Help Needed : Reichspresidential Election 1932

NoMommsen

Donor
I would like to have/find some advice about a legal situation for that possible happening :

Reichspresidential election in Germany 1932. Upt to and going of the first ballot as OTL.
BUT ...
Sometime between 31.March and 5.April Hindenburg dies of natural causes (he was old enough to do soo).

And now ?

Would it have been legally possible for the SPD to announce an own candidate for the second ballot
ALONG
with the DNVP/DVP/Zentrum and other conservatives presenting a replacement for Hindenburg ?

So that there would have been four candidates for the second ballot ?
(i.e. : Hitler (NSDAP), Otto Braun (SPD ... DStP, Zentrum ?, BVP ?), Ernst Thälmann (KPD), Lettow-Vorbeck (DNVP, Stahlhelm, BVP ? , just to name some possibilities)

At the Reichspresidential election in 1925 Hindenburg was - newly - introduced to the ballot race as a "replacement" for Jarres but on the same ... lets call it election platform the "Reichsblock" supported by DNVP, DVP and some other non-party "pressure groups".
The election platform the "Volksblock" was supported by Zentrum, DDP, and now also SPD and settled with Wilhelm Marx as their common candidate.

So : in 1932 would the ... pro-Weimar (more or leas) or better anti-Hitler parties beside the Communists have to settle on another common candidate or would it have been possible to introduce a new candidate on a new election platform ?
 

Deleted member 94680

Pomphis said:
The first ballot required an absolute majority, the second only a plurality. The second was not a run-off between the two best placed from the first. New candidates were possible.
Click to expand...

Were completely new candidates possible? Or is it just that existing parties, having gained votes in the first round, could change candidates for the second? I only ask, because what's to stop a popular figure waiting out the first round - requiring a majority - before entering the election in the second - requiring only a plurality - to take advantage of a divided electorate?
 

NoMommsen

Donor
@Pomphis THX for your input, I know your links quite well.
But unfortunatly they don't tell about the situation described. And the cited note-2 names only a "reasoning" but I wonder how far that had the "power" of a by the Reichstag (or National Assamby) approved law.

@Stenz that's exactly what I'm wondering about. How was this to be avoided - a completly new candidate with a completly new electoral platform.
The candidates were 1925 as well as 1932 already in the first ballot candidates of a common platform or "Sammelkandidaten", what means that they were nominated by a group - of parties as well as other pressure groups.
(Well in 1925 in the first ballot it was "only" Jarres, who run for DNVP as well as DVP.)
 

NoMommsen

Donor
I read again the substantiation linked by @Pomphis one more time in its original, as well as the according law of the 13.March 1925 (Second law concerning the election of the Recihspräsident [Zweites Gesetz über die Wahl des Reichspräsidenten vom 13. März 1925]).

For nomination it states, that candidates have to be filed latest 10 days before the election (not fully clear, if that counts also for the second ballot). For nomination there have to be signature of at least 20.000 voters. Then :
"Instead of 20.000 voters 20 might be enough, if the proposal is made by groups, who made a proposal for the last election and if the county-election-district-proposals (Kreiswahlvorschläge), that were associated to the overall-proposal (Reichsvorschlag), won altogether al least 500.000 votes. The same applys to proposals, who run in the first ballot."

Even though it mentions a second ballot (it was rendered almost "natural", that there would be always two ballots), it doesn't clearly states, that there could not be a completly new candidate.
Sure, as stated in the substantiation, it was "meant" , that groups of the first ballot merge to reduce the number of proposals.

But the wording IMHO wouldn't forbade in the above mentioned situation to have a new fourth candidate in the second ballot of 1932.
(Please correct me, if I am wrong in this assumption. ... and if you're able to ... PLEASE ! ;))
 

Deleted member 94680

NoMommsen said:
I read again the substantiation linked ...
For nomination it states, that candidates have to be filed latest 10 days before the election (not fully clear, if that counts also for the second ballot). ...
for the last election and if the county-election-district-proposals (Kreiswahlvorschläge), that were associated to the overall-proposal (Reichsvorschlag), won altogether al least 500.000 votes. The same applys to proposals, who run in the first ballot."

Even though it mentions a second ballot (it was rendered almost "natural", that there would be always two ballots), it doesn't clearly states, that there could not be a completly new candidate.
Sure, as stated in the substantiation, it was "meant" , that groups of the first ballot merge to reduce the number of proposals.

But the wording IMHO wouldn't forbade in the above mentioned situation to have a new fourth candidate in the second ballot of 1932.
(Please correct me, if I am wrong in this assumption. ... and if you're able to ... PLEASE ! ;))
Click to expand...

First let me make it clear I'm no expert in this matter, but by reading what you've put up, I would say that means the candidate needs to stand in the first ballot. The second ballot isn't a separate election, it's a second part of the same election.
 

NoMommsen

Donor
Let me play the devils advocate :evilsmile: :
This
For nomination it states, that candidates have to be filed latest 10 days before the election (not fully clear, if that counts also for the second ballot). For nomination there have to be signature of at least 20.000 voters. Then :
"Instead of 20.000 voters 20 might be enough, if the proposal is made by groups, who made a proposal for the last election and if the county-election-district-proposals (Kreiswahlvorschläge), that were associated to the overall-proposal (Reichsvorschlag), won altogether al least 500.000 votes. The same applys to proposals, who run in the first ballot."
Click to expand...
contains the whole paragraph. The italics I used only for the part I translated directly. The other part I summarized.

This paragraph is the only one that deals with the propositions necessary for a candidate to enter the election. Therefore for participating in the election already on the first ballot you need 20.000 signatures.

The part I put in italics 'just' specifies a situation when only 20 signatures are needed. In case there was already a first ballot.

But it doesn't (clearly) states that with a new proposal with again 20.000 signatures would not be allowed.

Being a nitpicking advocate (presumably of the SPD) :
wouldn't it be possible in the situation described in the OP - only with Hindenburg dying before the 30.March -, that I put up a new proposal with 20.000 signatures newly collected and register this candidate at the 30./31. March ?
(Have to admitt, that by pure chaance I made the 'right'-time-decision of him dying in the OP to NOT create this question :openedeyewink:, sry :angel: )
 
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