Proposal for dispossession of royal lines

© Renner One of the numerous demonstrations by unemployed women postulationg a dispossession (Banner: 2 millions unemployed - 1.2 billions for the princes)

On 19 January 1926, the Executive Committee of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), along with the Communists in Berlin’s Reichstag, agree to sponsor a proposal which, pending the results of a plebiscite, would dispossess princely houses in Germany without compensation. Princely possessions had already been confiscated during the revolution of 1918-1919, but legal dispossession had not been enacted. Since Article 153 of the Weimar Constitution guaranteed private property, for years princes had been demanding free access to their property as well as high financial compensation for lost profits. Many Germans, suffering under social distress, react indignantly to these demands. On 20 July, the referendum fails to pass. Soon after most Reich states reach financial compensation agreements with „their“ princely houses.