Austrian landtag elections 1929-1932

[rob in cal]

In addition to my research in little known German elections, I'm wondering if anyone can help me find some websites listing results of Austrian landtag elections up to the Dollfuss dictatorship.  I know that Vienna and several lander held elections in 1931 or so, but haven't found detailed breakdown of the vote.  IIRC, Innsbruck held a local election in the Spring of 1933, after Dollfuss had already suspended parliament and the Nazi's did quite well, and this probably encouraged Dollfuss to suspend further voting.

[Tender Branson]

The BMI (Interior Ministry) has a collection of Parliamentary Election Results since 1919, but breakdowns by state are only available starting after 1945:

http://www.bmi.gv.at/wahlen/wahldownloads/NRW_06/NRW_06_Stimmen_1919-1930.pdf

If you access this page

http://www.bmi.gv.at/wahlen/NRW_06_info.asp

and go to "Nationalratswahlen 2006 - Broschüre - Historische Zeitreihen", you can view the breakdowns by state.

The 2008 elections have a seperate page:

http://wahl08.bmi.gv.at

I would have to check the homepages of the individual states to see if they have election results prior to 1945 and it's also hard to find any election maps prior to 1945.

In high school I had a History Atlas which had numerous maps of 1919-1930 election maps incl. NSDAP, Socialist and Christian-Social strength by Austrian district, but I think I can't find them online ...

[Tender Branson]

I've found the offical statement of the vote from the 1919-1930 elections:

http://www.bmi.gv.at/wahlen/wahldownloads/NRW_1919.pdf

http://www.bmi.gv.at/wahlen/wahldownloads/NRW_1923.pdf

http://www.bmi.gv.at/wahlen/wahldownloads/NRW_1927.pdf

http://www.bmi.gv.at/wahlen/wahldownloads/NRW_1930.pdf

And from 1945 onwards:

http://www.bmi.gv.at/wahlen/nrw_history.asp

[minionofmidas]

These are the national elections by state, though. Not the state elections.

[Tender Branson]

These are the national elections by state, though. Not the state elections.

Yeah, as I´ve said its very hard to find state election results before 1945 ...

[Tender Branson]

Took a little bit to find the stuff, but here it is ...

1932 Salzburg state election results:

37.94% CS (Christian Social Party) - 12 seats
25.69% SDAP (Social Democratic Worker's Party) - 8 seats
20.79% NSDAP (Nazis) - 6 seats
  6.34% Independents/Farmers
  4.77% Heimatschutz (Homeland Protection)
  2.70% Kommunisten (Communist Party)
  1.77% GDVP (Great-German People's Party)

1932 Vienna state election results:

59.0% SDAP (Social Democratic Worker's Party) - 66 seats
20.2% CS (Christian Social Party) - 19 seats
17.4% NSDAP (Nazis) - 15 seats
  1.9% Kommunisten (Communist Party)
  1.5% Others

1932 Lower Austria state election results:

[Tender Branson]

The last democratic election in Austria before 1945 was held in Innsbruck, the capital of Tyrol, in April 1933.

The result of this city council election was:



After this result, the fascist Dollfuß-regime banned all elections as well as the Communist Party and the NSDAP.

Read more here:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

http://ausstellung.en.doew.at/m9sm101.html

[Tender Branson]

NSDAP-share by "gau" (=district) in the Salzburg state election of 1932:



Stadt Salzburg means Salzburg-City, the capital of the state.

[Hifly]

Do you have any Vorarlberg election results from that period?

[Tender Branson]

1932 Vorarlberg state election results:

56.75% CS (Christian Social Party)
15.60% SDAP (Social Democratic Worker's Party)
10.52% NSDAP (Nazis)
  6.96% Landbund
  6.75% GDVP (Great-German People's Party)
  3.42% Kommunisten (Communist Party)

[Cranberry]

Do you have Bezirks-data for the Landtagswahl 1929 in Tirol? I found the Tirol-wide results, but maybe you have it Bezirks-wide too? Reutte, Landeck, Imst and Lienz might look a bit like the Solid South there

[Tender Branson]

In high school I had a History Atlas which had numerous maps of 1919-1930 election maps incl. NSDAP, Socialist and Christian-Social strength by Austrian district, but I think I can't find them online ...

