1954 Bavarian state election

In the previous 1950 election, the CSU had suffered a major blow, losing 40 of their seats within the Landtag. After strenuous negotiations that lasted 17 days, a broad coalition was formed between the CSU, SPD, and GB/BHE, with Hans Ehard retaining in his position as Minister-President. With a vote of 131-5, with 36 abstentions he was elected as Minister-President within the Landtag.[2]

While the Auerbach Affair hung over much of Ehard's tenure, none of the intrigue of the first term occurred, and the coalition stayed intact. The only immediate result was the forced resignation of the Justice Minister in 1952.[5] The CSU managed to recoup some of their 1950 losses, gaining 19 seats in the 1954 elections, at the primary expense of the BP and GB/BHE which had divided the right-wing vote in 1950. However, an unlikely coalition formed. Under the leadership of the state SPD chair, Waldemar von Knoeringen, the SPD brokered a Viererkoalition (coalition-of-four) between themselves, the FDP, the BP, and GB/BHE which stemmed from a collective skepticism of the CSU. On 14 December 1954 Wilhelm Hoegner was voted in as Minister-President. In light of this, disputes broke out within the CSU, which led to the resignation of Hans Ehard as party chair in January 1955, but he still retained his position as President of the Landtag.[6]

The Hoegner government fell into a major scandal of its own, but it did not manage to come out intact like Ehard's had. In 1951, businessman Karl Freisehner had approached the government about casino operating concessions in his name. While this was rejected, several Landtag members had received a bribe of 50,000 marks in order to vote yes. With enough pressure, the Bavarian government did give the licences in April 1955. Soon afterwards, the CSU had launched a parliamentary investigation into the opening of the casinos. One of the recipients of the 50,000 mark check was a CSU deputy, Franz Michel, who came forwards to his other party members. Later on he'd claim he burned the check. The crusade against the bribery was now led by Friedrich Zimmermann, who reportedly had incriminating evidence on the Deputy Minister-President and co-founder of the BP, Joseph Baumgartner. In 1957, Baumgartner and Minister of the Interior August Geislhöringer (also a member of the BP) resigned in face of these allegations, and the coalition collapsed. This wasn't enough for Zimmerman and he eventually got what he wanted: in January 1959 Freisehner came forward with documents detailing payments made to the two ministers. Both were sentenced to jail, with Baumgartner receiving two years in prison, and Geislhöringer one and a half. It would later be revealed that the documents Freisehner had presented were most likely forged, however by that point it didn't matter, the BP had managed to destroy its own reputation.[7]

The Viererkoalition officially collapsed on 8 October 1957. due to a combination of the Casino Affair, and the CDU/CSU victory in the 1957 federal election. The right-wing parties abandoned the SPD in reaction to the election, and Hoegner submitted his resignation on 9 October 1957. CSU politician Hanns Seidel was chosen as Minister-President, and formed a coalition with the FDP and GB/BHE, which would last through the 1958 state elections.[6]

The table below lists parties represented in the Second Landtag of Bavaria.

Summary of the 26 November 1950 election results of the Landtag of Bavaria

Party		Votes	%	+/-	Seats	+/-	Seats %
	Christian Social Union (CSU)	3,691,954	38	10.6	83	19	40.7
	Social Democratic Party (SPD)	2,733,946	28.1	0.1	61	2	29.9
	Bavaria Party	1,286,937	13.2	4.7	28	11	13.7
	All-German Bloc/League of Expellees and Deprived of Rights (GB/BHE)	990,109	10.2	2.1	19	7	9.3
	Free Democratic Party (FDP)	653,741	7.1	1.4	13	1	6.4
	Communist Party (KPD)	205,206	2.1	0.2	0	±0	0
	Others	111,652	1.2		0	±0	0
Total		9,673,545	100.0		204
Voter turnout			82.4	2.5
Source: Statistik Bayern and Historisches Lexikon Bayerns

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• Historisches Lexikon Bayerns
• House of Bavarian Elections
• Election Results 1946-2018