Abstract

With this map one can see why anti-socialist observers in Saxony regarded SPD victories in the Reichstag elections of January 1877 as a “black spot” on their kingdom. August Bebel (1840–1913) won the 13th Saxon Reichstag constituency of Leipzig-County (the district surrounding the city of Leipzig), and socialists also won the 5th Reichstag constituency of Dresden-Old City (plus five other constituencies in Saxony’s southwest corner). This map accompanied an article in the popular journal Daheim, written by the future leader of the Pan-German League, Ernst Hasse (1846–1908). A National Liberal statistician, Hasse represented the 12th Saxon constituency of Leipzig-City in the Reichstag after 1890. In 1877 he had recently been appointed director of Leipzig’s Statistical Office—a post he held until 1908. Shortly after the January 1877 election, Hasse commissioned this detailed, large-scale map, which depicts Germany’s 397 Reichstag constituencies and the party affiliation of each winner. To this map he appended his own “explanatory remarks.” Hasse warned all non-socialist parties that disunity in the face of the socialist threat was nothing less than “suicidal.”

Map: The Reichstag Elections of 1877

Source

Source: Daheim, Jg. 13, No. 20, Extra-Beilage (1877): 320a-b, cartographer: R. Andree. Available online at MDZ, https://www.digitale-sammlungen.de/view/bsb11350477?page=332