I finally found my old Austrian history atlas from high school in the attic of my mum's house, which had these maps inside (right-click with your mouse for large pictures):



Mostly the left side is important: The upper left map shows the percentages of the rightist Great-German parties in the 1930 federal elections by district (the blue shades) and the NSDAP-shares (hatched areas).

The lower left map shows the NSDAP membership by Austrian district at the time of the July-Putsch in 1934, which happened tommorow 80 years ago exactly - on July 25, 1934.

And this:



The upper map shows the employee setup in each district in the year 1934, for example if a district was mostly agrarian (green), industrial (purple) or services/trade-oriented (yellow), or a mix of these.

The lower map shows the 1930 federal election winning party by district:

The blue shades are for the Christian Socialist Party (light blue is winning with up to 50%, medium blue is winning with 50-67% and dark blue is winning with a 2/3 majority).

Same thing for the SDAPÖ (Social Democratic Worker's Party).

Compare these 1930 federal election results with the 2013 federal election results by district:

[Tender Branson]

Do you have Bezirks-data for the Landtagswahl 1929 in Tirol? I found the Tirol-wide results, but maybe you have it Bezirks-wide too? Reutte, Landeck, Imst and Lienz might look a bit like the Solid South there

I don't have Bezirks-data for the LTW in Tirol 1929, sorry.

But look at the federal election map I just posted above for 1930, which includes district data.

Yepp, the Oberland+Osttirol was pretty conservative (and still is).

[Cranberry]

No problem.

I saw it - my district (Imst) is the darkest possible shade for the CS...

Oh yes, the Oberland was/is very conservative - I know no one born before let's say 1950 that would vote anything else than ÖVP - besides former railway workers - they'd never vote anything else but SPÖ

[Cranberry]

Thank you.... My district - 83% for the TVP! (Tirolean affiliate of the CS (like CSU/CDU but just for statal and local elections - Tiroleans always needed special treatment ) that's just like Mississippi at that time

[joevsimp]

In high school I had a History Atlas which had numerous maps of 1919-1930 election maps incl. NSDAP, Socialist and Christian-Social strength by Austrian district, but I think I can't find them online ...

I finally found my old Austrian history atlas from high school in the attic of my mum's house, which had these maps inside

those are fantastic, I studied history up to age 18 and we never had anything like that for a textbook

[rob in cal]

Thanks for your research Tenderbranson and Georgebner.  The 1933 Innsbruck elections are fascinating.  The Austrian Nazis must have been benefiting from the prestige of the new Hitler regime in Germany and probably new funding from it.  Had a national election taken place that spring it seems logical to assume that the Austrian Nazis would have won a plurality perhaps, but no majority in the National parliament.

[Tender Branson]

Thanks for your research Tenderbranson and Georgebner.  The 1933 Innsbruck elections are fascinating.  The Austrian Nazis must have been benefiting from the prestige of the new Hitler regime in Germany and probably new funding from it.  Had a national election taken place that spring it seems logical to assume that the Austrian Nazis would have won a plurality perhaps, but no majority in the National parliament.

This was one factor, but the most important factor was certainly the economic depression that hit Austria in 1933/34, in the wake of the global economic depression. The important Austrian banks went bankrupt and unemployment rose to 25-30% in summer 1934, when the Innsbruck city council elections took place.

The situation was similar to the Greek situation after 2008, just that the Austrians turned to the Nazis, while the Greeks supported the far-left SYRIZA.

