Wilhelm Marx (15 January 1863 – 5 August 1946) was a German judge, politician and member of the Catholic Centre Party.

His terms in office saw a number of progressive pieces of legislation pass, including family allowances for state employees and comprehensive unemployment insurance.

[2] In 1888 he passed the second state exam for the Prussian civil service and began working as an assessor in Cologne and Waldbröl and later at the land registry in Simmern.

[1] Prior to 1919, under the German Empire that was dominated by Protestant Prussia, his religion and political activities were a handicap for his career as a judge.

In the summer of 1919, Marx was one of the few Centre Party members to support German acceptance of the Treaty of Versailles, since he feared that failure to do so would result in French annexation of the occupied Rhineland.

He supported Centre Party Chancellor Joseph Wirth in his "fulfillment policy" (Erfüllungspolitik) which attempted to comply as far as possible with the Treaty of Versailles, notably the reparation demands of the Allies, in order to show that it would be impossible to meet them.

[3] Independent Chancellor Wilhelm Cuno received Marx's help in mobilizing civil disobedience against the Occupation of the Ruhr by France and Belgium.

Marx then helped replace Cuno's cabinet with the grand coalition headed by Gustav Stresemann of the German People's Party (DVP).

Marx pushed through the Enabling Act of December 1923 that gave his government the authority "to take such measures as it deems necessary and urgent in view of the plight of the people and the Reich".

Poor law residence was replaced by usual residence, and the federal statutes (as noted by one study) “established the principle that persons who could not provide minimum subsistence for themselves and their dependents, and who did not receive help from others, were entitled to proper maintenance including food, clothing, housing, medical aid in case of sickness, and the aid required in order to recover working capacity."

Even though Luther's government had fallen because of his decree allowing the old imperial flag to be flown alongside the Republic's in certain locations, Marx did not rescind it.

[11] In June 1926 a referendum to expropriate the assets of the former ruling houses of Germany without compensation failed to reach the fifty percent needed to pass.

[12] Marx's cabinet survived the referendum's failure and shortly afterwards succeeded in bringing Germany into the League of Nations.

He resigned as chancellor on 17 December 1926 when he lost an SPD-initiated vote of no confidence on the issue of the recently uncovered clandestine military relations between the Reichswehr and the Soviet Union.

The fourth and final Marx cabinet extended the 1922 Law for the Protection of the Republic,[14] although in order to gain the DNVP's support the extension was limited to two years.

[1] The government sought to standardize locally administered poor relief payments by fixing them in line with the prices of essential goods, and Germany became the first major industrial nation to sign the Washington Agreement for extended maternity leave.

[5] Although the coalition broke up over the issue of the School Law (Reichsschulgesetz) and the blame was put on the DVP, it was mostly internal opposition within the Centre Party, notably by Joseph Wirth, Adam Stegerwald and Theodor von Guérard that resulted in the cabinet's fall.