Turnips and war memorials: E.J. Gumbel's critique of German militarism, 1919-1932.

In late summer 1932, University of Heidelberg statistician E.J. Gumbel was dismissed from his academic post and lost his "right to teach" at any German university for "conduct unbefitting his position" as a professor. (1) His offense: suggesting, in a public speech, that the most appropriate symbol for World War I memorials was the turnip, the principal source of nourishment in Germany during the wartime famine of 1917-18. To Gumbel, the turnip evoked the suffering of German civilians and soldiers like no other symbol because it served as a reminder of the horrific famine and poverty of the latter war years. He objected to conventional monuments which routinely displayed neo-classical virginal figures holding victory symbols because these romanticized war and belied the suffering of millions of Germans as a consequence of the Great War. Gumbel's dismissal resulted, in part, from a nationally-orchestrated campaign by fight-wing students to remove him from the Heidelberg faculty. (2) Their success in achieving that objective accelerated the Nazi campaign to purge German universities of all professors deemed incompatible with the goals of the coming National Socialist State.

Historians have treated the witch-hunt against Gumbel as one of the best examples of the politicization of German universities during the 1920s and early 1930s. Gumbel was a radical pacifist, a progressive socialist, and a secular Jew, and as such he became an ideal target for opponents of the Weimar Republic and the democratization of Germany's universities. On four different occasions while he served as a member of Heidelberg's Arts and Humanities Faculty, Gumbel found himself the focal point of external political controversies that resulted in University disciplinary hearings, formal reprimands, and increasing enmity from his colleagues. For nearly a decade, anti-republican student organizations manipulated faculty distrust of Gumbel to fuel their campaign for his removal from the Heidelberg faculty. This campaign enabled student opponents to advance both their own opposition to the Weimar Republic and the anti-republican agenda of parent parties, especially the National Socialist German Workers Party. In this highly charged and politically polarized atmosphere, Gumbel's colleagues concluded that his journalistic work on behalf of the German Peace Cartel and the German League for Human Rights (3) violated the University's long-standing apolitical intellectual traditions and customs. (4) They strongly questioned whether his political activism in support of a pacifist agenda--the democratization of the Weimar Republic, the establishment of social and economic equity, opposition to political violence, and rejection of the military policies of the Weimar Republic--was compatible with the impartiality expected of German scholars. As members of university faculties, such scholars were civil servants employed by the state and subject to state guidelines. Moreover, Gumbel's peers feared that student unrest centering on Gumbel would continually disrupt the University's ability to conduct classes if he were not removed from his academic post.

Was Gumbel acting irresponsibly as a scholar and academic lecturer in his efforts to be a responsible citizen of the new German Republic, as many of his colleagues believed? Did his political writings violate the long-standing, but tacit professional commitment among German professors to serve the interests of the state and the people of Germany by means of impartial scholarship? Was Gumbel's political journalism too provocative and, hence, incompatible with preserving an atmosphere of order and civility within the university? What moved Gumbel, no stranger to academic traditions, to attempt to bridge the gap between elitist scholarship and mass politics after World War I? What moved his political opponents to seek his destruction by campaigning to remove him from the Heidelberg faculty and to revoke his right to teach at any Germany university?

Because Gumbel was so often publicly vilified as a danger to the nation, the story of his ultimate dismissal from the Heidelberg faculty in 1932 allows one to evaluate whether in the academic culture of the Weimar era it was possible to conduct socially responsible science and scholarship without taking a political position on the policies of the new republic. Played out on the stage of a university criticized by volkisch and Nazi students as a "bulwark of young democracy" (5) and a "stronghold of liberalism," (6) the drama surrounding Gumbel's dismissal illustrates how difficult it was for a professor to defend his integrity as a teacher and citizen against public disapprobation based on a deeply entrenched collective understanding of the nature of national sacrifice in war.

To be sure, many members of the Heidelberg faculty were politically engaged following the Great War, especially in the German Democratic Party (DDP). Many of Gumbel's colleagues supported working coalitions among middle class political parties and Social Democrats. Furthermore, some faculty were quite outspoken in their opposition to anti-Semitism at the University. (7) Indeed, one might argue, as historian Christian Jansen does, that Gumbel's achievement of the habilitation at Heidelberg is itself an indicator of an unusual degree of liberal-mindedness among the faculty. (8) But as Jansen also points out, though many Heidelberg professors had made their peace with the Weimar Republic, that peace was a fragile one that did not bind its practitioners in any emotional way to the new state. While many Heidelberg professors preferred liberal parties, this preference did not necessarily signal a politically liberal cast of mind. (9) It should therefore come as no surprise that even the most outspoken faculty supporters of the Weimar Republic such as sociologist Willy Hellpach, a member of the DDP, and jurist Gerhard Anschutz, who contributed to the formulation of the Weimar Constitution, quickly and vociferously distanced themselves from Gumbel's political views, especially those concerning the connection between Weimar militarism and the emergence of National Socialism. Nor is it surprising that many Heidelberg faculty members feared a rising tide of student unrest in response to Gumbel's political writings. They remained trapped, as Jansen explains, in a social and politically conservative mind-set that distorted their understanding of the dangers presented by National Socialism at all levels. (10)

Professors' uneasiness about the potential for student turmoil was not unfounded. Since 1919, the University of Heidelberg had experienced its share of politically motivated student unrest. During the 1921-22 academic year, radical student activists from the right brought contemporary political conflict into the University itself, seeking to use the student government to take positions on University decisions surrounding the dismissal of right-wing extremist Arnold Ruge from the Heidelberg faculty. In June 1922, radicalized students from the left swung into action against Philip Lenard, the director of the University's Physics Institute, who ignored a state directive to fly the flag at half-mast in honor of the assassinated Walther Rathenau. After failing to persuade the University rector to take action against Lenard or convince Lenard to address them directly, students and labor unionists forced open the barricaded doors of the Institute, abducted Lenard, and nearly threw him into the Neckar River. (11)

Both Lenard and the student leaders involved in this debacle faced disciplinary hearings. The outcome of the hearings, the reinstatement of Lenard to his teaching post, and the acquittal of the student leader Carlos Mierendorf, aroused grave concern about the students' behavior. Even though they strongly disapproved of Lenard's actions, professors were even more outraged by Mierendorf's acquittal, so much so that one prominent colleague shouted down Karl Jaspers' report from the disciplinary committee on the Mierendorf case. (12) Jaspers was so disturbed by the Lenard abduction that he spoke to his seminar students about it. Though he condemned Lenard's behavior, he strongly objected to students' use of force against Lenard, arguing that such action "endangers the rule of law and the existence of the university." Moreover, this form of political activism, Jaspers declared, violated the transnational character of the university. (13) One of his students, Theodor Haubach, disagreed, arguing that the issue in the Lenard case was not the viability of the university, but rather the very existence of the Weimar Republic, which, he asserted, Lenard's behavior gravely threatened. According to Jaspers' later account of this exchange, Haubach stated baldly that "since there is not full trust in today's functioning government authority, it is necessary to make a visible response to Lenard's threat which makes clear what is being played out." (14)

Though the Nazi Party and other right-wing extremist parties had been banned from Baden, especially after the 1923 Munich Beer Hall Putsch, right-wing student radicals began a campaign to gain representation in the University of Heidelberg student government. Despite numerous obstacles, including having to form front organizations to run in elections, Nazi supporters gained control of leading student government positions by 1925, and found themselves in a position to politicize the academic atmosphere at the University. (15) Thus, as Gumbel began teaching at Heidelberg, tension between student political activism and professors' desire to preserve academic decorum was already apparent.

