Editing Karl Seitz

{{Short description|Austrian Politician; Mayor of Vienna}}
{{for|the Austrian Olympic water polo player|Karl Seitz (water polo)}}
{{Distinguish|Carl Zeiss}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2019}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name         = Karl Seitz
| image        = File:Ferdinand Schmutzer - Karl Seitz, 1925 (cropped).jpg
| caption      = Seitz photographed by Ferdinand Schmutzer, 1925
| office       = [[President of Austria]]
| term_label   = ''De facto''
| term_start   = 10 November 1920
| term_end     = 9 December 1920
| chancellor   = [[Michael Mayr]]
| predecessor  = Office established
| successor    = [[Michael Hainisch]]
| office1      = [[List of mayors of Vienna|Mayor and Governor of Vienna]]
| term_start1  = 13 November 1923
| term_end1    = 12 February 1934
| predecessor1 = [[Jakob Reumann]]
| successor1   = [[Richard Schmitz]]
| office2      = [[Second President of the National Council (Austria)|Second President of the National Council]]
| term_start2  = 15 December 1920
| term_end2    = 20 November 1923
| predecessor2 = [[Matthias Eldersch]]
| successor2   = Matthias Eldersch
| office3      = President of the [[Constituent National Assembly (Austria)|Constituent National Assembly]]
| term_start3  = 5 March 1919
| term_end3    = 9 November 1920
| predecessor3 = Office established
| successor3   = Office abolished
| office4      = President of the [[Provisional National Assembly]]
| term_start4  = 21 October 1918
| term_end4    = 16 February 1919
| alongside4   = Franz Dinghofer, [[Jodok Fink]]/Johann Hauser
| predecessor4 = Office established
| successor4   = Office abolished
| birth_date   = {{Birth date|1869|9|4|df=y}}
| birth_place  = [[Vienna]], [[Austria-Hungary]]
| death_date   = {{Death date and age|1950|2|3|1869|9|4|df=y}}
| death_place  = Vienna, [[Allied-occupied Austria|Austria]]
| party        = [[Social Democratic Party of Austria|Social Democratic Workers' Party]]
| spouse       = Emilie Heindl
}}
'''Karl Josef Seitz''' ({{IPA|de|kaʁl ˈzaɪts|-|De-at Karl Seitz.ogg}}; 4 September 1869 – 3 February 1950) was an [[Austria]]n [[politician]] of the [[Social Democratic Party of Austria|Social Democratic Workers' Party]]. He served as member of the [[Imperial Council (Austria)|Imperial Council]], President of the [[National Council (Austria)|National Council]] and [[List of mayors of Vienna|Mayor of Vienna]].<ref>[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/532982/Karl-Seitz Encyclopædia Britannica]</ref>

==Early life==
Seitz was born in [[Vienna]], the capital of [[Austria-Hungary]]. He was the son of a struggling small-time coal trader. After the premature death of his father, in 1875, the family was thrown into abject poverty, and Seitz had to be sent off to an orphanage.

He, nonetheless, received adequate education and earned a scholarship so that he could enroll in a teacher-training college in the city of [[St. Pölten]], [[Lower Austria]]. In 1888, he took employment as a public elementary school teacher in Vienna.

Already an outspoken [[social democracy|social democrat]], he was disciplined several times for his political activism. His founding of a Social Democratic teachers' union in 1896 led to his delegation into the Lower Austrian Board of Education in 1897, which then led to his termination as a teacher later that year.

==Early political career==
Seitz now turned to full-time politics and established himself as one of the party's most eminent experts on educational policy. In 1901, Seitz was elected to the [[Reichsrat (Austria)|Imperial Council]] and, in 1902, to the provincial parliament of [[Lower Austria]]. Following the outbreak of [[World War I]] in 1914, Seitz developed pronounced [[pacifist]] leanings and participated in the 1917 [[Stockholm]] Socialists' Congress.

Seitz entered history in 1918, when Austria-Hungary was breaking down, and its disintegration into smaller independent [[nation states]] was becoming manifest. On 21 October the Imperial Council members, representing the empire's ethnically-German provinces, moved to form a Provisional National Assembly for "[[Republic of German-Austria|German Austria]]". In its constituent session, the Provisional National Assembly appointed Seitz as one of its three chairmen. All three presidents together functioned as head of state in the ''Staatsratsdirektorium''. After the [[1919 Austrian Constituent Assembly election|election to the Constituent National Assembly]], that was changed on 15 March 1919. Seitz became the First President, and the other two presidents became deputies of the First President. The First President was also to be head of state. He retained the position until 9 December 1920.

