Only men sit downstairs, chosen by men. Upstairs, in the spectator galleries of St. Paul's Church, women also have access on the days of the National Assembly. They also want to observe what the first freely elected all-German parliament does – how it works, what it decides, how such a newfangled representation of the people works at all. "You want to have seen something like this up close," Lulu Brentano wrote from Frankfurt to her sister-in-law Emilie Brentano in Aschaffenburg on 19 May 1848.
Lulu, one of the younger sisters of Clemens Brentano and Bettina von Arnim, as a merchant's daughter from the best Frankfurt family, is one of the lucky visitors who were able to get a ticket for the very first session of the Paulskirche parliament the day before. Her impression is mixed, as she notes in breathless spelling: "There was much uplifting in it, especially the constant tumultuous raising for and against the proposals, by the way, no rest, no dignity, it made me a sad impression." Lulu's resentment is mainly due to the fact that a motion of the Bishop of Münster, who had wanted to open the session with a service, does not find a majority. The devout Catholic Lulu, whose fortune was stuck in revolutionary France, did not become an ardent parliamentarian in the period that followed. But her interest in what was going on in St. Paul's Church was genuine.
It is no longer tumultuous there today. When the citizens gather modestly in the building occupied by the city of Frankfurt, the occasion is lifted, the mood dignified and the wide circle of rows of seats often quite empty. After the war and the rapid reconstruction of the burnt-out church building for the centenary of the revolution of 1848, with donations from all four occupation zones, the building became the temple of a post-war West German society, which in speech and counter-speech of the National Assembly of yesteryear paid homage, but above all tried to create what had been lacking in the fall of the Weimar Republic into dictatorship – a democratically constituted public. in which opinions are expressed and attentively received.
The house is rarely full
All of this has worked well for decades. But times are changing. The part of the city society that is willing to make a pilgrimage to St. Paul's Church as to the secular High Mass is getting smaller and smaller. Frankfurt is getting younger and more migrant, Twitter and smartphones are replacing entire mornings and evenings every minute on uncomfortable black folding chairs, what knowledge, culture and participation mean is currently changing as rapidly as it was during the last epochal break around 200 years ago. Peace Prize, Börne Prize, Goethe Prize: A full house is rarely guaranteed.
On February 28, the oval for the presentation of the "Edition Paulskirche" was at least quite well filled. What is gratifying is that the "Library of the Early Democrats" published by Kiepenheuer & Witsch reminds us not only of 1848 but also of the place where the revolution became permanent in parliament. Hopefully, two years of commemoration will generate a lot of desire for the Paulskirche visit. After all, there was once a fight for parliament as well as for tickets for the public gallery.