas Foundation 37, 152, 179, 186, 193, 198, 200, 403 St. William 41, 43, 45 – 46, 61, 79, 89, 166, 194, 40, 325 – 26, 379 intra-Protestant relations at 53n89, 128, 133, 158, 166 – 67, 366 inspection 181 – 82, 187, 191 – 95, 198 – 99, 225, 418, 438 parish life 78, 124 – 26, 130n24, 158 – 63, 255 – 56, 284n163, 344 – 46, 350, 352, 434 ritual practices at 235, 245, 250 – 52, 276, 285, 290 Staatskirchentum 172 state, modern 8, 435 and secularization 119n103, 172–74, 224, 391, 430 statistics, Protestant ecclesiastical (Strasbourg) 189 – 90, 274 – 89 passim. See also church rites; piety, church-based Statthalter (Alsace-Lorraine) 88, 173, 176, 409, 413. See also Alsace-Lorraine, administration Ste-Marie-aux-Mines. See Markirch Stempel, Georg 93 – 94, 444 Stern, Johann August Eugen 133, 206, 349, 356, 440 Stichaner, Joseph von 443 Stiehlische Regulative 300 Stift (Protestant) 137, 141, 186n41, 360. See also Protestant Seminary Stöber, Adolf 270 Stoecker, Adolf 24n4 Strasbourg architecture 86, 92 administration of 13, 88, 93 – 94, 95n31, 98, 444 Altstadt 87, 89, 95, 97, 101 – 3, 110, 113, 127, 327 as big city 3, 12, 24, 83 – 84, 98, 107, 374

514

index

burial office 289 – 90 as capital of Alsace-Lorraine 12, 24, 75, 92, 105, 172, 362 capitulation of (1681) 23, 26 Catholics (see Catholic community, Strasbourg) city hospitals 53, 89, 91, 113, 115, 124, 281, 289 – 90, 353n37, 381 commercial life 25, 31, 106–7 as cultural cross-roads 27 – 32 cultural life 27, 32, 107 – 8 demography 18, 30, 83, 85, 98 –105, 109 –13, 281 – 84, 288 – 89, 346 as ecclesiastical center 13, 24, 28, 30, 172, 197, 216 educational system (see schooling, Strasbourg; see also names of individual schools) expansion of 88 – 98 passim, 124, 346 extra muros 74, 99, 101– 2, 108, 112 –14, 123 – 25, 131 fortifications 24, 26, 31, 33, 87, 105 industrialization and 32, 105 – 6 intra muros 32, 74, 87, 89, 93, 99, 101 – 4, 112 –13, 123, 125 – 26 Jews (see Jewish community, Strasbourg) military presence in 87, 93, 99, 105, 113, 130 – 31, 256 Neustadt 85, 87 – 98 passim, 101 – 3, 110 –19 passim, 125 – 26, 255, 383 parishes (see parochial organization, Strasbourg; see also under names of individual parishes) political life 34, 76, 93, 116, 234, 347 port of 27 – 28, 106 –107 Protestants (see Lutheran community, Strasbourg; Reformed community, Strasbourg) religious demography 33 – 34 109 –13 residential patterns in 33, 101, 111, 126, 346 siege of 23, 39, 59 socio-economic conditions 35, 105, 107, 366 streets 85, 118 transportation 31, 87, 107 urban development and planning 83 – 98 passim and World War I 431 Straßburger Post 181, 367, 387, 402, 435

