Kaiser Wilhelm II bans German soldiers from dancing the tango - November 17th, 1913

On this day in 1913, German monarch Kaiser Wilhelm II forbade his officers from dancing the tango while in uniform.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Day in History Class is a production of I
Heart Radio. Hello and Welcome to This Day in History Class,
a show that proves there's more than one way to
make history. I'm Gabe Bluzier, and in this episode we're
talking about the time when the last Emperor of Germany

(00:20):
went to war with a popular new dance style. The
day was November. German monarch Kaiser Wilhelm the second forbade
his officers from dancing the tango while in uniform. The

(00:40):
new Latin American dance had captured the whole world's attention,
but not everyone was a fan of its intimate some
would say erotic dance moves. For instance, when upper class
Germans began dancing cheek to cheek at state dinners, Kaiser
Wilhelm was disgusted. He immediately denounced theo as vulgar and

(01:01):
began discouraging his subjects from dancing it in public. He
especially disliked seeing army officers dance the tango, as he
considered it a disgrace to their uniforms, and swiftly passed
an imperial bill to put a stop to the practice.
That may seem like an extreme reaction, and there was
but the Kaiser was hardly the only one to push

(01:23):
back against the popular dance. All across Europe and beyond,
political and religious leaders had begun speaking out against the
supposedly immoral dance. Yet despite their best efforts, the forbidden
dance lived on. In nineteen thirteen ultimately became known as
the Year of the Tango. The exact origins of the

(01:45):
tango are a matter of debate, but it's generally believed
to have developed in the late nineteenth century and the
dance halls, bars and brothels of Buenos Aires. Although Argentina
was among the wealthiest nations in the world at the time,
there was great inequality between the classes in the capital city.
At first, the tango was strictly the province of the poor,

(02:07):
a lively, fast and sensual counterpart to the wealthiest prim
and proper dance moves. Gradually, though, the tango began to
draw the eye of the upper classes. Soon the young
and wealthy were ditching their somber ball rooms and sneaking
off to the slums to sample the hot new dance craze.
In the years that followed, many of Argentina's young elite

(02:29):
began traveling to Europe to complete their education. They brought
the tango with them, and pretty soon it was popping
up at British tea parties and in the salons of Paris.
By nineteen thirteen, much of Europe's aristocracy was in the
grip of what some newspapers called tango mania, and as
the year went on, more and more countries around the

(02:50):
globe fell prey to it, including Australia and the United States.
Just like the dance trends of today, the tango in
thirteen evoked a wide range of emotions in the public.
Some were amused, some were transfixed, and some were outraged.
Most of the controversy centered on the intimacy of the tango,

(03:11):
which requires couples to press their legs and arms close
against each other so as to move in unison. At
the time, the tango was only the third ballroom dance
in which men and women both held and faced each other.
The other two were the Viennese waltz and the polka,
and while they lacked the close, continuous contact of the tango,

(03:32):
they were still met with suspicion when introduced. That's because,
for the most part, social dancing in Europe had always
been a very controlled and organized affair. Men and women
danced in lines or squares, and physical contact was limited
to loosely holding hands. You can imagine then, what a
stir the tango caused when it made its way to

(03:54):
the dignified halls of German power. By mid November, government,
dignitary and even military officers had begun hosting so called
tango tea parties. It was at one such event that
Kaiser Wilhelm first set eyes on the dance, and he
loathed it from the start. However, according to reports from

(04:15):
the era, the Kaiser didn't implement his crackdown until he
discovered that his son and daughter in law had succumbed
to the lure of the tango themselves. In January of
nineteen fourteen, the Brisbane newspaper The Queenslander addressed Germany's ban
on the tango, writing quote, the immediate cause of the

(04:35):
Kaiser's anti tango decree was the discovery that the German
Crown Princess was taking lessons in the Argentine tango, the
one step and other ultra modern dances from an American
woman who conducts a fashionable dancing school in Berlin. As
there was strong reason to believe that the Crown Prince,
who was an ardent dancer, was also interested in the tango.

(04:58):
His parents decided to put their in perial ban on
the dance for all officers of the army. The article
goes on to describe how the Kaiser's disapproval set off
a ripple effect in Berlin high society, with many upper
class Germans refraining from dancing the tango until all of
their quote unquote official guests had departed. In addition, some

(05:21):
German cities imposed even tighter restrictions on the tango, such
as Inhale, where the police actually hired a ballet dancer
to demonstrate the tango so that officers would be able
to recognize and shut it down when they saw it.
With World War One just around the corner, many Western
nations found little to agree on. In nineteen a mutual

(05:43):
distaste for the tango was a rare point of crossover
between government and church leaders. In England, Queen Mary and
King George the Fifth banned the dance from palace functions,
calling it a violation of social mores. In France, Cardinal
Amen of Paris took a hard line against the tango,
saying that Christians could not in good conscience take part

(06:06):
in it, and in Italy, Pope Pious the tenth when
a step further, instructing all Roman Catholic clergy to quote
initiate a crusade against the step, which is offensive to
every right minded person. His successor, Pope Benedict the fifteen,
doubled down on that sentiment a year later, declaring the
tango quote an outrageous, indecent heathen dance which is an

(06:31):
assassination of family and social life. In the United States,
the story was much the same. Ministers, priests, rabbis, town mayors,
and even the Vice President all spoke out against the
moral degeneracy of the tango. Meanwhile, in Australia, cooler heads prevailed.

(06:52):
There was no widespread panic about the tango's potential impact
on morality and public decency, and most people seem to
recogniz is the trend for what it was, a fun,
provocative dance that wasn't nearly a scandalous as other countries
seemed to think. One reporter said as much in a
Melbourne newspaper called The Argus in December of nine. They

(07:14):
wrote rather presciently that quote, the day will come when,
despite the edicts of ephemeral monarchs, the tango will be
danced at all official gatherings, and people will wonder at
the prudery of their ancestors and marvel at the prejudices
of kings. The German Crown Prince and the Crown Princess
will have to restrain themselves for a while, but someday

(07:38):
they will have authority to order the tango to be
danced at court, and even to be taught in the
academies to a modern generation of young folks. That prediction
was largely proven true. Despite the many public condemnations from
political and religious leaders, the tango survived the First World
War and became much more mainstream along the way. It's

(08:01):
popularity faded by the end of the nineteen tens, but
in ninety one it came roaring back thanks to some
fancy footwork from Rudolph Valentino in the silent film The
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Often regarded as the first
true anti war film, it became the top grossing movie
of the year and helped cement the tango's place as

(08:23):
one of the most romantic styles of modern dance and yes,
as you'd expect. Kaiser Wilhelm reportedly hated I'm Gay, Bluesier
and hopefully you now know a little more about history
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(08:46):
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Thanks to Chandler May's for producing the show, and thank
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