Chancelleries

These days the Austrian Federal Government and the National Council of the Austrian Republic decided to cancel the current legislative period long before the end of the four-year term and announced new elections for September. Alfred Gusenbauer will then have the honour to be the Chancellor of the shortest government among all Austrian Chancellors of the 2nd Republic (after 1945). Until today, this was the privilege of Alfons Gorbach, who served as Chancellor only for 1087 days (from April 1961 to April 1964).

The longest chancellorship was the one of Bruno Kreisky, who had been Chancellor for 4781 days (1970-1983), followed by Franz Vranitzky (3878 days from 1986 to 1997) and Julius Raab (2931 days, 1953-1961).

Gusenbauer will be the only Chancellor who resigned before the age of 50 years. Nevertheless, he is not the youngest Chancellor in Austrian history (after the Second World War): Leopold Figl was only 43 when he became the first Federal Chancellor of the 2nd Republic on 20 December 1945.

Among all Chancellors, two out of ten were older than 60 years when they entered upon the chancellorship: Julius Raab (aged 61) and Alfons Gorbach (62). Kreisky was the only one who resigned after his 70th birthday (at the age of 72).

Five out of ten (former) Chancellors deceased already, but none of them during his chancellorship.
The list of Austrian Chancellors by longevity is led by Josef Klaus, who died in 2001, only 20 days before his 91st birthday. Fred Sinowatz is the oldest of the still living (former) Chancellors; he will celebrate his 80th birthday in 2009.

Four Austrian Chancellors were born in Vienna: Kreisky, Vranitzy, Klima and Schüssel.
Raab and Gusenbauer were born in the City of St. Pölten (Lower Austria), and also Figl was born in the state of Lower Austria. There was one Chancellor from the Tyrol (Gorbach), one from Carinthia (Klaus) and one from the Burgenland (Sinowatz). Upper Austria, Salzburg, Styria, and Vorarlberg still have the chance to “send” their first Chancellor next autumn.

By the way: Leopold Figl was born in the smallest among all villages where an Austrian Chancellor was ever born: Rust im Tullnerfeld had 454 inhabitants at the last census in 2001 (Unfortunately I don’t know the number of inhabitants at his year of birth in 1902).

And: None of the Austrian Chancellors was born on a Saturday; most of them are “Monday-children” (Klaus, Vranitzky, Gusenbauer).
Until today, no Austrian Chancellor was inaugurated on a Wednesday, but four of them on a Tuesday, four on a Thursday, and one on a Monday and a Friday (each).

Fred Sinowatz never had to campaign for an election during his career as Chancellor. Leopold Figl, Josef Klaus and Bruno Kreisky were the only ones who had an absolute majority in the National Council. Wolfgang Schüssel became Chancellor although his party got only 26.9% of all votes and ranked only third in the election of 1999.

By far the least votes got Viktor Klima (1999: 1.5 Mio), Wolfgang Schüssel (2006: 1.616 Mio) and Franz Vranitzky (1994: 1.618 Mio).

Vranitzky has the honour of both the longest and the shortest period between two ballots: from 1990–1994 the election period lasted for 1463 days, from 1994-1995 only for 434 days.

Leopold Figl was the only Chancellor until today who was a member of the government after his resignment as Chancellor (as the foreign minister during the Austrian Independence Treaty of 1955). Wolfgang Schüssel and Alfons Gorbach were the only Chancellors who went back into the National Council after they resigned. Gorbach and Gusenbauer had been Chancellors without holding any government position before or after that time. All the others had been Minister of Finance, Economic Affairs, Foreign Affairs, or Minister of Education.

In 1998 Viktor Klima has been President-in-Office of the assembled European Council for 184 days. Wolfgang Schüssel held this position in 2006, but only for 181 days, as the presidency rotates every six months and the first term of a year is a little bit shorter than the second one.

(Please notice that I did not include Karl Renner in any of the above listings or statistics. Renner was leading the first Provisional Government from April until December 1945 until the first elections).