Karl Carstens
| Karl Carstens | |
|---|---|
 |
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President of Germany (West Germany) |
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In office 1 July 1979 – 30 June 1984 |
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| Chancellor |
Helmut Schmidt Helmut Kohl |
| Preceded by | Walter Scheel |
| Succeeded by | Richard von Weizsäcker |
| President of the Bundestag | |
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In office 14 December 1976 – 31 May 1979 |
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| Preceded by | Annemarie Renger |
| Succeeded by | Richard Stücklen |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
14 December 1914 Bremen, German Empire |
| Died | 30 May 1992 (aged 77) Meckenheim, Germany |
| Nationality | German |
| Political party | Christian Democratic Union (1955–1992) |
| Other political affiliations |
Nazi Party (1940–1945) |
| Spouse(s) | Veronica Prior |
Karl Carstens (14 December 1914 – 30 May 1992) was a German politician. He served as President of the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) from 1979 to 1984.
Carstens was born in the City of Bremen, the son of a commercial school teacher, who had been killed at the Western Front of World War I shortly before his birth. He studied law and political science at the universities of Frankfurt, Dijon, Munich, Königsberg, and Hamburg from 1933 to 1936, gaining a doctorate in 1938 and taking the Second Staatsexamen degree in 1939. In 1949 he also received a Master of Laws (LL.M.) degree from Yale Law School.
From 1939 to 1945, during the Second World War, Carstens was a member of an anti-aircraft artillery (Flak) unit in the Wehrmacht, reaching the rank of Leutnant (Second Lieutenant) by the war's end. In 1940 he joined the Nazi Party; reportedly, he had applied for admission in 1937 to avoid detrimental treatment when he worked as a law clerk. He had, however, joined the Nazi SA paramilitary organisation already in 1934.
In 1944 Carstens married the medical student Veronica Prior in Berlin. After the war he became a lawyer in his hometown Bremen, and from 1949 acted as a councillor of the city's Senate. From 1950 he also worked as lecturer at the University of Cologne, where he habilitated two years later. In 1954 he joined the diplomatic service of the German Foreign Office, serving as West German representative at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg. In 1955 he joined the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) under Chancellor Konrad Adenauer.
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