Constitution of the Kingdom of Prussia
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The Prussian constitution adopted in 1850, amended in the following years was far less liberal than the federal constitution of the German Empire. The government was not responsible to the Prussian Landtag (lower chamber), whose powers were small and whose members were elected by a suffrage system based on tax-paying ability. The house of lords (Herrenhaus) was largely controlled by the conservative Junkers, who held immense tracts of generally poor land East of the Elbe (particularly in East Prussia). Endowed with little money and much pride, they had continued to form the officer corps of the army. The rising industrialists, notably the great Rhenish and Westphalian mine owners and steel magnates, although their interests were often opposed to those of the Junkers, exerted an equally reactionary influence on politics. While the monarch had the "potential power of the Prusso-German crown was vast" (Christopher Clarke, Kasier Wilhelm II), he had for example the power to nominate and dismiss Prussian officials (as well as federal ones). His assent was also necessary for legislation to pass into law, as well as Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces and coming with this, the power to appoint or dismiss officials during peace time. In a decree William I of Prussia, stated that acts of the Prussian government were those of the King of Prussia also "from whose decision they originate, and who expresses his opinion and will constitutionally through them" (Christopher Clarke, Kasier Wilhelm II).
[edit] The Prussian Republic
The Prussian constitution was liberalized after Prussia became a republic in 1918, and the Junkers lost many of their estates through the cession of Prussian territory to Poland. However, both the Junkers and the Rhenish industrialists continued to exert much power behind the scenes, and when Franz von Papen became German chancellor in 1932 and commissioner for Prussia, they came into their own. In July, 1932, Papen suspended the Prussian parliament and ousted the Social Democrat Otto Braun, who had been premier of Prussia (with brief interruptions) from 1920.
