Conquering the world from the Kaiser's driver

Although Her Majesty the Emperor is a fifteen-year-old girl, she is a direct descendant of the Hohenzollern family. As long as this country is still the German Empire, no one in this country will really treat her as an ordinary woman.

Louis knew how low the social and political status of women was in the German Empire. He was also well aware of the country's conservative government's attitude towards women, and that the women's liberation movement in Germany had been in a slump.

He personally does not recommend that Lin Shangzhou help women now. At least he should wait until their power becomes strong and the Social Democratic Party becomes the ruling party before discussing this matter.

After some thought, Louis said to Lin Shangzhou in a serious manner: "Fritts, I suggest you give up helping these female workers now."

"Ah? You're not going to ask me to just give up helping the female workers, are you?"

Lin Shangzhou looked at Louis suspiciously. It was beyond Lin Shangzhou's expectation that Louis would ask him to give up directly.

Louis added: "Of course not. I mean that you should give up at this stage. The best and most effective time for us to help women is when the SPD becomes the ruling party and when you become chancellor."

"For the Strasbourg government, the only benefit of helping such a group of female workers is to win the hearts and minds of the people, but such hearts and minds are dispensable because women have no political benefits to offer at this stage, and doing so may also cause dissatisfaction in Berlin."

Louis said this with regret, saying that this was what disappointed him about the party, which was not tough enough in some aspects.

Lin Shangzhou thought it was outrageous. Why did a local government like you have to look at Berlin's attitude when making policies? He looked at Louis puzzled and asked, "Why does the Strasbourg municipal government have to look at Berlin's attitude when making local policies?"

Louis shrugged and said helplessly: "Local governments are local governments. You need to make policies without violating central policies."

"The Centre Party government's policies towards women are conservative and backward. If the Strasbourg government rashly violates the central government's policies to protect the interests of women, it will have a negative impact."

"Although women's suffrage was written into the Imperial Constitution twelve years ago (1918), there are still very few women who have the right to vote. Commoner women do not have any substantive political rights. It is not only difficult to help them, but the income is not proportional to the effort. That is why I suggest you wait until we come to power before considering this matter. By then, we will be the ruling party and everything will be easy."

Lin Shangzhou reluctantly recalled what Louis said. What he said made sense. Helping women at this stage was a thankless and troublesome task.

"You're right, but I don't want to give up. I still want to try to help those female workers. There are always more ways than difficulties."

"Oh, all right."

Louis looked as if he knew it was true. He put his hand on Lin Shangzhou's shoulder. He knew that Lin Shangzhou would not give up. Since he was unwilling to give up, Louis would not say anything more.

Anyway, in his opinion, it was impossible for Lin Shangzhou to succeed.

"Do whatever you want. Anyway, I'll back you up in Strasbourg. As long as you don't do anything treasonous, nothing will happen."

"About treason... Tsk, you still dare to say that to me."

Lin Shangzhou rolled his eyes at Louis. You know, the biggest traitor in the German Empire is right in front of him.

Louis smiled awkwardly, patted Lin Shangzhou on the shoulder and said, "Ah...haha, of course I know the seriousness of returning Alsace-Lorraine, so I will be satisfied if I can return Nancy."

"So you're going to change your agreement with me?"

Lin Shangzhou looked at Louis with strange eyes. He was a determined French man, so why did he choose Nancy as his second choice?

There is a big difference between Alsace Lorraine and Nancy.

Nancy is France's inherent territory. After the German Empire won the World War I, France ceded it to Germany II. This land was ceded, and it is not impossible to return it at some point in time.

Louis hesitated for a moment and then nodded and said, "Well... sort of. Although I hope to see France take Alsace Lorraine, if we really do that, we will face unprecedented pressure."

"So it's better to choose Nancy as a second choice."

Lin Shangzhou opened his mouth, but did not say what he had originally meant to tease. Instead, he said, "We'll talk about it later. We are still a long way from becoming the ruling party."

