I would like to add that the German distrust of government is fundamentally different to what I've come to know about the American distrust of government. We are very careful to give the government power that might be used to control the populace and further a totalitarian regime. But otherwise we have a strong government with a robust public health care system, free education (including great public universities) and reasonably good unemployment insurance. Some of that is eroding away unfortunately, but by an large Germans have a much more positive attitude regarding government organization and regulation than Americans.
I think the focus here is on the public part. Private universities in Germany don't have a particularly good reputation in general and are considered to be a way out for children who didn't do well in school but have parents rich enough to buy them into a university.
Public schools on the other hand are all considered to be more or less equally good, so it doesn't really matter which one you attended later in life, which as I gather is different in the US.
