History of the inventor: Since the middle of the 19th century, the findings of agricultural chemistry have increasingly led to the use of potash salts as an agricultural fertilizer. In 1859, the potash camps near Staßfurt were determined, and just two years later the first German potash factory was built there. Other very important deposits were mined in the rest of Central Germany and in the Upper Rhine area (Baden and Alsace). From 1871-1919, the German Reich almost had the world monopoly for potash. The voluntary association of the German potash industry in the potash syndicate has guaranteed the assertion of this outstanding position since 1888. It was seriously threatened from the inside when the syndicate broke up in 1909. It was only through the intervention of the Reich that orderly conditions could be restored. In accordance with the economic importance of the German potash industry, its organisation in a forced syndicate was given a completely new basis by the law on the sale of potash salts of 25 May 1910 (RGBl. I, p. 775 ff.), which at the same time represents the practical beginning of forced cartelisation in German economic history. Although the new 1910 Kalisyndikat (Kalisyndikat GmbH) was still organised as a private enterprise, its position as a compulsory cartel and sales monopoly organisation was much stronger than before as a result of the Imperial Law and was interspersed with elements of public law. It was subject to the supervision of the Reich, which was exercised by the Reich Chancellor in the absence of a Reich Office for Economic Affairs. The legal position of the potash syndicate was not explicitly determined, but it had a public character "by virtue of its nature". The most visible expression of these innovations was the distribution office for the potash industry in Berlin, which commenced operations at the end of 1910 on the basis of §§ 30 - 34 of the aforementioned Potash Act of 1910 at the expense of the Reich (§ 44). The distribution agency was responsible for the entire sales regulation in the long term. Preventive measures were to be taken to avert the dangers that had finally led to the end of the old potash syndicate in 1909, with sales stagnating and price wars resulting from overproduction. Appeals against the determinations and decisions of the distribution office were admissible, for which a special Appeals Commission for the Potash Industry was formed at the same time (loc. cit., Sections 31 - 33). The main work of the new organisation fell to the distribution office. Its modest name revealed only one side of its activity, the sales system. In order to fulfil this task, the agency needed precise knowledge of the entire German potash industry. The other side of the distribution agency's activity was therefore to obtain this knowledge of each individual potash mine and potash plant by means of the obligation to provide information imposed by law on the owners. In addition, the distribution agency had the right to inspect potash industry facilities and to access mines. Details of the Act of 25 May 1910 were amended or regulated in other amending acts and notices up to 1918. In the course of the First World War, economic problems intervened to an unprecedented extent in politics and warfare. Above all in Germany, which was almost completely closed off from the rest of the world, they led to the fact that more and more parts of the economy had to be seized and controlled by force. It spoke for the solid construction of the potash syndicate and the distribution office, which had already been created in peace, that their organization could be maintained until the end of the war. Even the efforts to socialise and democratise economic life in the republican empire since the end of 1918 did not change the core of the institutions established in 1910 (see, for example, the Ordinance of 27 December 1918 on the Participation of Plant Employees in Decisions of the Distribution Office for the Potash Industry - RGBl. I/1919, p. 20 et seq. The guiding principles of a new regulation of the German potash industry were laid down before the completion of the Weimar Constitution by the Law on the Regulation of the Potash Industry of 24 April 1919 (RGBl. I, p. 413 et seq., see also loc. cit., p. 661 et seq.). The basic provisions of this law were comprehensively expanded by the regulations issued by the Reich Ministry (= Reich Government) on its implementation of 18 July 1919 (RGBl. I, p. 663 ff.). Finally, these provisions were decisive in the version of the ordinance of 22 October 1921 (RGBl. I, p. 1312 ff.), which could now be based on Article 156 of the Weimar Reichsverfassung. The law of 19 July 1919 (RGBl. I, p. 661 f.) repealed the old potash law of 1910 and replaced it with the new regulations of 18 July 1919. The organisation of the potash industry was thus extended beyond the potash