German nationalist sentiment ran high during the early years of the republic. Sudeten representatives tried to join Austria or Germany or at least to obtain as much autonomy. The constitution of 1920 was drafted without Sudeten German representation, and Sudetens declined to participate in the election of the president. Sudeten political parties pursued an "obstructionist" (or negativist) policy in the Czechoslovak parliament. In 1926, however, German Chancellor Gustav Stresemann, adopting a policy of rapprochement with the West, advised the Sudeten Germans to co-operate actively with the Czechoslovak government. In consequence, most Sudeten German parties (including the German Agrarian Party, the German Social Democratic Party and the German Christian Socialist People's Party) changed their policy from negativism to activism, and several Sudeten politicians even accepted cabinet posts.