Unlike his colleagues who were members of established political parties, Gumbel was a pacifist whose political activism placed him in a much maligned minority that suffered widespread public disapproval because of its outspoken anti-war position and its rejection of the effort of the Weimar Republic to circumvent the military clauses of the Treaty of Versailles. Members of the anti-war wing of the German peace movement, especially after the Ruhr Occupation, were frequently denounced as traitors, (16) a view shared by people across the entire political spectrum from the German Communist Party to the National Socialist Party. (17) By this time, Gumbel, a prolific scholar and political writer, was well-known as a critic of Weimar militarism and an outspoken advocate for international reconciliation, especially with France. (18)

Radicalized students, prodded by National Socialist organizers, were quick to see that by attacking Gumbel the professor, they could accelerate their campaign to dominate the student government by gaining much-needed support from Heidelberg's nationalist/volkisch students. They also saw how to use their attacks against Gumbel to link their campaign against the Weimar Republic, as well as liberals, socialists, and Jews in higher education, with their political goal of reversing the terms of the Treaty of Versailles.

Gumbel was a prime target as one who, for nearly a dozen years, had systematically exposed the ties between German nationalism, German militarism, and the continued undermining of the Weimar Republic. Even his politically liberal colleagues had difficulty accepting Gumbel's relentless attacks against the military policies of the Weimar Republic. Perhaps most provocative were his attempts to recast the notions of patriotism and heroism in terms that denied the glory and heroism of war, views which violated deeply-held convictions about the sacredness of military sacrifice in German society.

Gumbel evolved these ideas, especially his commitment to international reconciliation and his understanding of the connection between economic competition and modern war, as he matured from late adolescence into early manhood. Born in 1891 to a wealthy Jewish banking family from Munich, Gumbel was deeply influenced by his uncle Abraham, a leader of the family bank in Heilbronn. Abraham Gumbel was an outspoken opponent of Bismarck's anti-socialist laws and became an equally outspoken critic of the Great War following his son's death in 1914. Not only did he admire his uncle's independence of mind and find in him a kindred liberal spirit, Emil Gumbel would adopt his uncle's polemical style and his penchant to challenge the status quo through journalism. (19)

In 1910, at the age of nineteen, Gumbel entered the University at Munich to study mathematics and political economy. While there, Gumbel's internationalism and his economic critique of war were strengthend by his association with the liberal economist Lujo Brentanno, a member of Gumbel's oral examination committee. Brentanno was an influential proponent of social reform who argued for cooperation between workers and employers. Between 1910 and 1914, while Gumbel was his student, Brentanno was deeply concerned about the connection between economic competition, international conflict, and the barbarism of modern warfare. (20) Gumbel would soon share Brentanno's concerns, but as historian Arthur Brenner notes, "until World War l, Gumbel was a moderate peace activist ... [who had] absorbed the rational, practical concerns and arguments of the bourgeois peace movement" and who had not yet developed the socialist, anti-militarist and ethical opposition to war that came to characterize his mature adulthood." (21)

Like many European pacifists whose anti-militarism was forged in the last decades of the nineteenth century, Gumbel, in 1914, volunteered for military service, persuaded that his country was fighting a just and defensive war. (22) Historian Sandi Cooper characterizes this choice as "patriotic pacifism," namely, the qualification of a pacifist's "antiwar or pro-peace position with various exceptions for self- and national defense." (23) But Gumbel's experiences as an infantry volunteer transformed his views about Germany's war aims, and by late 1915 he joined one of the new pacifist groups emerging in Europe during the war, the Bund Neues Vaterland (New Fatherland League, hereafter BNV). Like its counterparts in England, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, (24) the BNV differed from pre-war European peace organizations in two significant ways. First, its founders viewed the Great War as an economic catastrophe with consequences comparable to the economic and demographic exhaustion of Europe after the Thirty Years' War. (25) As Kurt Tepper-Laski, a BNV founder, argued:

 in war today, one kills the consumer of his own national product
 .... If it comes to a war, which will be carried out with the
 thoroughness and excellence of other achievements of our time, it
 won't matter whether the government of Germany, England, Russia or
 France is declared victor. In any case, North America and Japan
 will be able for a very long time to share the theft of world
 commerce. (26)

Second, this new strain of pacifism radically denied validity to the practice of war, calling upon peace activists, as patriots, to denounce the legitimacy and efficacy of war. This position reflected a new kind of pacifism born of outrage at the meaningless destruction of modern industrial warfare. (27)

Unlike Germany's prewar pacifist organizations, especially the German Peace Society, the BNV concluded early in the war that Germany was fighting an imperialistic, rather than a defensive war. It tried to prevent Europe and Germany from reverting to a foreign policy of dynastic expansionism and a domestic policy of political repression, especially of working class parties. The BNV sought to create democratic political and economic institutions through which parliaments could assert control over foreign policy, abolish secret diplomacy, establish international organizations (e.g., an international court of arbitration), and end the Great War based on principles of reconciliation among peoples, goals reminiscent of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's later "peace without victors" speech. (28)

Sympathetic toward socialist internationalism, Gumbel found the political goals of the BNV compatible with his own vision of a society founded on socialist economic principles and democratic political institutions. He was convinced that such a society could develop only under conditions of enduring international peace. Gumbel was also drawn to the BNV's practical agenda for achieving its goals, the academic, professional, and journalistic competence of its members, and their political connections to high positions in the German government, especially the diplomatic corps. (29) Until it fell afoul of Germany's military censors in the autumn of 1915, the BNV pursued a strategy of back channel diplomacy and public education designed to inform German citizens about the problems with Germany's war aims, especially the annexation of Belgium, the importance of domestic democratic reforms, and the participation of Germany in international institutions dedicated to ensuring peace. Despite government censorship and the arrest of BNV members, the organization continued to seek an enduring peaceful conclusion to the Great War by encouraging German politicians to consider a conciliatory peace and the establishment of a German republic based on democratic institutions. (30)

By 1919, the BNV pushed more vigorously for democratic reform of German domestic institutions as well as international peace and reconciliation through sponsorship of public lectures, anti-war assemblies, prolific publications in pacifist, socialist, and progressive newspapers and magazines, and participation in international conferences that championed peace and human rights. The BNV, as a co-founder of the German Peace Cartel, would cooperate with a wide range of pacifist groups active in Germany during the Weimar era. (31)

Gumbel was an energetic participant in the BNV's diverse strategy in pursuit of an enduring international peace. Engaged in the entire range of the BNV's work, Gumbel, the social scientist, became a prolific journalist as well as a public speaker and prescient critic of Weimar government and society. In the immediate aftermath of World War I, Gumbel used his many opportunities as a journalist and public speaker to articulate the specific connections between monarchism, militarism, and German capitalism. He believed that Germans would embrace the new republic if only they knew about the "unheard of mass of lies which imperial Germany had piled up to get the German people involved in the war and to exhort their endurance for the wrong reasons." (32) He also believed that if the German people, especially workers, only knew the truth, they would dedicate themselves to the establishment of a constitutional republic. That dedication, he maintained, would deprive the forces of the Old Regime, especially the military caste and capitalists, of the rhetorical and moral power which they had used to drag Germany into war and to oppress the German people in the first place. (33)

Gumbel, as a young soldier, had reached this conclusion himself. When he learned more about the diplomatic maneuvering that had thrust Europe into war in 1914, he began to view war as an instrument of the monarchy, the nobility, and influential capitalists to protect their interests. He rejected the widely-held belief that war was a means of achieving peace, seeing a direct connection between the political and social privileges of Germany's officer corps and the persistence of war to justify those privileges. These reactionary structures, he concluded, revealed Germany as an anachronism, a military state within the framework of eighteenth-century dynastic expansionism. Such an anachronism, a monarch privileging his domain's warrior elite, could never produce a democratic society. (34) Thus, the goals of establishing Germany as a democratic republic and creating a functioning international body to resolve conflicts between states could be achieved only by destroying the privileged status of Germany's elite. To do so, Gumbel argued, required severing the link between heroism and war because "all [of] our history books still concern themselves with honoring heroes, wherein the conduct of war for the good of the people and the expansion of the state continues to be treated as a moral deed." (35)