"You're right..."

Louis let out a long breath, then put his right hand on Lin Shangzhou's shoulder and stood up.

"So have you figured out how to help the women workers?"

"No, but I'll try."

Lin Shangzhou shook his head decisively.

"Go for it. If you need help from the newspaper, just ask for it. I have told Liavat that you can use the Workers' Newspaper as you like. Just treat it as your own newspaper."

Lin Shangzhou's eyes lit up when he heard Louis say that. Although the deputy editor-in-chief had agreed to almost all of his requests in the past, it was different with this editor-in-chief. He could let the newspaper do things for him without any scruples.

"Then I would rather obey your orders than be respectful."

"You are welcome."

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Chapter 95: A brief plot jump

On August 8, because Lin Shangzhou had no political experience, he wrote two documents under Louis's guidance to be submitted to the parliament. One was about formulating regulations on the treatment standards for workers and female workers, and the other was hoping that the parliament would allow workers in the Strasbourg area to establish their own trade unions. At the same time, he would attend the parliament as an observer on the 3th.

On the morning of August 8, Lin Shangzhou submitted the two documents to the parliament, where members of parliament discussed the relevant suggestions.

After the discussion, the proposal to improve workers' treatment was passed, and workers were allowed to form their own unions, but the lawmakers overwhelmingly refused to enact regulations to improve the treatment of female workers.

Lin Shangzhou spoke passionately to the members of parliament about the tragic experiences of the female workers and explained how doing so could win the support of the people and bring other benefits.

But the Speaker's rebuttal left him speechless.

"Senator Hipper, I understand your desire to help the female workers, but we can't just help them out of passion. We need to see what we can get from helping them."

“Female workers have no political status and cannot vote for us. Second, their income is too low to provide us with direct tax revenue. On the contrary, the increased profits of textile factories can provide us with additional income. Moreover, allowing workers to form their own unions has violated Berlin’s policy. We cannot violate Berlin’s policy again.”

The Speaker's words almost made him curse out loud in court. At this moment, he instantly and completely understood why Louis wanted to bring him into the Social Democratic Party so much. Faced with such a situation, anyone would have a headache. It is necessary and essential to bring a radical into the party to increase its strength.

He didn't understand why Parliament allowed workers to form their own unions but did not allow the formulation of relevant regulations to improve the treatment of female workers. No matter how you look at it, the former is more likely to cause dissatisfaction in Berlin than the latter, right?

Lin Shangzhou wanted to ask it in court, but Louis pulled his arm and motioned him to sit down, so he took a deep breath and sat down.

After that, there were very ordinary reports at the city council, with different officials reporting on the situation of different departments. He, as the newly appointed Minister of Labor and Social Affairs, also made a brief report to the parliament.

After the parliament ended, Louis found Lin Shangzhou and explained to him why the parliament would rather agree to the workers to form their own union than to improve the treatment of female workers.

There are two reasons for this. On the one hand, as the Speaker said, female workers cannot bring enough political and economic benefits to the government. On the other hand, it is because of the Prime Minister's personal discriminatory attitude towards women. Albert himself has taken the initiative to express his discriminatory attitude towards civilian women in public.

The prime minister has openly expressed his discrimination against civilian women, so the local government naturally dare not step on the landmine.

The first reason made Lin Shangzhou very angry, but after hearing the second reason, he was left with helplessness.

Who is the person at the pinnacle of power in the German Empire?

People who don’t know much about the German Empire would say it was the emperor, and that was indeed the case in the past. However, everyone who lives in this country now and knows a little about politics knows that the person at the pinnacle of power in the German Empire was the Center Party Chancellor—Albert.

It was also at this time that Lin Shangzhou realized that if he wanted to improve the status of women, the first thing he had to do was to kick Albert out of the position of prime minister.

If someone other than Albert became prime minister, the government's attitude towards women would definitely be much better.

Louis' attitude was also very clear, asking him to give up helping the female worker now.