Interestingly, Hitler tried to strangle Austrian tourism to death by imposing the 1000-mark penalty on German tourists who wanted to vacation in Austria, so that the Austro-Fascist regime folds. But despite this, a lot of unsatisfied/unemployed Austrians wanted to merge with Nazi-Germany (remember that unemployment in Germany was already going down again while Austrian unemployment peaked a bit later. Many Austrians thought Hitler would provide them with plenty of jobs as well).

[Cranberry]

Thank you very much, Georg Ebner.

Interesting here is the strength of the Ständebund in Schwaz and Reutte, while the center of the (extreme) far-right has always been and still is the Bezirk Kufstein, the only district home to two major industrial cities, and a relative small (for Tirol) rural agricultural area. I can only explain that with dissatisfaction with the TVP in the remote valleys like the upper Zillertal or the upper Außerfern (How would you translate "-Hinteres" into English? Upper doesn't seem that great a choice...)

[Tender Branson]

Thank you very much, Georg Ebner.

Interesting here is the strength of the Ständebund in Schwaz and Reutte, while the center of the (extreme) far-right has always been and still is the Bezirk Kufstein, the only district home to two major industrial cities, and a relative small (for Tirol) rural agricultural area. I can only explain that with dissatisfaction with the TVP in the remote valleys like the upper Zillertal or the upper Außerfern (How would you translate "-Hinteres" into English? Upper doesn't seem that great a choice...)

Maybe:

backmost
hindmost
rear
rearmost

[Tender Branson]

INNSBRUCK by the way voted 1931 as follows:

SD 41.1, TVP 33.7, GD 17.3, NSDAP (Hitler) 4.1, WomenP. 2.5, KPÖ 1.3

So in 1933 the Soc.Dem. lost 14%, TVP 8% - difficult question to whom...

The NSDAP (like the FPÖ now) used to be a big vacuum cleaner and sucked in votes from all parties (basically all the votes from the Greater-German parties naturally), and if you look at other state elections about equally (if not more) from the CSP and the SDAPÖ:

In the 1932 Vienna state election (according to Hänisch), only 1% (!!!) of SDAPÖ-voters from 1930 crossed over to the NSDAP, while 25% of the CSP-voters did and up to 51% of the Landbund.

...

In the 1932 Lower Austria election, the dominant CSP lost 12% relative to the 1927 state election, while the SDAPÖ only lost 3%.

The NSDAP gained 14% between the 2 elections, suggesting that they benefitted from the Christian-Socials much more than from the Social Democratic Worker's Party.

...

In the 1932 Salzburg state election, the CSP lost 10% relative to the 1927 state elections, while the SDAPÖ lost 6%. The NSDAP went from 0% to 21%. The Great-Germans went from 12% to 2%.

[Tender Branson]

Most of the links are dead, but they can be recovered:

https://www.bmi.gv.at/412/Nationalratswahlen/Historischer_Rueckblick.aspx

[Tender Branson]

Took a little bit to find the stuff, but here it is ...

1932 Salzburg state election results:

37.94% CS (Christian Social Party) - 12 seats
25.69% SDAP (Social Democratic Worker's Party) - 8 seats
20.79% NSDAP (Nazis) - 6 seats
  6.34% Independents/Farmers
  4.77% Heimatschutz (Homeland Protection)
  2.70% Kommunisten (Communist Party)
  1.77% GDVP (Great-German People's Party)

1932 Vienna state election results:

59.0% SDAP (Social Democratic Worker's Party) - 66 seats
20.2% CS (Christian Social Party) - 19 seats
17.4% NSDAP (Nazis) - 15 seats
  1.9% Kommunisten (Communist Party)
  1.5% Others

1932 Lower Austria state election results:

The similarities between the 1932 state elections and the 2018/2020 state elections is striking:

Salzburg 2018

38% ÖVP
23% FPÖ/FPS
20% SPÖ
  9% Greens
  7% NEOS
  1% KPÖ

Vienna 2020

42% SPÖ
20% ÖVP
15% Greens
10% FPÖ/Strache
  8% NEOS
  2% Left/KPÖ

Obviously, there were no Greens in 1932.