Prussian three-class franchise

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Prussian three-class franchise

After the 1848 revolutions in the German states, the Prussian
Prussia

Prussia was, most recently, a historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. This state had for centuries substantial influence on Germany and European history....
three-class franchise
Suffrage

Suffrage is the civil right to vote, or the exercise of that right. In that context, it is also called political franchise or simply the franchise....
system (Dreiklassenwahlrecht) was introduced in 1849 by the Prussian king Friedrich Wilhelm IV for the election of the Lower House of the Prussian state parliament

Parliament

A parliament is a legislature, especially in those countries whose system of government is based on the Westminster system modeled after that of the United Kingdom....
. It was completely abolished only in 1918. This franchise was used in Prussia, Brunswick

Duchy of Brunswick

Brunswick was a historical state in Germany. Originally the territory of Brunswick-Wolfenb?ttel in the Holy Roman Empire, it was established as an independent duchy by the Congress of Vienna in 1815....
, Waldeck

Waldeck (state)

Waldeck was a sovereign principality in the German Empire and German Confederation and, until 1929, a constituent state of the Weimar Republic....
and Saxony

Kingdom of Saxony

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Parliament

Duchy of Brunswick

Waldeck (state)

Waldeck was a sovereign principality in the German Empire and German Confederation and, until 1929, a constituent state of the Weimar Republic....
and Saxony

Kingdom of Saxony

The Kingdom of Saxony , lasting between 1806 and 1918, was an independent member of a number of historical confederacies in Napoleonic through Germany....
(the latter until 1909).

Those eligible to vote were men aged over 24, divided by their direct tax revenue into three classes. These three classes were calculated according to how much tax one paid, by dividing the entire range of taxes into thirds. The first class was for those paying the highest taxes; the second for those with a lower income; the third for those paying few or no taxes.

Voting took place in public, orally; there was no secret ballot

Secret ballot

The secret ballot is a voting method in which a voter's choices are confidential. The key aim is to ensure the voter records a sincere choice by forestalling attempts to influence the voter by intimidation or bribery....
. It was also indirect

Indirect election

Indirect election is a process in which voters in an election don't actually choose between candidates for an office but rather elect persons who will then make the choice....
; representatives known as electors (Wahlmänner) were voted for, each class electing a third of all the electors. The classes of course contained widely differing numbers of people, even though the number of electors was the same for each one: in 1849 the first class constituted 4.7% of the population, the second class 12.7% and the third class 82.6%. This distribution meant that a first-class vote had 17.5 times the value of a third-class vote. A three-class franchise system was also used for local elections in parts of Prussia, one result of which was that the industrialist Alfred Krupp

Krupp

The Krupp family, a prominent 400-year-old Germany dynasty from Essen, have become famous for their steel production and for their manufacture of ammunition and armaments....
was the only person able to vote for the electors in the first class in Essen.

Prussia's controlling position in the German Empire

German Empire

The German Empire is the name commonly used in English to describe Germany from the unification of Germany and proclamation of William I, German Emperor as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became Weimar republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of William II, German Emperor ....
meant that the system was at the heart of debates about reform. Extending suffrage would, however, have meant the downfall of the ruling conservative politicians, elected by the wealthy voters the three-class system favoured. Thus, despite popular dissatisfaction, the Prussian franchise persisted.

In 1917, Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, German Chancellor and Prussian Prime Minister, drafted a reform to the voting system. Trying to placate the public and avoid revolution, Kaiser Wilhelm II proclaimed a watered-down version of this reform in his Easter Speech on April 7, which, by specifying no fixed date, failed to satisfy the public. The three-class system remained until the German Revolution

German Revolution

The German Revolution was the politically-driven civil conflict in Germany at the end of World War I. The period lasted from 1918#November until the formal establishment of the Weimar Republic in August 1919....
of November 1918, when the Weimar Republic

Weimar Republic

The Weimar Republic was the democracy and republican period of Germany from 1919 to 1933. Following World War I, the republic emerged from the German Revolution in November 1918....
was formed. Article 17 of its constitution

Constitution

A constitution is a system for government — often codified as a written document — that establishes the rules and principles of an autonomous political entity....
proclaimed proportional representation

Proportional representation

Proportional representation , sometimes referred to as full representation, is a category of voting systems aimed at a close match between the percentage of votes that groups of candidates obtain in elections and the percentage of seats they receive ....
for women and men over the age of 20, with a secret ballot system.

Prussian three-class franchise

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