syndicate to become a single association regulating the market. Although the German Reich had lost considerable deposits of potash in Alsace through the Treaty of Versailles, thereby losing its world monopoly, it was still at the forefront of world potash production and left all other producing countries far behind. The potash industry continued to occupy an outstanding position in the German economy. After the loss of large agricultural surplus areas in eastern Germany, the regulated supply of potash to German agriculture was now almost a vital issue. The new organisation of 1919 was based on this knowledge. The potash industry remained united in the German Kalisyndikat GmbH. The Reichskalirat was established as a self-governing body of the potash industry (regulations on implementation, etc. of 18 July 1919, §§ 2 - 15); it was subject to the supreme supervision of the Reich, which was exercised by the Reich Economic Ministry. In addition to or under the Reichskalirat there were a number of so-called potash offices for individual tasks of the potash industry: 1. potash testing office (loc.cit.) §§ 17 - 25) 2nd Caliber Appellate Body (§§ 26 - 29) Continuation of the former Appeals Commission, responsible for appeals against measures of the Potash Examination Body) 3rd Potash Wages Examination Body of the First Instance (§ 30) 4th Potash Wages Examination Body of the Second Instance (§§ 31 - 34) Responsible for appeals against decisions of the Kalilohnprüfungsstelle erster Instanz) 5. Landwirtschaftlich-technische Kalistelle (§§ 35 - 37. Stelle zur Förderung des Domestic Kaliabsabsatz, Beratungsstelle für Kalidüngung etc.). The seat of the Kalisyndikat, the Reichskalirat and its five Kalistellen was Berlin. Of the potash sites, the most important is the potash testing site, whose activities began on 1 January 1920. It was the legitimate straightforward continuation of the distribution centre for the potash industry that was dissolved on 31 December 1919. Its tasks and powers vis-à-vis the potash industry were greatly expanded and it embodied the executive organ of the Reichskalirat. As the potash testing body also acted as a potash wage testing body of the first instance, it was also closely associated with socio-political issues of the potash industry. The economic depressions of the first post-war years and the competition of France on the world potash market resulting from the loss of the Alsatian potash plants forced the potash testing body to take drastic mining measures for the first time in the early 1920s and to close down a number of potash mines, special factories and sinking shafts by 1933 and to suspend the development of new deposits. Only in this way was it possible to regulate the production and sale of potash over the long term and to overcome the crisis years. The National Socialist state, which also promised to raise agriculture in the sense of its efforts to become self-sufficient, immediately turned to the potash industry in 1933. In their organization he eliminated in his first measures by the law about change of the potash economic regulations from 21 April 1933 (RGBl. I, S. 205) everything which contradicted his leadership terms and which looked to him all too much like Weimar democracy. As a result, all potash inspection posts were largely redeployed and the two potash wage inspection posts were dissolved. This transitional regulation was already abolished on 18 December 1933 by the new Potash Economy Act (RGBl. II, p. 1027 ff.) with effect from 1 January 1934; details of implementation were determined by the Ordinance of 29 June 1934 (RGBl. II, p. 363). These regulations finally eliminated all elements of potash legislation since 1919 that were regarded as democratic and therefore became unpopular and, under the closest ties to the Reich Ministry of Economics, only allowed the following institutions to exist: 1. potash syndicate (as a distribution association) (Potash Economic Act §§ 3 - 15) 2. potash testing body (loc. cit, §§ 16 - 36) and the corresponding Appeals Commission (§§ 37 - 38) 3. Landwirtschaftlich-technische Kalistelle (§§ 39 - 43. With the participation of the Reich Ministry of Food and Agriculture and the Reichsnährstand). The Reichskalirat thus completely disappeared as of 1 January 1934, following the two wage audit offices. The responsibilities of the three institutions mentioned, which were retained, remained unchanged. The apparatus of the forced potash economic cartel and the Potash Examination Office, which had been working well together since 1910 and was active in production and sales planning, certainly appealed to the National Socialist rulers, since it was largely compatible with their views of state economic control, which, by the way, had grown out of a different view and in many cases went even further, and which they were just now (1934) beginning to put into