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Konrad Adenauer
ADENAUER, FEDERAL CHANCELLOR and
for Foreign Affairs, head of the Christian
ijion (CDU) and Schuman Plan signer, cele-
i birthday this year, is twice-widower, has
its in the Bundestag (lower house of parlia-
enauer's CDU is the largest party, while his
three-party non-socialist coalition, controls
its in the Bundestag. Despite this narrow
trol (about the same as the Labor majority
rliament), the government has never been
er removed him from office, Dr. Adenauer
Cologne for 16 years. He was arrested
he SS period.
lor's son Paul was recently ordained to the
)out socialism, garden-loving Catholic Dr.
Adenauer says, "It is much more important to give the
worker a home and garden by means of sound housing
policy than it is to socialize."
The veteran statesman starts his work-filled day at five
in the morning. After breakfast, Schumacher arrives to
drive him to the office. Chancellor Adenauer's chauffeur
is named Schumacher.
Says SPD chief Schumacher (his principal antagonist in
the Bundestag): "There's only one Adenauer!"
Who's'
Vice-Chancellor Franz Bluecher
Franz Bluecher, Vice-Chancellor and Minister for ERP
Affairs, handles the German side of all problems in con-
nection with Marshall Plan aid.
Mr. Bluecher had early ambitions to become a politi-
cal writer, ended by becoming an actor instead of an ob-
server of the political scene, after way stations in sales
work and finance. During the Hitler period he worked
first as an expert on the financing of long-term building
projects and public utilities, later as director of a re-
gional bank.
Political activity began in 1945 for Mr. Bluecher, when
he helped found the Free Democratic Party (FDP), now
a junior partner in the three-party coalition. In the elec-
tions to the federal legislature in August 1949, Bluecher
lost the race in his district. Like FDP colleagues Dehler
and Wildermuth, and the German Party's Seebohm, he
owes his seat in the legislature and subsequent Cabinet
post to the proportional representation clause in the Ger-
man voting law.
What Mr. Bluecher sees in the FDP, which takes a
moderate, anti-socialist line without the religious flavor
of the Christian Democrats, is perhaps contained in a
ROBERT LEHR.
WILHELM NIKLAS.
HANS LUKASCHEK.