But the force of these arguments lost rhetorical strength in Germany with the promulgation of the Treaty of Versailles. Like most German pacifists, Gumbel was deeply disturbed by the outcome of the Paris Peace Conference. Most German peace groups had actively campaigned for a peace of reconciliation based on Woodrow Wilson's "Fourteen Points." They had hoped for peace terms that would not hold the new republic accountable for the decisions and actions of Wilhelm II and the government of imperial Germany. Most German pacifists, including Gumbel, agreed with the concept of restoring Belgian sovereignty and paying for property damage caused by the German Army in Belgium and northern France. Radical pacifists, like members of the BNV, also approved of the disarmament clauses of the Treaty of Versailles as a first step toward a European-wide process of disarmament. But they were appalled by the harshness of the terms of the Armistice, the continued blockade against German ports during the Paris Peace Conference, and, especially by Article 231, the so-called "war guilt clause" inserted into the peace treaty to justify the Allied claim for an, as yet, unspecified amount of reparations. (36) Nevertheless, unlike the more moderate members of the German middle class peace movement, the BNV cautiously embraced Article 231. (37)

Although these events reversed the focus of his political work, Gumbel continued to expose the connections between monarchy, militarism, and capitalism in Germany. In speeches and commentaries, he argued that the terms of the peace treaty strengthened antidemocratic forces in Germany and caused the new German government, which did not accept any guilt for the crimes of the prewar regime, to balk at implementing a traitorous peace. He pointed out that the punitive nature of the Treaty of Versailles unleashed the forces advocating violence and a war of revenge, achieving exactly what the Entente powers feared most, an unreconstructed militarist Germany in which the forces of internationalism and republicanism were too weak to succeed. (38) Because he interpreted Wilhelmine military practice as feudalistic and thus diametrically opposed to democratic political reforms, Gumbel was profoundly shaken by the resurgence of militaristic chauvinism in 1919. In a February 1921 newspaper article entitled, "The Men of 1914, the Psychology of Public Opinion in Germany," he discussed the danger presented to the Weimar Republic by returning military leaders of the Great War. These dangers were made more grave by the atmosphere of mistrust unleashed by the Entente. The German fear of encirclement by hostile powers was reawakened, and the political status and power of the officer corps of the Old Regime was being strengthened. This atmosphere revived the popular view that for Germany the Great War had been a just and defensive war. The belief that Germany had lost the war not on the battlefield but by sabotage on the home front gained increasing credibility. Thus, Germany's defeat was believed to be the result of treason on the part of socialists, communists, and Jews who had undermined the Hohenzollern monarchy, the very foundation of Germany's greatness. (39)

Such widespread myths made it difficult to gain a hearing for any objective public discourse about the real causes of Germany's defeat and the extent of German responsibility for the war. "It is hard," Gumbel wrote in 1919, "for people to doubt the angelic purity of the Old Regime," (40) even though the German White Book on the Armistice itself makes it clear that it was the German military command that had called for the Armistice and clearly at a point when Germany would have to accept the peace conditions of its enemies. (41) Furthermore, as Gumbel argued, Germany shared responsibility for the outbreak of the Great War. The sources of this responsibility included the "prevailing economic system which saw in war and the preparation for it, the possibility of great profit for the ruling classes"; the failure of German diplomats to prevent the collapse of disarmament talks at the two Hague Conferences because they viewed wars as potent diplomatic tools; the role of diplomats in fostering a system of myths about the moral efficacy and unavoidability of war which was supported by history instruction in the schools; and, the lust for war of the German people. (42)

Gumbel was equally disturbed by the apparent collusion of the Socialist-led Weimar government in the murders of the prominent Communist political leaders, Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxembourg. Could this fledgling republican government establish credible democratic institutions and an enduring constitutional government while violating the civil rights of its opponents and secretly encouraging the arming of paramilitary organizations which sought not only the republic's demise but which also constituted a violation of the Treaty of Versailles? Could the new republic succeed without a civil service corps committed to strengthening democratic institutions, especially those within the justice system and in universities?

Because of its wide-ranging campaigns to influence government policy through all venues of public information, BNV members were among the first political dissenters to experience the tenuousness and fragility of the Weimar Republic's commitment to upholding constitutional protections of civil liberties. Prominent members of the BNV, including Otto Lehmann-Russbuldt, Helmut von Gerlach, Magnus Hirschfeld, Albert Einstein, G.E Nicolai, and Gumbel were subjected to illegal searches and seizures in their homes and offices, physical abuse by anti-republican thugs during public lectures, physical attack by political opponents on public streets, student harassment during lectures, and even political murders. In nearly all cases, BNV victims were unable to obtain justice through the German judicial system even though their civil liberties had been violated. (43) In fact, four BNV members were murdered, including Kurt Eisner (February 1919), Gustav Landauer (March 1919), Alexander Futran (March 1920), and Hans Paasche (May 1920). Indeed, as Lehmann-Russbuldt, one of the founders of the BNV, points out, a number of prominent center and left political leaders murdered between 1919 and 1922 "stood in close personal and professional relationship to Bund circles." These included Hugo Haase, Matthias Erzberger, Liebknecht, Luxembourg, and Rathenau. (44)

In response to this violence, the BNV sponsored a study comparing judicial decisions handed down in the cases of right-wing political violence against rulings in cases of leftwing political violence. This study, prepared and published by Gumbel in 1921 as Zwei Jahre Mord (Two Years of Murder), and updated three years later as Vier Jahre Mord (Four Years of Murder), disturbed public sensibilities. Gustav Radbruch, the Social Democratic Party Minister of Justice, obtained an official Reichstag investigation which upheld Gumbel's findings. But the political instability and sustained economic crisis created by the Ruhr Occupation in 1923 derailed Radbruch's attempt to publicize the results of that investigation. (45)

The chief findings of the study were shocking. In cases that involved three hundred-eighteen political murders committed by right-wing forces, only five guilty verdicts were handed down with no death sentences. In cases that involved sixteen political murders committed by left-wing forces, thirty-nine guilty verdicts were handed down with eight death sentences. Most of those indicted in the murders of republican, socialist, and communist figures were former military officers. (46) Gumbel feared that this judicial double-standard would undermine the credibility of the law, and completely destroy public confidence in constitutional government. (47) Equally troublesome, Gumbel's judicial expose reinforced his sense of the danger posed to Weimar democracy by imperial jurists, militarism, (especially in the prominent role of military figures in the abrogation of civil rights), capitalism, and the republican government's secret funding of paramilitary organizations and weapons industry in western Russia. In November 1922, he wrote that the Weimar Republic seemed to uphold civil liberties of its enemies at the expense of its supporters. Not only was the reactionary Weimar judiciary allowed to dispense justice which favored the republic's right-wing opponents, the government also permitted the deposed Hohenzollern monarchy to retain all of its state holdings as private property. Because the Weimar coalition was so intent on preventing a Bolshevik-style revolution in Germany, it nurtured anti-republican forces whose ultimate goal was to put an end to the republic. Despite being presented with clear evidence of this danger, Gumbel lamented that, "seldom do people allow themselves to be genuinely persuaded by the facts." (48)

By the time Gumbel was appointed to the Arts and Humanities Faculty at the University of Heidelberg in 1923, he had already achieved an international reputation as a relentless critic of German militarism and of right-wing political violence. As an opponent of war and an expert in the new field of statistics, Gumbel based much of his critique of Weimar military policy on the unacknowledged long-term economic costs of war. Unusual for its time, his analysis of the Great War's immediate and long-term effects revealed the intimate connection between suffering on the battlefield and that on the home front, between suffering during the war years and continued hardship thereafter. He studied battlefield death rates, the effects of starvation rations on soldiers and civilians, and the links between malnutrition and significantly higher infant mortality rates and death rates among the population. He also explored the linkage between malnutrition and significantly increased incidence of tuberculosis and influenza, as well as delayed recovery from war wounds. Furthermore, he examined the relationship between battlefield disabilities, high death rates among male youth, and the decline in industrial productivity in Germany and elsewhere during the war. He concluded, in a 1923 article, that "anyone who stands on national territory and understands national wealth in terms of labor resources and labor capacity, will be unable to say yes to war. One can see just how really unnationalistic are the parties who pressure for war." (49) These conclusions confirmed Gumbel's belief that civilians and soldiers alike were the victims of industrial warfare and that endurance in the face of war's costly destructiveness, together with outspoken opposition to war, was the true measure of heroism, patriotism, and ethical nationalism. In short, Gumbel was appropriating the traditional language of heroism assigned to war and reassigning it to criticize war, a strategy which conspicuously and intentionally contradicted the warrior veneration rhetoric of Germany's conservative and reactionary political parties.