practice on a large scale. As in 1919, the Reich's supreme supervision was exercised by the Reich Ministry of Economics, but its powers extended considerably further than before; for in all cases where the Reichskalirat was involved as mediator between the Reich and the economy in accordance with the regulations of 1919, the Reich Minister of Economics could now make his own immediate decision. The establishment of the Reichsstelle für Kali und Salz in Berlin by decree of the Reich Minister of Economics of 9 September 1939 (Reichsanzeiger No. 211 of 11 Sept. 1939, p. 2, as well as the simultaneous announcement of the competence of this Reichsstelle) did not affect the existing institutions. For the activities of the Reich Office only covered the monitoring of the trade in potash and salt on the basis of the regulations on the trade in goods in the version of 18 August 1939 (RGBl. I, p. 1430 et seq.). In particular, foreign trade in potash (control of foreign sales) required monitoring by the Reich Office because of the foreign exchange regulations. The German military collapse on almost all fronts since August 1944 made the activities of this Reich office appear superfluous, so that in February 1945 its dissolution in the Reich Ministry of Economics was considered. On the other hand, the continued existence of the Potash Testing Body was also approved at that time; its tasks were determined by the Potash Economic Act and the dissolution of the body would have been associated with considerable difficulties. The surrender of 8 May 1945 brought about the end of all potash facilities. From 1943 onwards, the Potash Testing Centre and the Reich Agency for Potash and Salt had been relocated from Berlin to Eisleben. There the settlement office of the Reich Office was already dissolved in June 1945, that of the Kaliprüfungsstelle in April 1946 by the Soviet occupying power. Inventory description: Inventory history The inventory R 10 V Kalisyndikat belongs to the holdings of the Federal Archives which were handed down separately as a result of the Second World War. Due to the separate tradition in East and West Germany, two partial collections were created: 80 Ka 1 in the Zentralarchiv Potsdam and R 10 V in the Bundesarchiv Koblenz. As finding aids, a card index was produced in the Zentralarchiv Potsdam and a finding aid book in the Bundesarchiv Koblenz. The files of the Deutsche Kalisyndikat GmbH were moved to Eisleben and Bad Salzungen at the end of the 2nd World War, if not destroyed. In April 1945, the files that had been moved to Bad Salzungen fell into the hands of American troops and, together with other files, were brought to the American collection center of captured German files (Ministerial Collecting Center) in Hessisch-Lichtenau and Fürstenhagen. In 1952, they were transferred to the Federal Archives via the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology. These files formed the basis of the partial stock R 10 V in the Federal Archives. There Archivrat Dr. F. Facius initially edited the R 10 V holdings, which comprised 13 volumes until 1954 and 15 volumes after arranging and indexing. Further documents (in particular those of the potash testing agency and the Deutsche Kalisyndikat GmbH) were purchased by the Berlin company I. Velten in 1969 in the course of the "land consolidation" with the Secret State Archive Berlin-Dahlem. After this addition of 1.5 subjects of printed and written material, the partial stock comprised 115 volumes of files according to order, evaluation and cassation. Those files that were relocated to Eisleben (later GDR) were first kept in the United Archive of the Potash Industry of the GDR in Sondershausen and were transferred to the Central State Archive Potsdam in 1985 when this archive was dissolved, where they formed the holdings 80 Ka 1. As a result of reunification and the merging of the holdings of the Federal Archive and the Central State Archive of the GDR, the total holdings received the tectonic number R 10 V, the files of the partial holdings 80 Ka 1 were accordingly re-signed (new: R 10 V/ 201-556). Characterisation of content: In addition to general administrative matters, documents on the activities of the Syndicate as a whole and on potash legislation, there are also documents on issues of trade, sales and consumption of potash and potash products, in particular on the Paris (Potash) Agreement of 1926 and on financial issues. A further part of the documents relates to individual syndicate plants, syndicate accessions and participation quotas as well as other facilities of the potash industry such as the potash industry distribution office, the potash testing body and the potash industry appeals commission. In addition, processing documents up to 1960 are assigned to the inventory. State of development: Online-Findbuch (2006) Citation method: BArch, R 10-V/...
