The Free State of Saxony () was one of the constituent states of the federally organized Weimar Republic from 1919 to 1933. The Free State was established in 1919 as the successor to the Kingdom of Saxony and lasted until the Nazi regime effectively absorbed all of Germany's federal states in April 1933. Following the reunification of Germany in 1990, the name "Free State of Saxony" was taken up again and remains Saxony's official name.

The Free State of Saxony grew out of the German Empire's defeat in World War I and the German revolution of 1918–1919. King Frederick Augustus III of Saxony abdicated in November 1918 in the face of the revolutionary events, and workers' and soldiers' councils set up revolutionary governments in Dresden, Leipzig, Chemnitz and other Saxon cities. In a largely peaceful conflict between radical and moderate socialists on the councils, the moderates prevailed. A democratically elected constituent assembly passed a constitution for a republican Free State of Saxony in October 1920.

A minority of Saxon workers continued to push for a soviet-style council government, leading to sporadic outbreaks of violence in the early 1920s. In 1923, Minister-President Erich Zeigner appointed two members of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) to his cabinet, following which the German government sent troops to forcibly remove them. Unknown to Zeigner and the Berlin government, Soviet Russia had been planning to use the events as a signal for a communist revolution across Germany. They had badly misjudged the overall workers' mood in Germany, and no uprising took place.

From 1924 until the onset of the Great Depression in 1929, the political and economic situations in Saxony improved. After Adolf Hitler became German chancellor in January 1933, Saxony's political leadership was replaced by Manfred von Killinger as Reich commissioner. The two Nazi Gleichschaltung (synchronization) laws in 1933 brought Saxony and all the other German states fully under Nazi control and effectively ended both the Weimar Republic and the Free State of Saxony. Saxony became part of East Germany after World War II and was dissolved as a political entity in 1952 before being revived in 1990.

Background: Empire and World War I

The Free State of Saxony was the successor state of the Kingdom of Saxony, one of the 25 constituent states of the German Empire. The Kingdom was a constitutional monarchy under the House of Wettin, whose last king, Frederick Augustus III, ruled from 1904 to 1918. He and his government largely avoided taking major initiatives in the social and economic arenas, and he was often sceptical of the Empire's more activist politics. His family life had strong middle-class traits which helped make him a popular figure in Saxony. During his lifetime, Saxony developed into one of Germany's leading industrial regions. It was particularly strong in mining, iron production, machine building and textiles.

Saxony's government consisted of six ministries whose heads were appointed and dismissed by the king. The ministers were of equal rank, with no position equivalent to prime minister or chancellor. The Kingdom's 1831 constitution established a two-chamber parliament () with an upper house whose members represented the royal family, nobility, clergy, Saxony's larger cities and Leipzig University, while the lower house was popularly elected. Only the king and his government could initiate bills; both chambers of parliament had to approve a proposed law for it to go into effect.

Initially, men 25 years and older who paid at least three marks in state taxes were eligible to vote. In an attempt by conservative voices in the Kingdom to stem the rapid growth of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), the electoral law was changed in 1896 to a three-class franchise in which votes were weighted based on how much the voter paid in taxes. As a result of the new law, the number of social democratic members in the 82-seat lower house dropped from 14 in 1895 to zero in 1901. In the 1903 election for the national Reichstag, in which all adult males had equal voting rights, the SPD took 22 of Saxony's 23 seats. Protests over the Kingdom's restrictive electoral law led to a change in 1909 to plural voting, under which a voter could receive up to four ballots according to criteria based on income, property, education and age. Under the new rules, the SPD took 25 seats in the 1909 election, which was the Kingdom's last.

At the start of World War I in 1914, Saxony was highly industrialized with a large socialist or socialist-leaning working class that had a limited political voice. As the fighting entered its third and fourth years, more and more of the economy was directed towards waging the war. Many smaller Saxon firms were forced to close due to a loss of business or to manpower shortages as workers were drafted into the armed forces or moved to war-critical positions. The textile industry suffered particularly badly and did not recover even after the war.

No significant political changes took place in Saxony until after the Reich constitutional reforms of October 1918, which made the government's ministers dependent on the confidence of the Reichstag rather than the emperor. Even then Saxony did not alter its electoral laws or constitution but simply invited two members of the Majority Social Democrats (MSPD) – the moderate wing of the SPD from which the more radical Independent Social Democrats (USPD) had split in 1917 – into the government, which for the first time was led by a National Liberal, Rudolf Heinze. The new government announced plans for constitutional changes and the democratization of the electoral law, but in the face of escalating revolutionary events they were never implemented.