Gumbel believed that new conceptualizations and images were necessary to discredit the militaristic value system of the Wilhelmine Empire and to break the connection between heroism and war. New words and language were required which demythologized war by redefining heroism and patriotism which traditionally legitimatized war as a tool for solving national conflict. In so doing, Gumbel and the German League for Human Rights (50) sought to transfer legitimacy and respect to the fledging institutions of international law to achieve the goal of peace with justice. It attempting to forge this new language, Gumbel came into direct conflict with the conservative social values of his academic colleagues and right-wing students who denounced him as the embodiment of Weimar liberalism.

One of Gumbel's earliest attempts to recast the concept of patriotism is found in his review of G.F. Nicolai's Die Biologie des Krieges (The Biology of War, 1917). Nicolai rejected the popular assumption that social darwinist conflict and, hence, war, was the driving force of all living beings, including humans. He averred that cooperation rather than conflict was the most basic human drive. Because of these pacifist views as well as his refusal to take an oath to the German flag or to bear arms for Germany, Nicolai lost his right to teach at the University of Berlin. Gumbel profoundly admired Nicolai's personal and professional sacrifice for his convictions. He saw Nicolai as a courageous scientist and human being because he had placed service to truth above blind loyalty to nation. In so doing, Gumbel asserted a fundamental distinction between patriotism and chauvinism, a distinction that emphasized the highest standard of a scholar's moral and intellectual integrity:

 Love of the Fatherland is not something without limits. If there
 arises a conflict between our striving after truth and love of
 fatherland, then we must definitely place the quest for truth above
 love of the fatherland, and even eventually act against Fatherland
 Parties. Whoever doesn't do this is not a patriot, but rather a
 chauvinist. (51)

Gumbel also admired the personal courage of the English philosopher and pacifist Bertrand Russell, who lost his teaching post at Cambridge because of his active support for conscientious objectors against the Great War. (52) In articles published in 1920 and 1921, Gumbel praised the civil courage of both Nicolai and Russell who he characterized as driven by the relentless scholarly pursuit of truth even when their findings contradicted popular opinions or the goals of government. Gumbel emphasized the personal sacrifice of this new brand of patriotic pacifism by describing these men in terms ordinarily reserved for battlefield warriors. In his essay on Russell, Gumbel observed that "because the conscientious objector is so scorned and hated by public opinion, something like the Bolsheviks in today's middle class circles," the stand taken by a renowned middle class scholar like Russell "requires great courage [and] personal sacrifice." (53) Through such terminology, Gumbel sought to transform the patriotic pacifist into a hero, a redeemer on a moral plane higher than his warrior counterpart.

The controversial nature of this new language of heroism was made dramatically clear by the widespread public condemnation of remarks Gumbel made on July 26, 1924, during the closing phase of the annual "No-More-War" rally in Heidelberg. (54) Consistent with his analysis of the Great War and his definitions of heroism and patriotism, Gumbel, the master of ceremonies for this event, held that German involvement in World War I had been a betrayal of honor and an irresponsible sacrifice of innocent human lives. Emphasizing the necessity to reject "all war without reservation," Gumbel called for two minutes of silence to honor the war dead who "I will not say, fell on a field of dishonor, but who nevertheless died a horrible death." (55) The moderate Heidelberger Tageblatt (Heidleberg Journal) reported that the audience "had been strongly moved by the moderator's request.... The prevailing attitude most vividly expressed, as the quiet and dignified demonstration dispersed, [was] one of propriety and a disciplined sense of responsibility." (56) However, an account of the same meeting in the conservative Heidelberger Neueste Nachrichten (Heidelberg Latest News) interpreted Gumbel's closing remarks as an insult to the war dead and to their surviving families. (57) Portrayed in this manner, reports of Gumbel's remarks deeply offended influential sectors of public opinion across the political spectrum. Gumbel's numerous enemies seized upon this opportunity to attack him, charging that, by making such provocative remarks, the professor was undermining the reputation of the University and that of the Weimar government.

Harsh criticism from political conservatives and reactionaries was to be expected. But Gumbel's attempt to reappropriate the rhetoric of heroism outraged even pro-republican colleagues, thus strengthening the position of his enemies. As Willy Hellpach, Baden Minister of Culture and Education, recalled, "even the most influential Republicans" and Social Democrats had written him that "whoever lost a son, brother, father, or spouse out there, feels deeply offended" by this. (58) Gumbel had not intended to dishonor the war dead, nor had those who had attended the anti-war assembly taken any offense; (59) but his words were easily mischaracterized by his enemies. From Gumbel's perspective, he was trying to describe an important reality about modern warfare and its consequences. Like many antiwar veterans, Gumbel was desperate to make clear to his audience the horror of war and, above all, to keep alive the memory of the horror of the Great War in Germany. This strategy, which was practiced throughout the German peace movement, gained in significance as the immediate closeness to the war faded with time. But political activists outside of circles sympathetic to peace activism sought to bolster the memory of war's honor and sacrifice. For their part, Gumbel's colleagues feared that the controversy over his remarks could "tremendously damage [the] dignity of the University." (60) In the words of a sympathetic reporter, they still viewed the Great War as "something sacred, something idealistic, and this despite [the fact that] the war and its consequences, [namely,] the Inflation [sic], have left them materially deprived." (61) "They shriek," the reporter noted, "about an insult to the new God, war, as soon as someone openly attempts to show them the true face of war, its shamefulness, its dishonesty." (62)

After a lengthy University disciplinary hearing, Gumbel's colleagues and the Baden Minister of Culture and Education concluded that Gumbel had not intended to insult the German war dead and that his words had not violated the obligations according to the requirements of his position as a university professor. Thus, they chose not to expel Gumbel from the Heidelberg faculty. But they were sufficiently uneasy about his rhetoric that they took the unusual step of distributing to all German universities and newspapers a document criticizing Gumbel's "basic lack of tact," and his alleged inability to "identify with the interests of the university." They also accused Gumbel of using his political works to denounce the German government and to betray government secrets to a hostile foreign power. (63) Even the famed moderate liberal Karl Jaspers, who argued in favor of acquitting Gumbel, stated that he, too, was offended that Gumbel would "speak about such things in public." (64)

Like his colleagues, the republican press distanced itself from Gumbel's radical pacifism. Although they upheld his right to express his views and were persuaded that Gumbel had not intended to insult his fellow citizens, republican newspaper editors condemned Gumbel's phraseology as, at minimum, tactless, and, at best, inconsiderate. (65) Even the commentator Arnold Zweig, a fellow member of the German League of Human Rights, found himself struggling to combine his initial reaction to Gumbel's remark with his later reflections on the pacifist intentions informing Gumbel's words. In an article printed in the Weltbiihne (The World Stage), Zweig, a veteran of the Great War himself, acknowledged that he had been deeply hurt by the way in which Gumbel's ironic tone seems to disparage the aching struggle of soldiers like himself, at least to die with some dignity in such a horrific manner, in such an awful place. But he then wrote:

