New Reichstag

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"Impeach Hindenburg!" Probably in 1914-15 der feldmarschall had no time to notice that he, his Kaiser and the General Staff were being attacked every day by one Clara Zetkin, editor of a Socialist sheet (she did not join the Communist Party until 1919) which demanded "Proletarian Peace."* Without troubling der feldmarschall, policemen arrested Frau Zetkin in 1915 and kept her under indictment, though she was finally released. Last week she tongue-lashed thus: "Without consult ing the Reichstag, political power in Ger many has for the moment been grasped by a Presidential Cabinet which is the servant of trust and monopoly capital and of the agrarians and whose motive force is represented by Reichswehr Generals."

This statement of course is factual, but Grandmother Zetkin went on: "I demand the impeachment of President von Hindenburg for violation of the German Constitution! . . . Despite its all-powerful character, the [von Papen] Cabinet has failed miserably to solve domestic and foreign problems. . . . The best means to overcome the economic crisis is proletarian revolution! ... I open this Reichstag in fulfillment of my duty as senior member. I hope to live to see the day when, as senior member, I can open the first workers' and peasants' congress of Soviet Germany."

Most correspondents reported that "only Communists" cheered Grandmother Zetkin, but New York Evening Post's Albion Ross cabled:

"When the [Zetkin] speech was over the galleries burst into wild applause that was not a political demonstration but a tribute to the purely physical courage of the old revolutionary."

Only Work Done by the new Chamber last week was to organize itself for business. This job, which usually takes days of wrangling, was put through in five hours. The Reichstag:

¶ Elected as permanent Speaker paunchy, polite Fascist Hermann Wilhelm Goering, "the diplomat of his party." Though there are only 230 Fascist Deputies, Col. Goering was elected by a vote of 367 to 216. Famed during the War as a Commander of the late Baron von Richthofen's Flying Squadron, Speaker Goering mounted the tribune with militant jerkiness, replied with a Fascist salute to the salutes of Fascist Deputies who bounded from their chairs shouting, "Hail Hitler!"

The two Red Amazons, leading Grandmother Zetkin down to her Deputy's seat, shook their fists at the Fascists who mockingly chirped one line from a German popular song: "It happens only once!"

¶ Elected for the first time in the history of the German Republic a set of Reichstag vice-speakers (three) among whom there is no Socialist.

For twelve years, from 1920 until last week, the Reichstag's Speaker has always been Socialist Paul Lobe (except for a few months in 1924). Thus the Fascists visibly replaced the socialists as Germany's dominant party.

¶ Was rebuffed by President von Hindenburg when its new Speaker asked by telegram for an immediate interview with des Reichspräsident at his country estate in Neudeck, east Prussia, 260 miles from Berlin. The President, frankly playing the Dictator, wired back that he would grant audience to Fascist Speaker Goering "next week" in Berlin.

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