However, Lin Shangzhou would not give up easily. He indeed had no way to fundamentally change the treatment of the female workers, but he could still put obstacles in the way of the textile factory. After all, he was a government official. As long as he proposed an inspection and got approval, Jenna's textile factory would be inspected by government officials.

He planned to have government officials conduct inspections frequently. Frequent inspections would attract public attention, and then he would have the Workers' Daily intensify its coverage of the incident to trigger public opinion. If public opinion could not put pressure on the government and Jenna, then he believed that frequent inspections would put enough pressure on Jenna.

This approach is a bit cheating, but we are dealing with capitalists, and we cannot confuse capitalists with ordinary people.

After making the decision, Lin Shangzhou went to the newspaper office and told the deputy editor-in-chief about the matter. The deputy editor-in-chief readily agreed. He then found Goebbels, who was typing, and hoped that he could help write relevant articles.

After careful consideration, Goebbels did not agree to Lin Shangzhou's request because he had never written a similar article, and there were no articles in Germany that could be used as reference in recent years. He also believed that such articles would be better written by women.

So Lin Shangzhou had to give up for the time being.

After leaving the newspaper, he went to Wolfgang's bar. He wanted to seek help from the trade unionists. The trade unionists were definitely more radical than the SPD in terms of women's liberation, and there were definitely women among them.

But he didn't see Walter at the bar today, so he returned to the apartment.

Now he could only rely on frequent inspections, which was almost a cheating tactic.

In the following month, the inspection department of the Strasbourg government inspected the textile factory once a week on average. This was indeed effective, because Lin Shangzhou went to the textile factory again on August 8, which was a weekend. When he arrived at the textile factory, he actually saw that the female workers were not working but resting in the factory. This made him very happy and his efforts were effective.

Frequent inspections made Jenna unsure when the government would come to inspect again. The government's fines were much more than a day's wages, so she chose a method that would cost less - slightly increasing the treatment of female workers.

Reduce those unnecessary working hours, pay them wages that are insignificant to Jenna, and give them a day off on weekends.

The issue of treatment of female workers has been resolved for the time being. Next, Lin Shangzhou will focus on improving his prestige and popularity in the city of Strasbourg.

Since becoming a minister and a member of parliament in August, Lin Shangzhou has been frequently doing various things that are conducive to increasing his popularity, including but not limited to visiting factories, visiting residents in slums, and meeting with people from the middle and upper classes of society...

He did everything he could think of.

Because he had seen the lives of the middle and lower class residents of Strasbourg, he constantly proposed social welfare bills in the parliament. If it was not passed once, he would propose it a second time. If it was not passed twice, he would propose it a third time. Finally, in mid-September, the city council passed a social subsidy bill. This bill would provide subsidies to citizens whose income is below a certain standard and who have various life difficulties on top of the basic social welfare policy of the German Empire.

After the announcement of this bill, the name Fritz Hipper once again became the focus of the city of Strasbourg, winning Lin Shangzhou a lot of popularity and support.

The establishment of the Strasbourg Workers' Union has been proceeding steadily and orderly after being approved by the city council in August. The only obstacle is the factory owners. Lin Shangzhou does not have a good solution to this problem. After all, establishing a union in a factory requires the boss's consent, and for workers whose treatment has already been improved, the establishment of a union is dispensable, so several factories have not established unions.

The unions of each factory are under the leadership of the Machinery Factory Union, so the Machinery Factory Union has now become the Strasbourg General Labor Union.

After this, a new organization similar to the Free Workers' Union was taking root in Strasbourg...

After accumulating enough popularity, the only thing Lin Shangzhou had to consider was the mayoral election in November. At a meeting in early October, he received the mayoral nomination from the city council, and the next step was to prepare for the election.

Although he got the nomination, Lin Shangzhou did not think he could succeed in the election. The reason was...the ordinary people who supported him did not have the right to vote.