 ... I looked at [Gumbel's] enthusiastic, open, humane, and honest
 face, and understood.... My eyes saw European humanity speaking;
 this human being bore a spirit that was superior to ours today; in
 the cultural intertwining of a century of the best of the human
 intellect, and with this spirit we see the battlefields of the
 Great War, above all, as a field of dishonor, a dishonor not of the
 casualties of war, but of the entire epoch. (66)

The conservative press debated the case within the context of Gumbel's challenges to the moral and social conventions of modern nationalism as well as his alleged violations of the conventions of impartial scholarship and state allegiance required of German professors. A good example of the strength and pervasiveness of its viewpoint may be found in an August 9, 1924 editorial published in the Dresdener Nachrichten (Dresden News). The editor characterized Gumbel's remarks at the "No More War" rally as an example of the dangerous degradation of German morality and social mores. Not only had Gumbel insulted his fellow citizens, the editor complained, he had also degraded the moral influence of the university by dragging it into the "political quagmire." (67) Outraged that the Baden Minister of Culture and Education had reinstated Gumbel after the latter had made a public apology for his remarks, the editor asked:

 What moral plane would we be standing on if a German in a prominent
 position were allowed, without penalty, to get away with indirectly
 insulting his fellow comrades by declaring that they have been left
 behind on a 'field of dishonor'? What kind of stand are we taking
 when the Minister of Culture and Education of a German province can
 suggest [by his actions] that the disparagement of our war dead can
 be atoned for by a simple retraction of the incriminating remark?
 (68)

Harking back to the educational ideals of Wilhelm Humboldt, conservative and reactionary newspaper editors uniformly expressed the view that Gumbel's public anti-war and internationalist activism made him unfit to participate in the character education (Bildung) of German youth. They believed that his "moralistic desecration of the dead" had earned him a punishment which would "cut him to the quick, namely, the loss of his teaching post." (69)

While reactionaries parted company with conservatives on the value of preserving academic freedom, they did not hesitate to make common cause with conservative skepticism about Gumbel's ability to conform to academic norms. In order to broaden support for their own skepticism about the credibility of his "Germanness," they emphasized Gumbel's ethnic origin and political affiliations, insisting that Gumbel's controversial remarks "prove[d] that he is an outsider among the German people, for whose honor and feelings he possesses no understanding." (70)

While the University's purpose in publicizing the details of Gumbel's disciplinary hearing had been to satisfy the reservations of some colleagues, to restore trust within the faculty, and to bring the controversy to an end, (71) the report actually fanned the fires of anti-Gumbel activity throughout Germany. It pointedly warned that revoking Gumbel's right to teach would be reconsidered if "transgressions of this kind continued, [and] if it became known that [Gumbel committed acts or spoke words] believed by public opinion, independent of party, religion or world view to be morally degrading." (72) That condition would provide Gumbel's enemies with a practical political strategy to advance their own reactionary pro-warrior ethos and to attack Gumbel's attempts to detach the symbols of heroism from warfare.

Gumbel's advocacy of political pacifism continued at an accelerated pace as the political fortunes of the Weimar Republic steadily declined. He and the German League for Human Rights, of which he was now a leading member, were among the first to warn about the growth of the National Socialist German Workers Party. Their radical objection to war and militarism facilitated their early understanding of the Nazis' political threat to Germany. Their direct experience with the abrogation of civil rights under a moderate Weimar government prepared them to grasp the implications of a conservative and Nazi takeover of political power. Gumbel and his League colleagues recognized the dangerous implications of the Nazi definition of loyalty based on race. Their radical opposition to wars of any kind prepared them early on to see in the Nazi goals of territorial expansion and racially-based nationalism the impetus for another European war. Given their emphasis on the material destructiveness of modern war, Gumbel and his League colleagues predicted that the next war would make even more devastating use of modern military industrial technology and ultimately become a world war. Many of them, including Gumbel, made urgent efforts to put together a politically effective anti-fascist coalition to prevent this. These efforts failed within the peace movement, as they did within the Weimar coalition and the German Left, because of vastly different views among constituent groups about the importance of National Socialism and the actions necessary to eliminate the Nazi threat to the fledging German democracy.

In the absence of effective coalition efforts to undermine Nazism, Gumbel increased his own efforts to awaken the German public to the threat that Nazi war propaganda embodied. In November 1928, he spoke and wrote about "the coming waft' which he characterized as the logical consequence of Nazi political activity. Over the next five years, the economist, the statistician, and the pacifist in Gumbel's work converged. Desperate to make people aware of the effects of modern warfare, Gumbel strengthened his efforts to discredit the symbols glorifying war and military heroism and to make clear war's destructive reality. In speeches and newspaper articles, he portrayed the German people as unwitting victims of an insensitive military state and repeated his belief that genuine heroism and patriotism lay in efforts to prevent future catastrophic wars. Within this context, Gumbel first introduced the idea that the turnip was perhaps a far more appropriate symbol of wartime sacrifice. Beginning with a speech on Armistice Day in 1928, Gumbel unsparingly depicted the devastating human and material consequences of the new military technology, especially tanks and airplanes. He called attention to the disappearance of the distinction between soldier and civilian, arguing that in modern industrial warfare major cities would become military targets. He foresaw, as one might expect of an actuarial statistician, that the death toll of the coming war would far exceed the horrific slaughter that had occurred during the Great War. He traced this collective European sense of denial to three sources: (1) the fact that most young people of the time had not experienced war; (2) that teachers and trusted adults continued to be evasive about the realities of war; and, (3) the failure to understand the effect of new weapons technology on the conduct of war.

At the same time, Gumbel began to draw on the image of the turnip to demonstrate the incongruity between the "Myth of the Great War" and the war's gruesome reality. In a speech delivered to a Berlin audience in 1928, Gumbel declared:

 In the psyches of all people who have gone through [German]
 schools, there continues to live, although, not in quite the same
 resonant phrases, the untruthfulness we have all experienced. War
 Monuments tell us nothing of the turnip which everywhere dominated,
 nothing of the horrible hunger, the cold poverty, nothing of the
 good life of the officers off the backs of soldiers, nothing of
 officers' bordellos, but rather of the Spirit of 1914, of an
 undefeated army, of heroes rich in glory who were stabbed to death
 by those at home, and [as] seen from the outside surface
 appearances, we stand again, psychologically in the same frame of
 mind as before 1914, in a rising capitalist economy which obscures
 progress and peace. The coming war reveals itself dimly and to only
 a few initiates. (73)

Later, in May 1932, while Gumbel spoke to the University of Heidelberg Socialist Student Association about war and the work force, he used, as he had already done for several years, the rhetorical image of the turnip to undermine the symbolic link between war and heroism. On this occasion, however, three Nazi students attended the meeting for the purpose of "exposing" Gumbel, and seized on his statement, "the war memorial of the German soldier is for me, not a lightly clad virgin with the palm of victory in her hand, but a large turnip." (74) Though Gumbel was clearly innocent of any incitement, the students published their notes of Gumbel's lecture, emphasizing the "turnip" comment to strengthen local Nazi Party electioneering in May 1932. Indeed, during the University's subsequent disciplinary hearing against Gumbel, the Nazi Party held a well-attended rally attacking Gumbel and the University. (75)

This time, the University decided against Gumbel. According to the disciplinary board's report:

 even if the meaning of this remark is as the majority of those who
 were present say it is and as Professor Gumbel argues in his later
 interpretation, there can be no doubt that this comment, in its
 tone and wording, could indeed damage the reverence owed to those
 who fell in the Great War and [has] deeply upset national
 sensibilities. (76)

The University chose not to defend a man who, in its view, by his reckless insistence on reversing the traditional use of the symbols of heroism, and his refusal to refrain from public debate about controversial issues, seemed to endanger his colleagues' "very existence as scholars." (77) No longer would it protect a man whose political activism, the disciplinary board concluded, had turned the University into a "cauldron of unrest." (78) Nor did Gumbel's colleagues believe they could withstand the accelerating attacks by right-wing students and ideologues against the University's intellectual commitment to scholarly objectivity. They worried about protecting the advancement of scholarly endeavor from the attacks of an intellectually narrow-minded public if they permitted an outspoken activist with controversial views like Gumbel to remain in their midst. Gumbel, they maintained, had abused the sanctuary of the University by continuing his public engagement in the political realm.