German revolution

Formation of workers' and soldiers' councils The German revolution of 1918–1919 began at the end of October 1918 with the Kiel mutiny. Rebellious sailors set up a revolutionary workers' and soldiers' council at Kiel and in early November spread the revolt across Germany. Councils took power from the existing military, royal and civil authorities with little resistance or bloodshed. The revolution reached Berlin on 9 November, and Emperor Wilhelm II fled to Holland the next day.

Saxony's first council was set up by soldiers at the airbase at Großenhain, near Meissen, on 6 November. Two days later, workers' and soldiers' councils took control of both Leipzig and Chemnitz. In Leipzig, which had seen workers' councils on the Russian model during large-scale strikes in 1917, the workers were led by Richard Lipinski and the USPD. They and rebellious soldiers ousted the military general command, called a general strike and set up a workers' and soldiers' council that excluded the MSPD. In Chemnitz, where Gustav Noske, who gained notoriety as the Weimar Republic's first defense minister, was a leading figure in the MSPD, the workers' and soldiers' council was formed with ten representatives each from the MSPD, USPD and soldiers.

Two competing councils were formed in Dresden on 8 and 9 November. In one, the workers were members of the MSPD under Reichstag delegates Georg Gradnauer and Wilhelm Buck, and in the second all were from the USPD, led by Hermann Fleissner and Otto Rühle. The USPD-led council proved to be stronger and was able to take over the administrative machinery of Dresden and the Kingdom of Saxony on 9 November. Following overnight negotiations, the two councils announced a "united revolutionary workers' and soldiers' council" with an equal number of representatives from the MSPD and USPD. The MSPD's leaders had agreed to step down since they were considered to have been compromised by the MSPD's support of the war in the imperial Reichstag. In their place, from the metal workers' union assumed leadership of the MSPD on the council. At a mass meeting held the next day, Fleissner issued a proclamation on the council's behalf that promised abolition of the monarchy and the two-chamber Landtag, announced an agreement with state ministers for them to continue provisionally in their roles, and called for the election of a constituent assembly to draft a democratic constitution for Saxony. The proclamation made it clear that they wanted to see a parliamentary republic rather than a soviet-style council republic.

Abdication of King Frederick Augustus III

In a cabinet meeting on 8 November, King Frederick Augustus III said that he did not want the war that had just ended to be continued with the spilling of blood on the streets of Dresden. That evening, as revolutionary soldiers took control of the city, he left for Moritzburg Castle, a short distance to the northwest. At first he hoped that the MSPD would support the establishment of a parliamentary monarchy in Saxony, but when it became clear that they would not, he renounced the throne from Guteborn in Prussian Brandenburg on 13 November and asked Saxony's sworn officials to continue to do their duty. On the fifteenth, Frederick Augustus settled at Sibyllenort Palace near Breslau in Silesia, where he died in 1932. The royal family was allowed to keep a generous share of its private fortune in the form of land, dwellings and artwork.

The King's statement of abdication did not include the heir to the throne, his 25-year-old son Georg. The omission was deliberate because he wanted Georg to be able to assume the title of King of Saxony in the event that the monarchy was restored at some later date. When Georg was requested to renounce his claim from Neschwitz in eastern Saxony where he had taken refuge, he refused. Not long after, his decision to dedicate his life to the Catholic Church led to his renunciation of any claim to the throne. Georg went on to become a priest and member of the Jesuit Order.

Revolutionary government The USPD and MSPD formed a provisional revolutionary government for Saxony on 15 November 1918. Called the Council of the People's Deputies (), it was made up of three members from each party, with the USPD holding the key posts (interior, war and finance). Richard Lipinski of the USPD was chosen to lead the council. On 16 November it issued a statement confirming that existing members of the civil service would continue to exercise their former responsibilities, although the workers' and soldiers' councils would have oversight over individual officials. The government's program, which was issued on the 18th, stated that its purpose was "to lead the state out of the great difficulties of the present situation, to secure democratic gains and to carry out economic restructuring in accordance with socialist principles”. Freedom of the press, association and assembly were guaranteed. The program also promised an eight-hour workday, the separation of church and state, the introduction of a unified school system, modernization and democratization of the administration of justice, implementation of full self-government in municipalities and an amnesty “primarily for persons who, out of necessity, have violated laws or war regulations”. Some of the objectives, such as the eight-hour day and the amnesty, were implemented quickly, but there was little progress made in matters affecting schools and the church or with socialist economic restructuring. Providing food for the population remained a significant problem in the face of the continued Allied blockade of Germany, which was not fully lifted until 12 July 1919. Freedom of the press and of assembly were ensured as promised, including for the citizens' councils () which were set up to represent middle class interests in opposition to the workers' and soldiers' councils. Members of the middle class had been prohibited from participating in the revolutionary bodies.