Frankfurt Documents

The Frankfurt Documents were an important step towards the founding of the Federal Republic of Germany.
On July 1, 1948 the representatives of the Western allied occupation forces handed over a number of documents to the prime ministers and the two ruling mayors of the western zones of occupation. The documents contained recommendations for establishing a West German state. The main problem with the recommendations was that they did not provide an all-German solution but only a West German state. The Frankfurt Documents formed a working basis for the Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany. They were created at the London 6-Power Conference in early 1948.
The handover took place at the IG Farben Building in Frankfurt am Main, and the documents took the name of the city. The military governors Lucius D. Clay (United States), Marie-Pierre Koenig (France) and Sir Brian Robertson (UK) issued an order establishing a western German state. Present were Peter Altmeier (Rhineland-Palatinate), Karl Arnold (North Rhine-Westphalia), Lawrence Bock (Württemberg-Hohenzollern), Max Brauer (Hamburg), Hans Ehard (Bavaria), Wilhelm Kaisen (Bremen), Hinrich Wilhelm Kopf (Lower Saxony), Hermann Lüdemann (Schleswig-Holstein), Reinhold Maier (Württemberg-Baden), Christian Stock (Hessen) and Leo Wohleb (Baden).
A West German state was to be established under the following conditions:
The Frankfurt Documents prompted the prime minister to hold the Rittersturz Conference in Koblenz on the resolutions that had been passed.