Gumbel's life changed dramatically after his dismissal from the University of Heidelberg. Not only did he lose his teaching credentials and his university post, he also lost his country and experienced the frustrating life of political exile. He was fortunate enough to find both refuge and a new academic post in France where, in 1939, he became a naturalized citizen. But he was less fortunate in his efforts to exercise leadership in the expatriate anti-fascist opposition in France. Both because of political fractiousness among expatriates, especially between communist and non-communist opponents of Hitler, and because many expatriate intellectuals feared his political intemperateness, Gumbel gradually lost his political voice. When France fell to Germany in June 1940, he and his family began a journey that led a number of German refugee intellectuals, including Gumbel, to the United States. There, he continued to strengthen his scholarly reputation in statistics, but he never regained the political prominence that characterized his early career in Germany. He died of lung cancer in 1966. (79)

Gumbel, the target of right-wing attacks for eight years, for his part could not remain silent about the catastrophic political disaster he saw overtaking Germany. In the fashion of his own heroes, G.F. Nicolai and Betrand Russell, he tried to expose the realities of war as vividly, thought-provokingly, and as loudly as he knew how in the name of salvaging human dignity before it was too late. Although his colleagues believed that disinterested scholarship would improve the human condition over time, Gumbel acted on the belief that modern warfare would destroy the material and cultural vitality of German life if allowed to continue, and that broadly publicizing his findings as a social scientist, through academic and public channels, was a scholar's moral imperative.

ENDNOTES

(1) "Verordnung, die Entziehung der Lehrberechtigung der an den Landesuniversitaten habilitierten nichtetatmassigen Dozenten, betr. Nr. A 612" (Ordinance, the Removal of the Teaching Privilege from qualified, but not budgeted Instructors at the Provincial Universities, re: document number A 612), January 13, 1921, Article 1, Section 2, in Universitatsarchiv Heidelberg (University of Heidelberg Archives, hereafter UAH)--III, 5b, 333, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel.

(2) "Das Kriegerdenkmal eine Kohlrube" (Warrior's Memorial a Turnip), Der Heidelberger Student (The Heidelberg Student) June 9, 1932, in UAH-III, 5b, 434, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel.

(3) The German League for Human Rights began during World War I as the Bund Neues Vaterland, one of the new peace groups to emerge at this time. In 1922, in part to reflect modifications in the direction of their activism, the Bund changed its name to German League for Human Rights. See Otto Lehmann-Russbuldt, Der Kampf der Deutschen Liga fur Menschenrechte (vormals Bund Neues Vaterland) fur den Weltfrieden, 1914-1927 (The Struggle of the German League for Human Rights, earlier the New Fatherland League, for World Peace, 1914-1917) (Berlin: Hensel and Company Verlage, 1927), esp. 100-32.

(4) These concerns were explicitly stated in the two reports emanating from the first disciplinary hearing against Gumbel in August 1925. Two members of the hearing committee, Graf zu Dohna and Baethgen, stated their belief that Gumbel "lacked the necessary understanding of how the character of his political engagement" threatened the "reputation of the university and the undisturbed unfolding of its intellectual work." (Bericht des Untersuchungsausschusses gezeichnet von A. Graf zu Dohna und F. Baethgen (Report of the Investigation Committee signed by Alexander Graf zu Dohna and Friedrich Baethgen), April 4, 1925, in UAH-III, 5b, Nr. 333, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel. Karl Jaspers, the third member of the committee, wrote that "it lies outside the realm of Gumbel's thinking to assume responsibility for harmony within the university by avoiding provocative behavior, especially in an atmosphere of widespread indignation against him." Ergebnis der Untersuchung der Handlungen und der Personlichkeit des Privatdozenten Dr. Gumbel, Sonderbericht des Beisitzers im Untersuchungsausschuss Karl Jaspers (Results of the Investigation of the Behavior and Personality of Instructor Dr. Gumbel, Special Report of Karl Jaspers, Member of the Investigation Committee) in UAH-III, 5b, Nr.333, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel.

(5) Willy Hellpach, Wirken in Wirren, Lebenserinnerungen, Eine Rechenschaft uber Wert und Gluck, Schuld und Sturz meiner Generation, Band 2, 1914-1925 (Acting Effectively amidst Confusion, Memoirs, an Evaluation of the Value of Fortune, the Guilt and Fall of My Generation, volume 2, 1914-1925) (Hamburg: Christian Werner Verlag, 1949), 175.

(6) Gustav Adolf Scheel, "Heidelberger Studenten im Kampfe um die Erneuerung der Hochschule" (Heidelberg Students in the Struggle to Renew the University), in Der Deutsche Student (The German Student), July 1936, 291-93.

(7) Christian Jansen, Professoren und Politik, Politisches Denken und Handeln der Heidelberger Hochschullehrer 1914-1945 (Professors and Politics: Political Thought and Behavior of Heidelberg University Professors, 1914-1945) (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1992), 189.

(8) Ibid.

(9) Ibid., 227.

(10) Ibid. A revealing example of this phenomenon is the politically moderate philosopher Karl Jaspers. Jaspers was a strong advocate for keeping any kind of politics out of the university, a position he fully explicated in his 1923 essay Die Idee der Universitat (The Spitit of the University) written in the wake of Heidelberg socialist students' participation in the abduction of Nobel laureate Philip Lenard from his Physics Institute. Jaspers later admitted that he was unable to grasp "the dangerousness of the background, how evil for the whole German race [sic] were the forces which came forth at that time in Lenard, in Rathenau's murder and those who condoned it, that these were the kind of forces which could destroy all of us." Karl Jaspers, "Doktor der Philosophie," in Theodor Haubach zum Gedachtnis, hersaugestellt von Theodore Haubach und Walter H6sterey ("Doctor of Philosophy" in In Honor of Theodor Haubach and Walter Hosterey, eds. Theodor Haubach and Walter Hosterey) (Frankfurt/Main: European Publishing Agency, 1955), 15.

(11) Ernst Bruche and Hugo Marx, "Der Fall Philip Lenard, Mensch und "Politiker'" (The Case of Philip Lenard, the Man and the Politician), Physikalische Blatter (Physics News) 23 (1967):263. Marx was the City of Heidelberg prosecuting attorney who tried the Lenard case.

(12) Jaspers, "Doktor der Philosophie" (Doctor of Philosophy), in Theodor Haubach zum Gedachtnis herausgestellt von Theodore Haubach und Walter Hosterey (In Honor of Theodor Haubach and Walter Hosterey), eds. Haubach and Hosterey, 16.

(13) Ibid., 15.

(14) Ibid.

(15) Norbert Giovannini, Zwischen Republik und Faschismus, Heidelberger Studentinnen und Studenten 1918-1945 (Between the Republic and Facism: Heidelberg Students, 1918-1945) (Weinheim: Deutscher Studien Verlag, 1990), 128-61.

