[2][3] Baumgarten's philosophy also created a significant political impression on Max Weber, an influential social theorist of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

In 1859 he began working at Maximilian Duncker's "literary bureau", a Prussian institution used to disseminate propaganda.

[2] As a champion of Prussian/German liberalism, Baumgarten faced the dilemma as to whether or not to accept the military and political successes of Prussia's conservative Prime Minister, Otto von Bismarck.

In 1866, Baumgarten published his support of Bismarck's policies in an essay entitled A Self-Criticism of German Liberalism.

This work essentially ended radical German liberalism as a force, whereupon many Prussians joined the Bismarck-supporting National Liberal Party), and allowed the new German empire to nationalize and solidify.