Toni Sender was a German socialist, feminist, politician and journalist.
Early life
She was born into an Orthodox Jewish family with the name Sidonie Zippora Sender. Her father was Moritz Sender, an influential businessman in the local Jewish community. Her mother was Marie, née Dreyfus: both her parents were orthodox Jews. Her sister, Rachel married the sculptor Fred Kormis. However, Toni surprised her family by insisting that she wished to learn a profession. When she was just thirteen, having successfully completed her time at the girl's school to which her parents had sent her, she left home and headed for nearby Frankfurt where she enrolled at a private "business school for girls". As she later explained, she wanted to be "in charge of her own life" as soon as possible, not just economically but also spiritually, mentally and in the way she lived her life. Despite coming from a relatively affluent family, by the time she was sixteen she was earning her own money. She joined the Social Democratic Party of Germany in 1910, but shortly left to work for the Paris branch of a German metal firm. There she joined the French Section of the Workers' International, being particularly impressed by Jean Jaurès. She returned to Germany shortly after his assassination in July 1914.
Her return journey to Germany happened during the mass mobilisation of the First World War. Although she travelled back via Switzerland, she was only able to make her way back to Biebrich thanks to help from soldiers on their way to the front. Her family doctor invited her to join the staff at a local hospital and help treat the wounded. However she soon concluded that her principal role was to patch up wounded soldiers so that they could be sent back to the front as soon as possible. So when she was invited to work in Frankfurt for the metal company which had previously employed her before the war, she readily accepted – although this too involved war-work, as did virtually all jobs in war-time Germany. Nevertheless, her work made her aware of many secrets which would have been valuable to the anti-war movement. Sender decided to compartmentalise her life, seeing it as a matter of honour not to disclose secrets discovered at work to her political colleagues. When the SPD voted for war credits, Sender considered leaving the party, but she heard that an anti-war opposition group had formed within the party and that Robert Dissmann was the local organiser. Dissmann was an official with the German Metal Workers' Union. She met Dissmann in the summer of 1916. Dissmann had just been meeting with Rosa Luxemburg shortly before she was imprisoned. Dissmann soon recruited her to join the ant-war faction within the SPD. When Max Quarck, the sitting SPD member of the Reichstag, addressed a meeting in favour of the war credits, Sender spoke against him. However such opportunities for debate became rarer as the majority disregarded the rights of the minority. Dissman decided to set up the anti-war minority through establishing a local section of the National Federation of Proletarian Thinkers as a front organisation. He asked Sender to take on the role of organising this. Their attempts to disguise their political purpose were often ineffective and they were subject to police surveillance, and often had meeting venues cancel their bookings. Sender claimed that the military authorities also took an interest in them, resulting in many of their members being called up for the army. Sender attended the Third International Socialist Women's Conference held at Berne March 26–28, 1915, where she encountered Lenin's manipulation of the Bolshevik Women's delegation and took a dislike to Karl Radek who was acting as Lenin's aid.
Sender was an active participant in the German Revolution of 1918–19. She was elected to the Reichstag in 1920, sitting as a member of the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany which had broken away from the Social Democratic Party three years earlier following intensifying internal party ructions over support for war funding. Two years later the USPD itself broke apart, with most of its members joining the recently formed Communist Party. Tony Sender was one of the smaller number who in September 1922 returned to the SPD. She continued to serve as a Reichstag deputy till 1933, taking a particular interest in issues involving trade and tariffs.
The city of Frankfort has created the Tony Sender Prize for women who defend the equal rights of both men and women in the face of disadvantage mad discrimination.
Writings
1919: Die Frauen und das Rätesystem, speech to the Leipzig Women's Conference on 29 November 1919. Berlin: Freiheit
1920: Diktatur über das Proletariat oder: Diktatur des Proletariats: Das Ergebnis von Moskau Frankfurt: Volksrecht
1924: Fünf Jahre nach der Novemberrevolution! Lecture, held at the Saxon State Party Congress of the USPD on December 1, 1923 Zwickau: District board of the VSPD, 1924.
1951: "Does Stalin Dare Lift the Curtain?" The Federationist 9 June 1951,