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Chapter 96 Mid-Autumn Festival in Germany (I)

On the morning of October 10, Lin Shangzhou was nominated as one of the mayoral candidates at a meeting of the city council. In addition to him, there were three other candidates nominated: a former mayor, an economic minister, and a senior member of the parliament.

Lin Shangzhou was not very happy after being nominated. After all, this was a letter of allegiance to the senior officials of the Social Democratic Party. Otherwise, how could they trust him when he had no political experience? So it didn't matter whether he was elected or not. Lin Shangzhou even didn't want to be elected.

The elected mayor can write a strong note in his letter of allegiance, but it will also draw Berlin's attention. This is different from a strike. The elected mayor must report relevant work to Berlin. If he is really elected, reporting to Berlin is equivalent to sending himself to Klein.

Lin Shangzhou knew very well how much that racist hated him, and his uncle was the prime minister, so he would definitely put obstacles in his way.

After getting the nomination, the next thing each candidate has to do is to canvass for votes. Lin Shangzhou did not have too many plans for canvassing. He planned to spend the period before the November election in a plain way, and at most let Goebbels write some articles in the Workers' Newspaper.

After the parliament ended, he took Letitia back to the office of his department. When he entered his office, he saw Tang Heping sitting uncomfortably on the small sofa.

He was very surprised. How did this little fat boy get here?

"Heping, are you here to see me for something?"

As Lin Shangzhou spoke, he took off his coat and handed it to Letitia. Letitia hung the coat on the hanger beside her. She was now very familiar with the job of a secretary and could occasionally help Lin Shangzhou deal with some documents that he could not handle.

"Ah...Mr. Lin, it's like this..."

Tang Heping hurriedly stood up and spoke to him stutteringly in German. Lin Shangzhou signaled him not to be nervous and asked him to sit down.

"Don't be impatient. Speak slowly. If you don't understand German, just speak Chinese. We are all Chinese. Isn't it more intimate to speak Chinese?"

He sat on another single sofa next to Tang Heping, looked at him and asked, "Did someone bully you?"

"no no."

Tang Heping shook his head quickly, then said, "It's like this, Mr. Lin, today is Mid-Autumn Festival, we made some mooncakes, and we would like to invite you to eat mooncakes with us."

Lin Shangzhou was very surprised. He didn't expect that today was Mid-Autumn Festival.

"Today is actually Mid-Autumn Festival..."

He looked at Tang Heping. He was deeply touched that these international students even thought of inviting him to the Mid-Autumn Festival.

"Do you think you have time to go?"

Tang Heping asked, he hoped that Lin Shangzhou could come to their place and celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival with them.

Lin Shangzhou nodded without hesitation. Although today was Monday, no one would say anything if he skipped work occasionally.

"Of course we have time. Shall we go now?"

Tang Heping was stunned. It was completely unexpected that Lin Shangzhou would agree to celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival together. He knew that today was Monday, so he was prepared to be rejected. He thought that Lin Shangzhou was taking special care of them, a group of international students.

He said hurriedly: "You don't have to take special care of us. If it affects your work, it doesn't matter if you don't go."

Lin Shangzhou waved his hand and said with a smile: "It's okay, don't worry about my work. It's almost noon, I'll go to your place for lunch."

After saying that, Lin Shangzhou stood up, walked to the clothes rack, took down his clothes and put them on again, and said to Letitia on the side: "Let's go, Letitia, let's go to their place at noon and let you taste Chinese mooncakes."

"Mooncake? What is that?"

Letitia asked curiously.

"A round dessert with a filling. You'll know what it looks like when you see it."

Lin Shangzhou put on his clothes and walked to the door and said to Tang Heping who was still sitting on the sofa: "Let's go, what are you still doing sitting here?"

"okay!"

Tang Heping immediately stood up and followed Lin Shangzhou out of the office.

Ten minutes later, Lin Shangzhou drove to the apartment where the international students lived, parked the car, and the three got out.