(16) The term "radical pacifist" refers to those peace groups during the post-World War I era which objected to war and German militarism in all forms. Following World War I, the coalition of peace groups in Germany was both more organized and more fractious than during the prewar years. To some extent, this fractiousness can be traced to ideological, strategic, and tactical differences that characterized a spectrum from cautious middle class groups through religious groups to socialist groups. One critical issue dividing the postwar German peace movement was the concept of "just war" held by many left of center peace organizations to keep alive the possibility of warfare as an appropriate means for deciding international disagreements. Groups such as the Bund Neues Vaterland (New Fatherland League) and its 1922 successor, the Deutsche Liga fur Menschenrechte (German League for Human Rights), rejected all kinds of wars as a threat to the very existence of humanity. Members of these groups, like Gumbel and his colleagues in the BNV, were often portrayed as both radicals and traitors to Germany. See Arthur D. Brenner, Radical Pacifist, Refractory Professor: A Political and Intellectual Biography of Emil J. Gumbel (1891-1966) (Ann Arbor, MI: University Microfilms International, 1993), 91 - 101.

(17) See Karl Holl, Pazifismus in Deutschland (Pacifism in Germany)(Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1988), 141-43. See also Dieter Riesenberger, Geschichte der Friedensbewegung in Deutschland von den Anfangen bis 1933 (History of the Peace Movement in Germany from the beginning until 1933) (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1985), 122-23, 206-07.

(18) For samples of Gumbel's writings, see Zwei Jahre Mord (Two Years of Murder) (Berlin: Verlag Neues Vaterland, 1921); Vier Jahre politischer Mord (Four Years of Political Murder) (Berlin: Verlag der Neuen Gesellschaft, 1922); Verschworer: Zur Geschichte und Soziologie der deutschen nationalistischen Geheimbunde seit 1918 (Conspirators: On the History and Sociology of the German Nationalist Secret Associations) (Berlin: Malik Verlag, 1924); Deutschland und Frankreich. Eine Rede gehalten Dijon, Orleans, Nantes, La Rochelle, Cognac, Rennes, Le Mans, Le Havre (Germany and England, a speech delivered in ...) in Der Drache (The Dragon) 6, nos. 8-9 (November 25, 1924 and December 2, 1924); Deutschlands geheime Rustungen? (Germany's Secret Rearmanment?) in Weissbuch fiber die Schwarze Reichswehr (Whitebook on [Germany's] Illegal Military), ed. Deutsche Liga fur Menschenrechte (German League for Human Rights) (Berlin: Verlag der Neuen Gesellschaft, 1925).

(19) Brenner, Radical Pacifist, Refractory Professor, 50-52.

(20) Ibid., 33.

(21) Ibid., 47-48.

(22) Ibid., 56-62.

(23) Sandi Cooper, Patriotic Pacifism. Waging War on War in Europe, 1814-1914 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 10.

(24) These included the Union of Democratic Control, England; the Anti-Oorlog-Rad (Anti-War Commission) the Netherlands; and, the Komitee zum Studien der Grundlagen eines dauerhaften Friedens (Committee for the Study of the Basic Principles of Lasting Peace), Switzerland. See Riesenberger, Die Geschichte der Friedensbewegung in Deutschland, von den Anfangen bis 1933 (History of the Peace Movement in Germany from the Beginning until 1933), 100.

(25) Kurt Tepper-Laski, quoted in Lehmann-Russbuldt, Der Kampf der Deutschen Ligafur Menschenrechte (vormals Bund Neues Vaterland), fur den Weltfrieden, 1914-1917 (The Struggle of the German League for Human Rights, earlier the New Fatherland League, for World Peace, 1914-1917), 9.

(26) Ibid.

(27) Cooper, Patriotic Pacificism, 199.

(28) Riesenberger, Geschichte der Friedensbewegung (History of the Peace Movement in Germany from the Beginning until 1933), 100; Lehmann-Russbuldt, Der Kampf der Deutschen Liga fur Menschenrechte (vormals Bund Neues Vaterland), fur den Weltfrieden, 1914-1917 (The Struggle of the German League for Human Rights, earlier the New Fatherland League, for World Peace, 1914-1917), 12-18.

(29) Lehmann-Russbuldt, Der Kampf der Deutschen Liga fur Menschenrechte (vormals Bund Neues Vaterland), fur den Weltfrieden, 1914-1917 (The Struggle of the German League for Human Rights, earlier the New Fatherland League, for World Peace, 19141917), 18-42.

(30) Ibid., 58-81.

(31) For a thorough compilation of the activities of the New Fatherland's League and its successor, the German League for Human Rights, see Ibid. This work also contains details about attacks against the organization and its members, including character assasination, physical assasinations, and illegal searches and seizures of the organization's files as well as the papers of its leading members.

(32) E.J. Gumbel, quoted in Wolfgang Benz, "Fememord, Rufmord, Emigration: Die Karriere des deutschen Pazifisten Emil Julius Gumbel" (Extra-judicial Violence, Character Assasination, Emigration: The Career of the German Pacifist, Emil Julius Gumbel), transcript of radio broadcast by Bayerischer Rundfunk, Munchen (Bavarian Radio, Munich), August 10, 1981, 4.

(33) E.J. Gumbel, "Rede an Spartacus" (Speech to the Spartacus League), in Die Weltbuhne (The World Stage), December 19, 1918, Nr. 51, in The E.J. Gumbel Collection: Political Papers of an Anti-Nazi Scholar in Weimar and Exile, 1914-1966 (hereafter E.J. Gumbel Collection) (Bethesda, MD: University Press of America, 1990), microfilm, reel 3.

(34) E.J. Gumbel, review of G.E Nicolai, Die Biologie des Krieges (The Biology of Warfare), in Die Neue Erziehung (Contemporary Education), November 14, 1920, in E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(35) Ibid.

(36) Lehman-Russbuldt, Der Kampf der Deutschen Liga fur Menschenrechte (vormals Bund Neues Vaterland), fur den Weltfrieden, 1914-1917 (The Struggle of the German League for Human Rights, earlier the New Fatherland League, for World Peace, 1914-1917), 94-97.

(37) Brenner, Radical Pacifist, Refractory Professor, 98-99, esp. n l0.

(38) E.J. Gumbel, "Verstocktheit" (Unyielding), Die Weltbuhne (The World Stage) XV, March 28,1919, in E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(39) E.J. Gumbel, "Die Manner von 1914, zur Psychologie der Offentlichen Meinung in Deutschland" (The Men of 1914, on the Psychology of Public Opinion in Germany"), in

Suddeutsche Sontags Zeit (South German Sunday Times), nr. 9, February 27, 1921, in E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(40) Ibid.

(41) Ibid.

(42) Ibid.

(43) Lehmann-Russbuldt, Der Kampf der Deutschen Liga fur Menschenrechte (vormals Bund Neues Vaterland), fur den Weltfrieden, 1914-1917 (The Struggle of the German League for Human Rights, earlier the New Fatherland League, for World Peace, 1914-1917), 99-100.

(44) Ibid.

(45) E.J. Gumbel, "Memoiren von E.J. Gumbel, Vortrag gehalten im New York," April 17, 1964 ("Memoirs of E.J. Gumbel," lecture delivered in New York), unpublished manuscript in E.J. Gumbel Papers, University of Chicago Library, A 3, 6.

(46) Gumbel, Zwei Jahre Mord (Two Years of Murder), 52-53.

(47) Ibid., 6.

(48) E.J. Gumbel, "Deutschland von Heute, die Demokratie ohne Demokraten" (Germany Today, a Democracy without Democrats), in Suddeutsche Sontags Zeit (South German Sunday Times), nr. 45, November 5, 1922, in E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(49) E.J. Gumbel, "Der Einfluss des Krieges auf die Bevolkerungsentwicklung in Deutschland" (The Influence of War on the Population Growth of Germany), Friedens-Warte (Peace Watch), 23, no. 4 (April 1923): 133-34, in E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(50) Beginning in 1922, the German League for Human Rights was the successor organization of the Bund Neues Vaterland. See endnote 3.

