Gustav Stresemann helped found the right-wing liberal German People’s Party. Initially an opponent of the republic, he became one of its most ardent supporters. As Reichskanzler during the crisis-ridden year of 1923, he saved it from demise. And as Foreign Minister, he achieved the reconciliation with France, for which he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1926. His early death in 1929 was a major loss for the democracy.

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Raumer joined the Reichstag in 1920 to represent the DVP, which he left in 1930. Reichskanzler Fehrenbach named him Minister of the Treasury in the same year in which he took office as a Member of the Reichstag. He played a major role in the Treaty of Rapallo negotiations. In 1923, he took on the post of Minister of Economic Affairs in Stresemann’s government. While in office, he focused his efforts first and foremost on promoting economic cooperation with France and the Soviet Union.

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Curtius was elected to the Reichstag as a member of the DVP in 1920 and kept his seat until 1932. He was appointed Luther’s Minister of Economic Affairs in 1926 and direct his efforts first and foremost towards strengthening the country’s exports and its trading ties with the Soviet Union. Following Stresemann’s death, Curtius took on the post of Foreign Minister; initially in addition to his existing duties and subsequently as his sole function. He successfully pushed through Germany’s acceptance of the Young Plan. Curtius had to step down from his post as Foreign Minister in 1931 because attempts to create a German-Austrian customs union failed.

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Karl Jarres, a Doctor of Law, was a member of the National Liberal Party during the Kaiserreich. In 1914, he was elected Mayor of Duisburg, an office he was to hold until 1933.  When the Kaiserreich collapsed at the end of World War I, he joined the newly founded DVP. During the French and Belgian occupation of the Ruhr Valley, he resisted his forced expulsion, which brought him a two-month prison sentence. His passive resistance against the occupying forces made him very popular with the people. In November 1923, he joined Stresemann’s government as Vice Chancellor and Minister of the Interior. He stayed in these offices in the following cabinets, Marx I and Marx II. In the 1925 presidential elections, he garnered a plurality of the votes during the first round, yet withdrew from the race so as to improve Paul von Hindenburg’s chances of winning. After the Nazis seized power, he withdrew from politics, turning to business activities.

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Stinnes came from a family of entrepreneurs in the Ruhr valley region. At 23, he launched his own business activities, founding several successful companies that took on much greater proportions than the family’s previous portfolio. When building his group of companies, he followed the example of American trusts and big businesses, pursuing similarly aggressive corporate growth policies. Given that Stinnes’ companies were largely financed from abroad, he benefited from the currency devaluation during the inflation period, earning him the nickname of “inflation king”. With his enormous economic clout, he also had political influence, which he used during the 1923 Ruhr struggle in particular. During the November Revolution, Stinnes feared the socialists would overthrow the government. This spurred him to try to reach a settlement with the unions; in 1918, he signed the Stinnes-Legien Agreement with the unionist Carl Legien. The agreement recognized unions as representatives of workers’ interests and social partners with equal standing. In return, the unions promised to not hinder the functioning of the free market economy. Aside from signing this agreement, Stinnes was elected to the Reichstag in 1920, where he was part of the DVP’s right wing. In 1924, Stinnes died from the complications of a gall bladder operation. Soon thereafter, his company started to collapse.

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