Social Democratic Workers' Party of Germany
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The Social Democratic Workers' Party of Germany, in German Sozialdemokratische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands, SDAP, was a German left-wing political party founded on August 7/August 9, 1869 in Eisenach, Germany by, among others, Wilhelm Liebknecht and August Bebel. They were members of Bebel's and Liebknecht's Association of German Workers' Associations (Verband Deutscher Arbeitervereine) and of Ferdinand Lassalle's General German Workers' Association. Bebel became the first chairman of the Social Democratic Workers' Party.
The party included some former members of the General German Workers' Association (ADAV) of Ferdinand Lassalle who had died five years earlier. They were known as the Eisenacher after the town where the party was founded, and their programme was the Eisenacher Programm. Bebel and Liebknecht were influenced by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and considered their party "a section of the International Workingmen's Association", sharing its aspirations. The party, which was based mainly in Saxony, demanded the democratisation of the state and of German society.
The party's organ, which was at first called Demokratisches Wochenblatt (Democratic Weekly Paper), later Der Volksstaat (The People's State), was published three times a week.
The ADAV and the SDAP were very similar, and in 1875 the two parties finally merged to form the SAPD, which in turn became today's SPD.
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