Template talk:German elections

Federal vs. imperial
User 129.240.214.83 commented a rv with ""Federal" is the appropriate English translation of both." I don't think so, because in German, there is a sharp distinction between federal="Bundes..." and imperial="Reichs...". leo.org seems to support my point of view. I like the new solution. -- till we &#9788; &#9789; | Talk 16:50, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

That difference is irrelevant here. The sole and only point with "federal" is to mark that it is at the federal level, not state level. In this context, "federal" is the appropriate translation of both. "Reichs-whatsoever" doesn't mean "federal" less than "Bundes-whatsoever". "Imperial" is a less appropriate translation in this context.

Then way not spell it out? -- till we &#9788; &#9789; | Talk 17:44, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

east germany?
Should East German elections go on the same template? Given that it already includes imperial, weimar, and FRG elections, I think yes it should be on here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kami888 (talk • contribs) 17:23, 19 November 2008 (UTC)
 * No - there should be a separate template, as East Germany was considered a separate country, whilst the current country is a successor state to West Germany. пﮟოьεԻ   5  7  18:13, 19 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Do legal technicalities like this actually matter though? I mean there is no doubt that both states were German in nature, and if the template is about elections in Germany, what's the problem of having them on the same template? Kami888 (talk) 05:18, 20 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Because East Germany is not Germany - it is a separate state - hence I've created Template:East German elections. The best paralell I can think of is this is why there there are separate articles for Germany national football team and East Germany national football team (but not one for West Germany, as it is included under the Germany one). пﮟოьεԻ   5  7  09:12, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

Pre-1949?
Shouldn't we consider present-day Germany as a state which essentially arose with the 1949 Basic Law? From that point of view, it's inadequate to include in this template Weimar Republic parliamentary and presidential elections, right? I suggest this template includes only elections held in Bundesrepublik Deutschland. I reckon another template already exists for the DDR; this one should then be split, with the 1871-1945 elections and referenda presented at a new one. It would be linked to from here, and could be named "Elections in Germany (1871-1945)" or "Elections in the German Reich" (as the state name continued to be Reich even during the Weimar years).

Was denkt ihr? What do you think? 189.97.228.45 (talk) 01:00, 13 June 2009 (UTC) (User:Amorim Parga, too lazy to login. And oh, I'm curious about the 1930s referenda, what were they about?)


 * I disagree, the elections all occurred in some form of modern-day Germany, and we do not separate elections from other countries regardless of reconstitution. пﮟოьεԻ   5  7  08:55, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Then, why having a separate template for the DDR? Was it any less a "form of modern-day Germany" than the BRD? Says who? I mean, personally I'd much rather live in the BRD than in the DDR, but that's just my opinion. Some East Germans might have disagreed; I think that, for WP:NPOV issues, either Template:East_German_elections should be merged here or this template be split into pre- and post-1949 elections, like I had suggested.

Put otherwise: given the need to keep a NPOV, why list West Germany as the successor state to Nazi Germany instead of East Germany? Yet another way: why was the Weimar/Nazi Republic the same as BRD, why group all of these successive states as "modern-day Germany"? 189.99.136.145 (talk) 20:07, 14 June 2009 (UTC) (me again)


 * There's definitely an inconsistency here, I agree. Either of your proposed solutions -- dividing the template at 1949, or adding East German elections -- would work. -- SCZenz (talk) 09:04, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

The Federal Republic is identical with the state founded in 1867. See Legal status of Germany. Therefore, the elections of 1867 should be added.--Ziko (talk) 16:12, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Bundespräsident
Why Bundespräsident elections are not here?--Ventusa (talk) 20:38, 20 February 2010 (UTC)


 * They should be in here, of course. --bender235 (talk) 20:53, 20 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Because they were not public elections, which is what these templates are for. If you like, create a separate template like Israeli presidential elections for the non-public ones. Cheers, пﮟოьεԻ   5  7  15:34, 21 February 2010 (UTC)


 * That's ridiculous. Those presidential elections are indirect public elections, like in the United States. --bender235 (talk) 16:40, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
 * They are not indirect public elections - people are not elected specifically to elect the President. пﮟოьεԻ   5  7  09:20, 22 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Difficult. I would like to see the federal presidential elections here because of the continuity. The template serves to find elections easier, not to define whether they are essentially comparable. Otherwise we would have to eliminate the NS era elections because they are something completely different from democratic elections. By the way, why are the two Volksentscheide of the 1920s missing?--Ziko (talk) 16:12, 6 May 2010 (UTC)
 * The template exists at German presidential elections. Number   5  7  16:51, 18 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Election is election, either it was direct or not(indirect). Do not delete.--LINKMAN (talk) 04:39, 4 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Presidential election 1919 is in the German template, by the way. Ziko (talk) 20:31, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * A navbox should provide links to related topics, so it doesn't matter if there's a separate template or how the elections are performed. Either we have a group for presidential elections in this template that shows all of them or we should completely skip them and include default link to German presidential elections. De728631 (talk) 12:49, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Also, most pages linked from German elections do not deal with presidential elections and will therefore not have the separate presidential navbox. Nevertheless should there be the opportunity to access the articles about presidential elections from such pages. That's why also this template should feature all presidential election articles. De728631 (talk) 14:15, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
 * The templates only feature public elections, and aside from 1925 and 1932, none of the others involved public votes. Number   5  7  16:39, 18 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Apparently I'm not the only one who found this a bit restrictive and confusing. So maybe we should at least pipe the template title to "Public elections in Germany". De728631 (talk) 20:34, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

"Different states"
Re this edit (which I have reverted), the German Empire, Weimar Germany, Nazi Germany and the Federal Republic of Germany are all successor states. The state changed in size during the various eras, but I do not consider it a reason to separate out the elections (we do not do so in the case of the UK, which changed shape in 1921 or the US, which changed shape even more often than Germany as it gradually expanded).

The only entities that were different states were East Germany (which dissolved itself in 1990 and its Länder joined the FRG, which until then had been commonly known as West Germany - the edit summary mentions West Germany as being different to the current Germany, but they are the same legal entities - there's not even a succession issue there because no new country was created in 1990 - "unification" is somewhat of a misnomer, it was simply the FRG absorbing the former DDR), and the pre-1871 elections. Whilst I disagree with separating out the 1871-present elections, I can see the case for the latter being given their own row, and East Germany already has its own template which is linked to from here. Number  5  7  23:43, 10 December 2013 (UTC)


 * I do not want to offend you, but perhaps you are not an expert on German history and constitutional law. There are so many complaints on this page, that it is inaccurate to simply put the elections of the German Empire, Weimar Republic, Nazi Germany, West Germany and re-unified Germany in one row. A state is not only defined by its geography, but also by its regime. While UK and US changed their borders in the course of time, they never changed their regime, at least never as radically as Germany did. It is unacceptably incorrect to pretend that there was always one "Germany", which basically was the same state. And what is the disadvantage of having sub-groups? You say it looks awful. This is utterly subjective. I say it looks neat and tidy. And historical accurateness is much more important than subjective impressions of the design. --RJFF (talk) 18:33, 13 December 2013 (UTC)
 * No offence taken, and I hope you don't mind me asking a similar question given that you noted that West Germany and Germany are separate entities (joke)? But anyway, perhaps the UK and the US were poor examples – Polish elections and Serbian elections may be better ones to show that different regimes do not necessitate separate rows. I think the sub-templates are an unnecessary complication, and make the template overly-large for what it needs to be. Number   5  7  21:59, 13 December 2013 (UTC)