Editing Weimar Republic (section)

===Terminology===

Even though the National Assembly chose to retain the old name {{lang|de|[[German Reich|Deutsches Reich]]}} (Art. 1 of the Constitution),<ref>{{Cite web |title=Verfassungen des Deutschen Reichs (1918–1933) |trans-title=Constitution of the German Reich (1918–1933) |url=https://www.verfassungen.de/de19-33/verf19-i.htm |access-date=4 November 2023 |website=Verfassungen der Welt |language=de}}</ref> hardly anyone used it during the Weimar period, and no single name for the new state gained widespread acceptance.<ref name="Schnurr-2014">{{cite magazine |last=Schnurr |first=Eva-Maria |date=30 September 2014 |title=Der Name des Feindes: Warum heißt die erste deutsche Demokratie eigentlich 'Weimarer Republik?' |trans-title=The Name of the Enemy: Why Was the First German Democracy Even Called the 'Weimar Republic'? |url=https://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/spiegelgeschichte/d-129494116.html |magazine=[[Der Spiegel]] |language=de |access-date=11 June 2020 |url-access=subscription}}</ref> To the right of the spectrum, the politically engaged rejected the new democratic model and were appalled to see the honor of the traditional word ''Reich'' associated with it.<ref name="Sebastian Ullrich">{{ill|Sebastian Ullrich|de|Sebastian Ullrich (Historiker)}} as quoted in {{harvnb|Schnurr|2014}}</ref> The Catholic [[Centre Party (Germany)|Centre Party]] favored the term {{lang|de|Deutscher Volksstaat}} (German People's State),{{efn|During the time of the Weimar Republic,
terms such as [[People's Republic]] and [[People's State]] were used by republican movements across the political spectrum. It was only during and after [[World War II]] that such terminology became more specifically associated with socialist and Communist regimes.}} while on the moderate left, Chancellor [[Friedrich Ebert]]'s [[Social Democratic Party of Germany]] preferred {{lang|de|Deutsche Republik}} (German Republic).<ref name="Sebastian Ullrich" /> By the mid-1920s, most Germans referred to their government informally as the {{lang|de|Deutsche Republik}}, but for many, especially on the right, the word "{{lang|de|Republik}}" was a painful reminder of a government structure that they believed had been imposed by foreign statesmen and of the expulsion of Emperor [[Wilhelm II]] in the wake of a massive national humiliation.<ref name="Sebastian Ullrich" />

The first recorded mention of the term {{lang|de|Republik von Weimar}} (Republic of Weimar) came during a speech delivered by Adolf Hitler at a Nazi Party rally in Munich on 24 February 1929. A few weeks later, the term {{lang|de|Weimarer Republik}} was first used again by Hitler in a newspaper article.<ref name="Schnurr-2014" /> Only during the 1930s did the term become mainstream, both within and outside Germany.

According to historian [[Richard J. Evans]]:<ref>{{cite book |first=Richard J. |last=Evans |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CmjBW3lsA84C&pg=PT33 |title=The Coming of the Third Reich |publisher=Penguin |year=2005 |isbn=978-1-101-04267-0 |page=33}}</ref>
<blockquote>The continued use of the term 'German Empire', ''Deutsches Reich'', by the Weimar Republic ... conjured up an image among educated Germans that resonated far beyond the institutional structures Bismarck created: the successor to the [[Roman Empire]]; the vision of God's Empire here on earth; the universality of its claim to [[suzerainty]]; and a more prosaic but no less powerful sense, the concept of a German state that would include all German speakers in Central Europe{{snd}}'one People, one Reich, one Leader', as the Nazi slogan was to put it.</blockquote>