131214840-Carl-Schmitt

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Parlamentarismus had first appeared in 1923 in the University of Bonn Law Faculty's
festschrift for Ernst Zitelmann. 5 Schmitt approached the publishers Duncker & Humblot
about a second edition of his essay the following year, and a contract was signed in June. But
before Duncker & Humblot were prepared to issue the second edition, Richard Thoma's
review appeared. In early 1926 Schmitt wrote to Karl Muth, suggesting that Hochland
publish his reply, and Muth agreed. 6 When the manuscript was submitted to Ludwig
Feuchtwanger, Schmitt's editor at Duncker & Humblot, Schmitt asked that the reply be
included as a preface. 7 Neither Muth nor Feuchtwanger objected, and Schmitt's reply to
Thoma appeared in both Hochland and the second edition of his Parlamentarismus in 1926.
Some indication of how Schmitt (and his editor) viewed the essay is given in the
correspondence between them on its title and the publisher's original proposal for a second
edition. In reply to Schmitt's urging that a new edition appear in 1925, Feuchtwanger
expressed doubt that the market was favorable: "No one buys a book today that is not directly
and closely connected to some concrete existential purpose, such as passing an examination,
or which serves some professional requirements, etc., or which is a sensation. . . ." As an
alternative, Feuchtwanger offered to publish Schmitt's Parlamentarismus in 1926: "Next year
we are reissuing some of our out-of-print brochures which are the most important and most
frequently asked for, in identical form: Max Weber, Politik als Beruf; Simmel, Der Konflikt
der modernen Kultur; Bendixen (the late Hamburg Bank director), Das Wesen des Gelds;
Becher (now professor of philosophy), Metaphysik und Naturwissenschaft; and lastly, your
Parlamentarismus." He suggested that the five might appear with a covering title page
identifying them as ''Beiträge zur Kulturwissenschaft"; they were in any case "united by their
intellectual superiority." 8 When Schmitt's manuscript had been submitted, Feuchtwanger
wrote back on May 6, 1926, confirming that it would be set and printed with the others in the
summer.
Schmitt had agreed to Feuchtwanger's suggestion in late 1925 that the title be changed to Die
moralische Lage des heutigen Parlamentarismus
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