Oskar Hergt Explained

Oskar Hergt
Order:Vice-Chancellor of Germany
Chancellor:Wilhelm Marx
Term Start:28 January 1927
Term End:28 June 1928
Predecessor:Karl Jarres (1924)
Successor:Hermann Dietrich (1930)
Order2:Reich Minister of Justice
Term Start2:28 January 1927
Term End2:28 June 1928
Chancellor2:Wilhelm Marx
Predecessor2:Johannes Bell
Successor2:Erich Koch-Weser
Order3:Chairman of the
German National People's Party
Term Start3:19 December 1918
Term End3:23 October 1924
Predecessor3:Office established
Successor3:Johann Friedrich Winckler
Office4:Member of the Reichstag
Term Start4:1920
Term End4:1933
Constituency4:Hesse-Nassau (1932–1933)
Liegnitz (1920–1932)
Birth Date:22 October 1869
Party:DNVP (1918–1933)
Otherparty:FKP (1902–1918)
Occupation:Lawyer

Oskar Gustav Rudolf Hergt (22 October 1869 in Naumburg – 9 May 1967 in Göttingen) was a German lawyer and nationalist politician, who served simultaneously as the minister of Justice and vice-chancellor from 28 January 1927 to 12 June 1928. Hergt attended the prestigious Domgymnasium Naumburg before studying law at Würzburg, Munich and Berlin. He worked as a Gerichtsassessor in Saxony, and as a judge in Liebenwerda. Hergt held various senior offices at the Prussian Ministry of Finance from 1904 to 1914. Previously a member of the FKP, which was dissolved after the First World War, Hergt was a founding member of the right-wing monarchist DNVP and the party's first chairman. First elected to the Reichstag in 1920, he was seen as one of the more moderate members of the party. His support for the Dawes Plan in 1924 was seen as a betrayal of the party's line and led to his replacement with the more hardline conservative Kuno von Westarp. As vice-chancellor, Hergt was the most senior DNVP politician in Wilhelm Marx's coalition government, but after losing the DNVP's leadership election in October 1928 to Alfred Hugenberg, he became an increasingly minor figure in the radicalised DNVP. After the rise of the Nazi Party, Hergt retired from politics.