Hermann Müller

Müller joined the SPD in 1893 and climbed fast enough to reach the Reichstag by 1916, during the war's grinding middle years. As foreign minister in 1919, he became one of Germany's signatories on the Treaty of Versailles that June, a job no one wanted and many would use against him. His first chancellorship in 1920 lasted three months - long enough to pass a clutch of social reforms before the SPD's election losses forced him out. He returned in June 1928 to lead a grand coalition through budget fights and diplomatic headaches, then watched it fracture after the Depression hit. He left office in 1930, his health already failing, and died a year later at fifty-four.