==President==
Almost simultaneously, Seitz was also appointed provisional chairman of the [[Social Democratic Workers' Party of Austria]] after the death of the party nestor [[Victor Adler]]. In 1919, his positions both as [[President of Austria]] and as party chairman were formalised.

Following the implementation of the definitive [[Constitution of Austria]] on 1 October 1920, Seitz declined to seek re-election. He left office on 9 December but did not retire from politics and retained both his party chairmanship and his seat in the newly established [[National Council of Austria|National Council]], Seitz now devoted his attention to Vienna local affairs.

==Mayor of Vienna==
On 13 November 1923, he was elected [[List of mayors of Vienna|Mayor of Vienna]].<ref name="seitz1869">{{cite web |url=http://www.bundespraesident.at/en/history/the-predecessors/karl-seitz-1869-1950/ |title=Karl Seitz (1869-1950) |access-date=9 May 2014 |archive-date=4 March 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304211400/http://bundespraesident.at/en/history/the-predecessors/karl-seitz-1869-1950 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

The extensive and competently administered public welfare and education programs that he implemented, particularly promoting the building of residences, were very popular, even by his party's opponents, and they were positively remembered for decades.

==Personal life==
Karl Seitz married Emma Seidel, daughter of [[Amalie Seidel]], one of the first women members of the Austrian parliament.

==Later life==
With the rise of the [[Fatherland Front (Austria)|Fatherland Front]] in 1934 and the Social Democracts' failed [[Austrian Civil War|insurrection against the federal government]], the Social Democratic Worker's Party was outlawed. Having thus lost his party chairmanship, Seitz was also removed from his post as a mayor, taken into custody and released without charge a few weeks later. Even though a majority of Viennese considered his removal from office illegitimate, Seitz's political career had essentially been brought to an end.

Continuing to live in Vienna, Seitz witnessed the [[Anschluss]] with [[Nazi Germany]] in 1938 and the outbreak of [[World War II]] in 1939. There were contacts with the important resistance group (Maier-Mesner group, CASSIA) around the later-executed priest [[Heinrich Maier]], who was in contact with the American secret service [[Office of Strategic Services|OSS]]. Maier had set up an information network to receive important information and to realise political plans for after the war.<ref>Fritz Molden: Die Feuer in der Nacht. Opfer und Sinn des österreichischen Widerstandes 1938-1945. Amalthea, Vienna 1988, p 122; Christoph Thurner "The CASSIA Spy Ring in World War II Austria: A History of the OSS's Maier-Messner Group" (2017), pp 14; Hansjakob Stehle: Die Spione aus dem Pfarrhaus. In: Die Zeit. 5.1.1996.</ref> In 1944, he was placed under arrest a second time and for a time was even imprisoned in the [[Ravensbrück concentration camp]], only to again return to Vienna when Nazi Germany eventually collapsed in May 1945. Though now ill, Seitz served the newly established [[Social Democratic Party of Austria]] as its honorary chairman and a nominal National Council member until his death, at the age of 80.<ref name="seitz1869"/>

==References==
{{Reflist}}

== External links ==
*{{Commons-inline}}
* {{PM20|FID=pe/016330}}

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{{succession box | before = [[Matthias Eldersch]] | title = [[Second President of the National Council (Austria)|Second President of the National Council]] | years = 1920–1923 | after = [[Matthias Eldersch]]}}
{{succession box | before = [[Jakob Reumann]] | title = [[List of mayors of Vienna|Mayor and Governor of Vienna]] | years = 1923–1934 | after = [[Richard Schmitz]]}}
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{{Presidents of Austria}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Seitz, Karl}}
[[Category:1869 births]]
[[Category:1950 deaths]]
[[Category:Austrian Civil War]]
[[Category:Austrian people of World War II]]
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[[Category:Mayors of Vienna]]
[[Category:Members of the Austrian House of Deputies (1901–1907)]]
[[Category:Members of the Austrian House of Deputies (1907–1911)]]
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[[Category:Members of the Provisional National Assembly]]
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[[Category:Members of the Executive of the Labour and Socialist International]]
[[Category:Ambassadors of Austria to Peru]]
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[[Category:Ravensbrück concentration camp survivors]]
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