Richard Karl Freiherr von Weizsäcker

Richard von Weizsäcker was born in the family of German diplomat Ernst von Weizsäcker. He studied philosophy and history in Oxford and Grenoble. In 1938 he joined the army and participated in World War II fighting in the battles against Poland and Soviet Union. In 1945-1950, Weizsäcker continued his studies in Göttingen and as lawyer defended his father prosecuted as Nazi state official. In the 1950s his career was mostly connected with the Mannesmann AG mining company. He was also an active participant in the Evangelist church affairs serving on many ecclesiastic councils. In 1954, Weizsäcker joined the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), but he remained politically inactive until 1965, when the future chancellor Helmut Kohl proposed his candidacy for the parliamentary elections, but Weizsäcker refused to participate in the electoral campaign. In 1966, Weizsäcker became a member of the CDU federal board and was finally elected to the Bundestag in 1969. In November 1968, the CDU leadership considered Weizsäcker as a possible candidate to the federal presidency, but the choice fell on Gerhard Schröder, who eventually lost to Gustav Heinemann. While the CDU was in opposition (1969-1982) Weizsäcker actively worked on the party's new program and was a candidate to the post of CDU/CSU leader in the Bundestag, but Karl Carstens assumed the office in May 1973. The next year brought another defeat when Weizsäcker lost 32 votes to Walter Scheel at the presidential elections. Weizsäcker served as vice president (1979-1981) of the Bundestag, but he resigned the office to become the governing mayor of West Berlin (11 Jun 1981 - 9 Feb 1984). In November 1983, the Bavarian minister-president Franz Josef Strauß insisted on inclusion of Weizsäcker as the CDU/CSU candidate at the presidential election. Weizsäcker easily defeated the independent candidate Luise Rinser, supported by the Greens and the Free Democrats. On May 8, 1985 - the 40th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe - he made a dramatic speech to the Bundestag that articulated the historic responsibility of Germany and Germans for the crimes of Nazism. In his public addresses, Weizsäcker called for supporting democratic principles, tolerance and social responsibility. He was involved in food aid activities targeted at relieving hunger problems in the third world countries. Running unopposed for the first time in the history of presidential elections in Germany, Weizsäcker was reelected in 1989. His second term witnessed the process of the unification of Germany and collapse of the Communist regimes in Eastern Europe. By 1994, the seat of the German presidency was transferred to the Schloß Bellevue in Berlin. Biography source: [2]