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The Federal Republic's first national elections were held in October [[1949]]. Schumacher was convinced he would win, and most observers agreed with him. But Adenauder's new [[Christian Democratic Union of Germany|Christian Democratic Party]] had several advantages over the SPD. Some of the SPD's strongest areas in pre-war Germany were now in the Soviet Zone, while the most conservative parts of the country - [[Bavaria]] and the [[Rhineland]] - were in the new Federal Republic of Germany. In addition both the American and French occupying powers favoured Adenauer and did all they could to assist his campaign; the British remained neutral.
Further, the onset of the [[Cold War]], and particularly the ruthless behaviour of the Soviets and the German Communists in the Soviet Zone, produced an anti-socialist reaction in Germany as elsewhere. The SPD would probably have won an election in [[1945]]; by [[1949]] the tide had turned. The German economy was also reviving, thanks mainly to the currency reform of the CDU's [[Ludwig
The result was that the CDU won a plurality of seats, and was able to form a majority government with the support of some minor parties. This was a complete shock to Schumacher, and he never really recovered from it. In opposition he was totally intransigent, refusing to co-operate in parliamentary matters and denouncing the CDU as agents of the capitalists and of foreign powers. Although he also denounced the Communists, and in fact organised an underground SPD resistance network in eastern Germany, his anti-capitalist and anti-Western rhetoric sounded sufficiently similar to Communist [[propaganda]] to undermine his support.
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