Manifesto of the Ninety-Three

October 23, 2014

Max Planck (1858-1947), pictured here in 1910. His 1900 hypothesis that light could only carry energy in units of hν formed the genesis of quantum mechanics. Along with 92 other intellectuals, he signed the Aufruf an die Kulturwelt defending German actions in the war, though he began having regrets within a year. He was largely forced out of his scientific posts by the Nazis by 1938; his son Erwin was shot for his involvement in the July 1944 Plot against Hitler.

October 23 1914, Berlin–The Germans had so far been losing the propaganda war abroad. The largest factor was their mistreatment of the Belgians (and their gross mishandling of the resulting press fallout). To help combat these negative impressions, a group of ninety-three German intellectuals issued a manifesto in defense of German actions, titled Aufruf an die Kulturwelt (“An Appeal to the Civilized World”).

The bulk of the manifesto was a series of denials of Allied “lies”, prefaced with It is not true:

As representatives of German Science and Art, we hereby protest to the civilized world against the lies and calumnies with which our enemies are endeavoring to stain the honor of Germany in her hard struggle for existence—in a struggle that has been forced on her…
It is not true that Germany is guilty of having caused this war…
It is not true that we trespassed in neutral Belgium…
It is not true that the life and property of a single Belgian citizen was injured by our soldiers without the bitterest self-defense having made it necessary…
It is not true that our troops treated Louvain brutally…
It is not true that our warfare pays no respect to international laws…
It is not true that the combat against our so-called militarism is not a combat against our civilization…
Have faith in us! Believe, that we shall carry on this war to the end as a civilized nation, to whom the legacy of a Goethe, a Beethoven, and a Kant is just as sacred as its own hearths and homes.
For this we pledge you our names and our honor:

Many of the signatories are obscure today, but a few, especially scientists, remain well-known. These include:

Walther Nernst (Third Law of Thermodynamics, Nernst Equation, Chemistry Nobel 1920)

Philipp Lenard (Physics Nobel 1905)

Max Planck (quantum theory, Planck’s law of blackbody radiation, Physics Nobel 1918)

Wilhelm Röntgen (X-rays, Physics Nobel 1901)

Wilhelm Wien (Wien’s displacement law, Physics Nobel 1911)

Adolf von Baeyer (synthesis of indigo, Chemistry Nobel 1905)

Hermann Fischer (Fischer esterification, Fischer projection, Chemistry Nobel 1902)

Fritz Haber (synthesis of ammonia, “father of chemical warfare”, Chemistry Nobel 1918)

Wilhelm Ostwald (Chemistry Nobel 1909)

Richard Willstätter (Chemistry Nobel 1915)

Emil von Behring (diphtheria and tetanus vaccines, Physiology/Medicine Nobel 1901)

Paul Ehrlich (chemotherapy, Physiology/Medicine Nobel 1908)

Rudolf Eucken (Literature Nobel 1908)

Gerhart Hauptmann (Literature Nobel 1912)

Felix Klein (Klein bottle)

Englebert Humperdinck (composer of Hänsel und Gretel).

Of the 90 (out of 93) signatories I could find information on, all were (of course) working in Germany at the time the manifesto was published. Most were born in Germany, though some were native German-speakers who emigrated from other countries (8 Austrians, 4 Swiss Germans, and 4 Baltic Germans), or in the case of one Alsatian, became German after the Franco-Prussian war. Only one signatory was not German in any fashion, the Dutch Sinologist Jan Jakob Maria de Groot, who had only begun working in Berlin two years prior.

At the time of signing, their ages ranged from 36 to 82, with an average age of 59. Thirteen signatories died by the end of the war. Another four died within a year of the armistice; the remaining 76 survivors were interviewed and only 16 of them fully stood by their position, with the other 60 expressing some sentiments of regret.

When Hitler came to power in 1933, only 32 signatories were still alive. Their reactions were on the whole mixed. Only four (including Philipp Lenard) directly joined the Nazi Party, but another seven were supportive in some fashion (signing loyalty oaths to Hitler, supporting other far-right parties, creating Nazi propaganda, or espousing extreme anti-Semitism), including Gerhart Hauptmann. Many were actively ambivalent; eight had already retired or left Germany and felt no need to express political views. The remaining thirteen were definitively opposed to the Nazis, and (if still working) found themselves forced out of their jobs, though only five of those left Germany. Four of the thirteen were Jewish: Fritz Haber (left Germany in 1933 and died the next year in Switzerland), Max Liebermann (impressionist; died peacefully in 1935), Ludwig Fulda (playwright; attempted to leave for the US in 1939, committed suicide after being denied entry), and Max Reinhardt (stage director; left Vienna after Anschluss, died in New York in 1943).

Only nine were still alive at the close of World War II, and all but one had died within the following five years. The last, architect Bruno Paul, outlived all the other signatories by eighteen years, and passed away in 1968 at the age of 94.

In response to the manifesto, German pacifists circulated a counter-manifesto, Aufruf an die Europäer (“Appeal to the Europeans”), but only four people signed it: physiologist George Nicolai, philosopher Otto Buek, astronomer Wilhelm Foerster (who also signed the pro-war manifesto, confusingly; it may be the case that Friedrich Wilhelm Foerster, his son, signed the pacifist manifesto), and Albert Einstein. Einstein was at that time the director of the Kaiser Wilhelm (now Max Planck) Institute for Physics; his pacifist views were well-known, and he had not been approached to sign the pro-war manifesto.

3:58pm | URL: https://tmblr.co/Zq0s6n1TsLx_V

(Notes: 12)