Stricker, Eduard 235, 258, 441 – 42 appointment at Strasbourg 134n34, 165 role in Reformed Church governance 218, 221 and urban ministerial care 341 – 43, 349 – 54 passim Strohl, Henri 15n42 Strong, Josiah 433 Stübel, Otto 437 Studt, Konrad, von 442 Stumpf, Pierre-Paul (Bishop of Strasbourg) 182 Sturm, Jacob 25, 119 Stuttgart 105n63, 114 suffrage, parochial 21, 46, 160 – 64, 166 – 67, 346 efforts to reform 393, 398, 407 – 9, 420, 425 and resident aliens 208, 419, 420 – 28, 428 and women 390 – 91, 405 – 28 passim See also parish councils, Protestant, elections to Sulze, Emil 244, 377, 389, 391 – 92 Sundhausen 192 Superior Consistory 213 –15, 218, 356 and church reform discussions 81, 393 – 428 passim and clergy 78, 80, 133n33, 142 – 48, 152 – 56, 165 – 68, 188 composition 47, 179 – 80, 183, 186 – 87, 191 – 99, 437 – 39 delegates to the Directory 195 – 99, 437 internal functioning of 179, 199 – 204 and intra-Protestant relations 53 – 54 lay-clerical relations within 200 powers of 47 – 48, 171, 216, 221n151, 334 – 35, 390 relations with political authorities 47 – 48, 171 – 87 passim, 201 – 204, 222 and ritual practice 238, 260, 268–73, 288, 320 and schooling 320, 322n76, 324 – 27, 334 and Strasbourg 47, 124, 197 – 99, 387 and transition to German rule 55, 61, 68, 72, 77–78 See also General Consistory; Lutheran Church, Alsace (-Lorraine)

index Superior Presidency (Alsace-Lorraine). See Alsace-Lorraine, administration Möller, Eduard von Superior School Authority. See Oberschulrat Sutcliffe, Anthony 4n8 Switzerland 135 synagogues 61, 89, 112 –18, 373n83. See also Jewish community, Strasbourg Synod, Reformed 42, 271, 288, 332 – 34, 356 and church reform discussions 390 – 91, 419 – 28 passim efforts to create 80 – 81, 211 – 22 executive committee (Synodalvorstand) 149, 216 – 21 organization of 213 – 20 powers of 215, 219 – 21 See also Reformed Church, Alsace (-Lorraine) Synodal Law of 1905 203, 219 – 22, 390, 400 teachers, churches and appointment of 322 – 24 Tenfelde, Klaus 4n8 Teutsch, Daniel Christian 197, 437, 439 textbooks, and religious education (Protestant) 47, 171, 200, 220, 310, 308, 322n76, 324 – 28, 390, 421 Thann 218 theological exams (Alsace-Lorraine) 18 experiences with 142 – 47 introduction of 19, 80, 140, 142, 186 establishment of second ( pro ministerio) 145 – 49, 156, 189, 209, 211–12 See also ministerial preparation, Alsace (-Lorraine): professionalization, clerical time, Protestant liturgical 227 – 28, 230, 232, 238 – 40 Tönnies, Ferdinand 2 – 3, 226 Tournier, Camille 134n34, 164, 442 Treitschke, Heinrich von 23, 64, 173 Trier 111 Tubach, Karl 139, 158, 346, 360, 440 Tübingen 137n43, 141 Turner, Victor 227n7 Uberfill, François 100n50 ultramontanism 65, 157 Ungerer, Karl Gustav 138, 257, 261, 440

515

as Directory member 437, 190, 193n66 as religious inspector 195n72, 197 – 98, 382, 438 and religious life in Strasbourg 230, 274, 280, 288, 319, 343, 346, 378 Union, Evangelical-Protestant 71, 165, 192 Union, Liberal Protestant 241, 360, 367 – 68, 368, 372–73, 375 union, Protestant. See under Protestant union, tendencies toward University of Strasbourg to 1871 26 – 29, 32, 35 1870 –1918 18, 60 – 61, 79 – 80, 92, 105, 143, 162, 183, 221, 232, 431 and the Neustadt 84, 88, 91 – 95, 141, 381 See also Faculty of Catholic Theology; Faculty of Protestant Theology Unsinger, Edmund 398, 438 urban history 4, 10 Urban Mission 339, 365, 371–79 passim, 383, 434 urban planning 31, 83, 95, 97, 119 urbanization, nineteenth-century 5, 83, 98, 136, 295, 336 – 37, 431 and ecclesiastical organization (Alsace-Lorraine) 136, 340, 388 – 430 passim in German Europe 12, 83, 96 – 97, 102–7, 111, 170, 285, 345 and modernization 2 – 5, 83, 85, 225, 291 and the press 357 – 69 and religious conditions 2, 5, 10 –12, 20 – 22, 84 – 85, 113 –19, 123 – 28, 169–70, 225 – 27, 232, 255, 274–75, 291, 318, 331, 336, 339 – 48 passim, 388 – 90, 431 – 35 (see also parochial organization, Strasbourg) and Strasbourg 12 –13, 19 – 20, 83 – 86, 93 –119, 122, 231, 303, 322, 331, 354 – 56, 431 and voluntary organizations 357 – 58, 370–77 urban-rural relations, and Protestantism (Alsace) 165, 192, 331, 369, 394, 405, 418 –19, 432, 435 Vatican Council, First 38, 63 Vauban, Marquis de 26

