A History of Germany 1918 - 2020. Mary Fulbrook

A History of Germany 1918 - 2020 - Mary  Fulbrook


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different direction. The Communist Deputies were prevented from attending the Reichstag vote, as were twenty-one of the Social Democrats. In the event, when the Reichstag convened in the Kroll Opera on the evening of 23 March, the only members courageous enough to vote against the Enabling Act were the Social Democrats. Otto Wels read out their reply to Hitler, in which he stated: ‘At this historical hour, we German Social Democrats pledge ourselves to the principles of humanity and justice, of freedom and Socialism. No Enabling Law can give you the power to destroy ideas that are eternal and indestructible…’1 But this protest was ultimately to no avail.

      Map 4.1 The Reichstag elections, 5 March 1933.

      At the same time, the traditional decentralization of the relatively recently unified Germany was attacked – a continuation of tendencies already evident towards the end of the Weimar Republic. The powers of the Länder were reduced by the Nazi seizure of power in the regional states in March 1933. (The takeover of Prussia the previous summer, with the installation of a Reich Commissioner in place of the elected government, had provided a useful precedent.) On 7 April 1933 10 so-called Reichsstatthalter (Reich governors) were appointed, usually the senior Gauleiter of each state, except in the cases of Bavaria (Ritter von Epp) and Prussia (Hitler). The takeover was by no means smooth: as at national level, there were perpetual tensions between party and state. Frictions varied from place to place, depending on preexisting political configurations and circumstances. Curiously, the heavy-handed actions of local party officials were often dissociated in people’s minds from the regime as a whole, and the person of Hitler in particular: people frequently asserted that ‘if only the Führer knew’, things would not be allowed to go on in the way they were locally.

      While the Nazis made strenuous efforts to woo economic elites – many of whom had been belatedly persuaded to give financial support to the Nazi election campaign in the spring of 1933 – they had no such tender consideration for the bulk of the German people, and notably the workers. Giving the appearance of populism by proclaiming 1 May a national holiday on full pay, the Nazis rapidly proceeded to dismantle and destroy the autonomous workers’ organizations. Trade unions were wound up and replaced by a body spuriously claiming to represent the interests of all German workers in the new ‘national community’, the German Labour Front (DAF) under Robert Ley. Walther Darré took control of the Reich Food Estate (Reichsnährstand), dealing with the peasantry and agriculture, while small traders were organized into the HAGO (Handwerks-, Handelsund Gewerbe-Organisation). While in appearance developing a form of corporatism, in practice this was a coercive system in which none of the Nazi organizations actually represented the real interests of their ‘members’.

      On 30 January 1934, one year after Hitler’s appointment as chancellor, the Reichsrat, or upper chamber of the Reichstag, was abolished and the federal system was effectively terminated by removing independent authority from the states. Perhaps the final major event in terms of initial constitutional change came with the death of President Hindenburg on 2 August 1934. Hitler made use of the occasion to merge the offices of President and Chancellor and to take personal command of the armed forces. Abolishing Hindenburg’s title of Reich President, Hitler now styled himself ‘Führer and Reich Chancellor’. The army and public officials had to swear personal oaths of obedience to Hitler – oaths that subsequently proved for many to be a moral obstacle to resistance against Hitler’s regime.

      The army was able to ignore or surmount its potential misgivings about Hitler in August 1934 for a number of reasons. For one thing, Hitler had made no secret of his intention to pursue an aggressive foreign policy, revising the much-hated Treaty of Versailles. Hitler’s whipping-up of resentment against Versailles, and his sharp denunciations of the Jews and Bolsheviks whom he held to be the ‘November Criminals’ responsible for Germany’s national humiliation, had been constant themes prior to his coming to power. After becoming Chancellor Hitler had lost little time in setting revisionist policies in motion: on 8 February 1933 Hitler informed ministers that unemployment was to be reduced by rearmament; in July 1933 Krupp’s euphemistically named ‘agricultural tractor programme’ started the production of tanks; and by 1934 explosives, ships and aircraft were in production – all contrary to the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, but greeted with approval by the army itself.


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