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Hubert Klausner (1 November 1892 – 12 February 1939) was an military officer and Nazi Party politician. He served as Gauleiter of Reichsgau Kärnten and Landeshauptmann (premier) of Carinthia from 1938-39.
When the war ended, Klausner from 1919 fought in the Volkswehr paramilitary forces in the armed conflicts against Yugoslav troops, which led to the Carinthian Plebiscite of 1920. Afterwards he joined the Federal Army of the First Austrian Republic and was promoted to the rank of Hauptmann (Captain). In 1930 he was promoted to major, the highest rank that he would reach in the Austrian Army before he had to leave for political reasons in 1933.
His arrests for political reasons however, could not keep him from further advancing the Nazi movement. His home in Latschach near Finkenstein became a venue for meetings with other leading Carinthian Nazis such as Friedrich Rainer and Odilo Globocnik. Klausner resigned as Gauleiter on 9 October 1936 in a policy dispute with Leopold, who favored a more independent Austrian approach as opposed to the German Question ideas of Klausner and his associates. Things reached a climax on 21 February 1938 when Leopold was removed as Landesleiter of the Nazi Party by Adolf Hitler and replaced with Klausner.
The next day, Klausner was appointed by the new Nazi Chancellor Arthur Seyss-Inquart to be "Minister for Political Decision Making" in the first Nazi cabinet. At the parliamentary election of 10 April, he obtained a seat as a deputy to the Reichstag from the newly renamed Ostmark. On 23 April, he became deputy to Josef Bürckel, the Reichskommissar for the Reunification of Austria with the German Reich. Then, on 22 May he again was named Gauleiter of Gau Carinthia, and also became deputy to Bürckel in his capacity as Reichsstatthalter of Ostmark. Along with all this, he also attained, as of 1 June 1938, the office of Landeshauptmann of Carinthia. He thus united under his control the highest party and governmental offices in his jurisdiction. While he was in Vienna assisting Bürckel, his duties as Gauleiter and Landeshauptmann were exercised by his deputies Franz Kutschera and Wladimir von Pawlowski, respectively. On 9 November 1938, Klausner was promoted to SS- Brigadeführer.
At the height of his power, Hubert Klausner died suddenly on 12 February 1939 in his home in Vienna, officially of a stroke. Adolf Hitler together with Reinhard Heydrich and Rudolf Hess attended Klausner's state funeral in Klagenfurt, where Hitler delivered the commemorative address.
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