516

index

venia concionandi and the Lutheran Church 146 – 48, 208 and the Reformed Church 147, 208, 213, 216 Vereine. See voluntary associations Vereinshaus. See club house, Protestant vicars Catholic 41n56, 127n14 Protestant 145 – 46, 148, 151, 170 (see also under pastoral corps) Virchow, Rudolf 66 visitation districts, Lutheran 381. See also parochial organization, reform efforts visitors (Reformed Church) 217 –18, 220, 333, 441 Vogler, Bernard 15, 135 Volksfreund 36, 318, 359n58, 360 – 61, 367, 432 Volksverein, in Strasbourg 115 –16 voluntary associations 75, 83 and Catholicism 9 –10, 226, 358, 370, 374–76 and Protestantism 16, 21, 53, 116, 155, 160, 178, 192, 370 –77 and religious community 112, 117n96, 340 – 41, 358, 377, 388, 392 and urban culture 5, 7, 32, 85, 113, 231, 340, 357 – 58, 368, 388 Wagner, Ludwig 412, 439 Wagner, Paul 169, 372, 440 Wahl, Alfred 13n39 Webb, Eugen 437 Weber, Adna F. 3n4 Weber, Andreas 437 Weber, Eugen 296 Weber, Max 3, 226 Wedel, Karl von 324, 414 –15, 429, 442 Wehler, Hans-Ulrich 18n54, 297 Weichlein, Siegfried 17 Weirich, Julius 251, 290, 438 Weissenburg (inspection) 43n65, 74, 194, 196, 198, 210n114, 439 Weltz, Philipp 181, 197 – 98, 438 Westphalia, Peace of 26 Weyer, Adolphe 76n175 Weyermüller, Friedrich 270, 360 Wichern, Johann Hinrich 52, 370 Wiese, Ludwig 316 Wilcken, Niels 86 Wilhelm I (of Germany) 55, 72, 77, 87, 90n20

Wilhelm II (of Germany) 22, 184, 429, 435 Will, Ludwig 127, 133, 134n36, 138, 167, 440 Will, Robert 16n45 as pastor at St. William 134n35, 138, 290, 349, 440 as professor of Protestant theology 139n48, 259n100 and religious conditions in Strasbourg 232, 342, 344, 346, 352, 383, 385 and voluntary associations 377 Wissembourg (inspection). See Weissenburg Witz, Paul Eugen 124, 126, 442 Wolf, Georg 321, 367, 401, 404, 409, 438 Wolff, Emil 402, 439 World War I 22, 429 – 30 worship, Protestant approaches to 20, 122, 226 – 29, 234 – 35, 241 – 51, 255 – 84, 291 – 92, 355, 377 Württemberg 100, 150, 155, 297 Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) 52, 160, 367, 370, 372 Young St. Peter, Lutheran 37 – 38, 61, 126, 158n107, 161 – 63, 231 – 36, 328, 345, 350 – 52, 440 intra-Protestant relations at 53 – 55, 61 – 62, 159 – 61, 167 – 69, 285, 372 liturgical practices at 261, 269, 271, 276, 278–79 and Lutheran church organization 41, 43, 45 – 46, 166, 194 – 95, 379, 399 simultaneum at 27, 240, 242n57 worship space at 242n57, 247 – 57 passim youth ministry 354 – 56, 372, 375. See also Young Men’s Christian Association youth, worship services for 258, 268, 356 Zabern 394 Zabern affair 297, 391, 429 Zalar, Jeffrey T. 7n15 Zionskirche (Strasbourg) 114 –115 Zorn von Bulach, Hugo 86n9, 175, 429, 442 Zwingli, Huldreich 240