(51) E.J. Gumbel, review of G.E Nicolai, Die Biologie des Krieges (The Biology of War), in Die Neue Erziehung (Contemporary Education), November 14, 1920, in E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(52) E.J. Gumbel, "'Bertrand Russell und die englischen Pazifisten im Krieg" (Bertrand Russell and English Pacificists during War), Die Neue Generation (The New Generation), July-August 1921, 181-92, in E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(53) Ibid., 188, 192.

(54) Sponsored by several peace organizations, in particular, veterans against war, these rallies were designed to commemorate the war dead, and especially to remind German citizens of the horror and suffering of war. Quite popular from 1920-23, the No-More-War rallies fell victim to divisions within the peace movement, especially in defining the relationship of this event to the German Peace Cartel. The anti-war character of the rallies was also weakened by Germany's experience of the French occupation of the Ruhr and the subsequent problem of hyperinflation in 1923.

(55) E.J. Gumbel, quoted in "Nie Wieder Krieg" (No More War), Heidelberger Neueste Nachrichten (Heidelberg's Latest News), July 28, 1924, in UAH, File III, 5b, Nr 333, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel.

(56) "Der Fall Gumbel, Ein Streit um ein 'Schlusswort'" (The Gumbel Case, a Fight About Closing Remarks), Heidelberger Tageblatt (Heidelberg Daily Journal), July 31, 1924, Leo Baeck Institute, Literary Estate of E.J. Gumbel, AR 7267, Box 8.

(57) "Nie Wieder Krieg," (No More War) Heidelberger Neueste Nachrichten (Heidelberg's Latest News), July 20, 1924, in UAH, III, 5b, Nr. 333, Personal Files of E.J. Gumbel.

(58) Hellpach, Wirken im Wirren: Lebenserinnerungen, Eine Rechenschaft uber Wert und Gluck, Schuld und Sturz meiner Generation, Band 2, 1914-1925 (Acting Effectively amidst Confusion, Memoirs, an Evaluation of the Value of Fortune, the Guilt and Fall of My Generation, volume 2, 1914-1925), 171.

(59) Feststellung des Untersuchungsausschusses an die Philosophische Fakultat Heidelberg, (Findings of the Investigative Committee to the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Heidelberg), August 1, 1924, in UAH-III, 5b, Nr. 333, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel, 24.

(60) Ibid.

(61) "Der Fall Gumbel" (The Gumbel Case), Pazifistische Jugend (Pacifist Youth), August 1, 1924, E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(62) Ibid.

(63) Bericht des Untersuchungsauschusses gezeichnet von A. Graf zu Dohna, und F. Baethgen (Report of the Investigation Committee signed by Alexander Graf zu Dohna and Freidrich Baethgen), April 11, 1925, 5b, Nr. 333, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel.

(64) Ergebnis der Untersuchung der Handlungen und der Personlichkeit des Privatdozenten Dr. Gumbel, Sonderbericht des Beisitzers im Untersuchungsausschuss Karl Jaspers (Results of the Investigation of the Behavior and Personality of Instructor Dr. Gumbel, Special Report by Karl Jaspers, Member of the Investigation Committee), in UAH-III, 5b, Nr. 333, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel.

(65) "Der Fall Gumbel, ein Streit um ein 'Schlusswort'" (The Gumbel Case, a Fight over Concluding Remarks), Heidelberger Tageblatt (Heidelberg Daily Journal), July 31, 1924; "Der Fall Gumbel," (The Gumbel Case), Pfalzer Bote (The Pfalz Messenger), August 2, 1924; "Der Fall Gumbel, Schnelligkeitsrecord der Universitatsbehorden" (The Gumbel Case, Speedrecord of University of Officials), Heidelberger Volkszeitung (Heidelberg People's Newspaper), August 2, 1924, in Leo Baeck Institue, Literary Estate of E.J. Gumbel AR7267, Box 8.

(66) Arnold Zweig, "Gumbel, Heidelberg Republik" (Gumbel, Heidelberg Republic), Die Weltbuhne (The World Stage), August 28, 1924, in Leo Baeck Institute, Literary Estate of E.J. Gumbel, AR 7267, Box 8.

(67) "Vom Kritizismus zur Gesinnungslosigkeit der Fall Gumbel" (From Criticism to Senselessness in the Gumbel Case), Dresdener Nachrichten (Dresden News), August 9, 1924, in Leo Baeck Institute, Literary Estate of E.J. Gumbel, AR 7267, Box 8.

(68) Ibid.

(69) Ibid.

(70) "Der Fall Gumbel" (The Gumbel Case), Heidelberger Tageblatt (Heidelberg Daily Journal), July 31, 1924, in Leo Baeck Institute, Literary Estate of E.J. Gumbel, AR 7267, Box 8.

(71) Letter of Ludwig Curtius, Dean of the Philosophical Faculty of Heidelberg to the Executive Committee of the Senate, Document Number 325-1924/25, July 28, 1925, in UAH-III, 5b, Nr. 333, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel.

(72) Hellpach, Wirken im Wirren, Lebenserinnerungen, Eine Rechenschaft uber Wert und Gluck, Schuld und Sturz meiner Generation, Band 2, 1914-1925 (Acting Effectively amidst Confusion, Memoirs, an Evaluation of the Value of Fortune, the Guilt and Fall of My Generation, volume 2, 1914-1925), 171.

(73) E.J. Gumbel, "Die Kriegsrustungen der imperialistischen Staaten" (The Rearmament of Imperialist States), Speech to the Founding Congress of the Friends of the Soviet Union League, November 4, 1928, in E.J. Gumbel Collection, microfilm, reel 3.

(74) Es gumbelt wieder. Seine Kriegerdenkmal eine einzige grosse Kohlrube (It's Gumbel Again. His War Memorial a Single Large Turnip), Die Heidelberger Volksgemeinschafi (Heidelberg's National Community), June 1, 1932, Leo Baeck Institute, Literary Estate of E.J. Gumbel, AR 7267, Box 10.

(75) "Gegen Gumbel. Die Kundgebung in der Stadthalle" (Against Gumbel, the Demonstration at the Municipal Auditorium), Heidelberger Tageblatt (Heidelberg Daily Journal), June 25, 1932, in Leo Baeck Institute, Literary Estate of E.J. Gumbel, Gumbel, AR 7267, Box 10.

(76) Report of the Board of Inquiry to the Heidelberg Arts and Humanities Faculty, July 30, 1932, in UAH-III, 5b, Nr. 434a, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel, 149-50.

(77) Ernst Hoffmann, quoted in Report of the Board of Inquiry to the Heidelberg Arts and Humanities Faculty, June 23, 1932, in UAH-III, 5b, Nr. 434a, Personnel Files of E.J. Gumbel, 87.

(78) Ibid., 91.

(79) For an extended discussion of Gumbel's post-1932 life, see Arthur Brenner, Emil J Gumbel: Weimar German Pacifist and Professor (Boston: Humanities Press, 2001), 144-91.

ROSANNA M. GATENS is the director of the Holocaust/Human Rights Education Center at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Florida.

Article Details

Printer friendly Cite/link Email Feedback
Author:	Gatens, Rosanna M.
Publication:	International Social Science Review
Geographic Code:	4EUGE
Date:	Mar 22, 2008
Words:	10836
Previous Article:	Explaining the democratic trust conundrum: the sources of institutional trust in the reunited Germany.
Next Article:	'Of great utility to the people of Cincinnati': The Centinel of the North-Western Territory reports the French Revolution.
Topics:	College faculty Criticism and interpretation Works College teachers Criticism and interpretation Works Militarism Criticism and interpretation Statisticians Criticism and interpretation Works