Party for a Rule of Law Offensive

Initially it used the acronym PRO but had to drop it after a judicial complaint by the Pro Deutsche Mitte (Pro DM) party, as it was considered too similar to the latter's short name. Because of this, the official short name was "Schill", derived from the informal, but commonly used epithet Schill-Partei ("Schill party") from 2001 to 2004. After Schill's resignation, the party had to choose yet another short name, now running as Offensive D, the "D" standing for Deutschland ("Germany").

Before his political career, Ronald Schill had been a criminal judge at the Hamburg district court. He was known in the local tabloid press for passing unusually severe sentences and advocating harsher penalties, especially for adolescent delinquents, winning the nickname of "Judge Merciless".{{Cite book |first=David F. |last=Patton |title=The PDS and the party systems in unified Germany |work=Germany at fifty-five: Berlin ist nicht Bonn? |publisher=Manchester University Press |year=2004 |page=298}}{{Cite book |author=Dürr |title=On Westalgia |year=2003 |page=41}} Schill supporters launched a political initiative in late 1999 and registered the Party for a Rule of Law Offensive in July 2000. The party platform and public appearance was strongly focused on the personality of its founder.

In the 2001 Hamburg state parliament elections it instantly came third and received 19.4% of votes (only 7 points behind the major conservative CDU) and 25 of the 121 seats in the assembly.{{Citation |title=Hamburger Wahlergebnisse seit 1965 |url=http://www.statistik-nord.de/fileadmin/wahldb/index.php |publisher=Statistisches Amt für Hamburg und Schleswig-Holstein |accessdate=2008-09-26 |author=Search database for Hamburg state elections |language=de |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20080630053046/http://www.statistik-nord.de/fileadmin/wahldb/index.php |archivedate=2008-06-30 }} During the campaign, it had accused the state government of insufficient action against criminality, drugs, violence, demanding more police and tougher sanctions. It benefitted from a general feeling of insecurity that had spread after the September 11 attacks in the United States, especially given that three of the terrorists had lived and studied in Hamburg.{{Cite book |author=Hyde-Price |title=Germany: Redefining its security role |year=2003 |page=105}} After the election, the new party joined a centre-right coalition with the CDU and the liberal FDP. The Schill party had 3 out of 11 senators (equivalent to ministers), with Ronald Schill being deputy mayor and senator of the interior.

The party could not extend its success to other states: In the state elections of Sachsen-Anhalt 2002 and Bremen 2003, it won 4.4% and 4.5% of the votes respectively, but failed to surmount the 5% threshold for parliamentary representation. In other states it only polled around 1%. In the 2002 federal election, the Schill party won only 0.8% of the votes.{{Cite book |author=Patton |title=Dogs That Did Not Bark |year=2005 |page=179}} In Spring 2003, Mario Mettbach was elected federal chairman of the party, while Schill continued to lead the Hamburg state branch. After a dispute about Schill's state secretary, Hamburg's first mayor Ole von Beust (CDU) removed Schill from his government office, accusing him of blackmail. Purportedly, Schill had threatened to accuse von Beust of granting undue advantages to the senator of justice, with whom Schill suspected von Beust of having a love affair.{{Citation |url=http://www.citymayors.com/politics/hamburg_election.html |title=Mayor von Beust to govern alone after victory in Hamburg election |accessdate=2008-09-26 |author=Staff: (source: Deutsche Welle) |publisher=www.citymayors.com | date =2004 }}

In December 2003, the federal board of the party removed Schill from his position as chairman of the state party. Schill considered this illegal and ignored the decision, therefore the federal board decided to expel Schill from the party. Consequently, the party's parliamentary group split, the supporters of Schill leaving the party's group and founding a separate one. Von Beust canceled the coalition and called a snap election.

In the 2004 Hamburg elections, the party under the new leader Mario Mettbach only reached 0.4% and lost all of its seats, while Schill ran on a joint ticket with the Pro DM party, winning 3.1% of the votes, but also failing to qualify for parliamentary representation. After the election, Mettbach and most of the other members left the party, some of them joining the CDU. The members who hadn't left elected a new leader and changed their short name to Offensive D. Under that name, they came in last at the 2005 German federal election, polling 3,338 out of over 47 million votes (less than 0.01%).

The party dissolved due to poor election results and financial problems in September 2007, having lost several leading figures and entire state groups to other right-wing parties such as the Centre Party.

Logo Partei Rechtsstaatlicher Offensive.svg|2000-2001

Partei Rechtsstaatlicher Offensive - Logo 2001-2004.svg|2001-2004

• {{Cite journal |first=Frank |last=Decker |title=Perspektiven des Rechtspopulismus in Deutschland am Beispiel der "Schill-Partei" |journal=Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte |issue=21 |year=2002 |url=http://www.bpb.de/apuz/26907/perspektiven-des-rechtspopulismus-in-deutschland-am-beispiel-der-schill-partei?p=all |language=German}}

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Category:Defunct political parties in Germany

Category:Conservative parties in Germany

Category:Political parties established in 2000

Category:Politics of Hamburg

Category:Political parties disestablished in 2007

Category:Right-wing populism in Germany

Category:2000 establishments in Germany

Category:2007 disestablishments in Germany