National StudiesGERMANY 1918 – 1939

Nazism in PowerHitler’s Role

ByS. AngeloHead Teacher HistoryEast Hills Girls Technology High School2009

Where did power lie in the 3rd Reich?

• How powerful was Hitler?– Relationship with German people

• All powerful because he represents the will of the people (Huber, 1935; Frank, 1938)

Ian Kershaw: The Hitler Myth

Why did it develop and gain credence?•Reaction to Weimar•Satisfied German emotional need for strong gov’t•Reinforced authoritarian leadership tradition•Developed from Nazi Fuhrerprinzip•Sustained by Hitler’s successes•Enhanced by propaganda

What was it?* carefully cultivated image

personified nationunselfishunderstood German peoplearchitect of Germany’s economic recoveryrepresented popular justicedefended Germany against enemiesresponsible for major successes

Effects???•Hitler’s personal popularity•90% in late 1930s•Sustained Nazi regime•Inherent instability•Military failures led to a declining belief in myth

What role did Hitler play in decision making in the Nazi regime?

• Leader principle = Fuhrerprinzip• Führer und Reichskanzler • Total authority

Mein KampfVolkischer Beobachter

• Haphazard, unbureaucratic approach• Spent much of his time in Berchtesgaden in the Berghof• Peterson: The Limits of Hitler’s Power

– The man who does not decide – surrounded by an anthill of aspiring and fearing people trying to please “the great one”

– Regime divided into thousands of little empires of ambitious men, domains largely unchecked by law

• Dietrich: Twelve Years with Hitler (memoirs)– Hitler produced the biggest confusion in government that ever existed in a

civilized state– He systematically disorganised the upper echelons of the Reich leadership in order

to develop and further the authority of his own will until it became a despotic tyranny

The operation of Hitler’s government

Why were Nazi policies implemented?

Was Hitler an all-powerful dictator?

View 1: Tradition (Rich, Bracher)

• Hitler makes all the decisions• He is a strong leader

View 2: Revisionist (Mommsen)

•Hitler is a weak dictator•Not very involved in most gov’t directives•Allows others to decide•Unwilling to make decisions

View 3: Complex picture (Kershaw)• Key activator•Policy reflects Hitler’s vision•No effective opposition to his will•Mobiliser, legitimiser of policies, does not initiate many policies

Decision Making in the 3rd Reich

1935 Nuremburg Laws• Anti-Semitic views of Hitler• Few moves against Jews until

1935 with SA attacks• Hitler intervenes in the dispute

between radicals an moderates on the Jewish question

• Anti-Semitic Nuremburg speech • This led to the hastily written

Nuremburg laws passed in 1936• Hitler also intervened to stop

street violence against Jews for the Olympics in 1936

Kristallnacht 1938

• 1938 anti-Semitic violence erupted on the streets again

• 8/11/1938 a Polish Jew assassinates a Nazi official in Paris

• Goebbels suggests to Hitler that the anti-Semitic violence should increase

• Hitler assents• Kristallnacht was the result

Radicalisation of 3rd Reich

Lack of formal restraints

• Collective system of government decays

• Institutional constraints have been removed Hitler’s popularity

• Successful policies• Successful propaganda• Shifts responsibility for

failures and less savoury aspects onto others

Traditional Power Structures??

Reichstag

• Enabling Act– Legislative power given to

Hitler– Renewed every 4 years– Reichstag rarely met

Cabinet• Retained but lost purpose• Had legislative power but

laws really issued by Hitler• Reich Chancellery drew up

laws

Reich Chancellery• headed by Lammers•Roles expanded•Responsible for co-ordinating responses of departments to new legislation•Bureaucratic centre•New Party & state sections created

Civil Service•Traditionally conservative• committed to serving the state•Transferred happily to the 3rd Reich• compulsory membership of the Nazi Party 1939•Wearing of uniform 1939•Lost influence by end of 1930s

Local Government• Taken over by Nazi appointed

officials• Agents of central government• Gauleiter held power

Courts & Legal System• Franz Gurtner – non-Nazi

Justice Minister 1933 – 1941• Supported authoritarian state

operating within the law• Nazi ideas penetrated• SS& Gestapo gain power• People’s Court and Special

Courts – March 1933

Foreign OfficeRemained largely intactKonstantin von Neurath Foreign Minister to 1938Foreign policy taken over by Goering, Goebbels, Ribbentrop, special missionsBecame more nazified

ArmyHitler weakened the SAPersonal Oath sworn to HitlerArmy could pose a potential dangerGenerally co-operated and was left structurally unchanged until 1938Army policies changed to reflect Nazi policiesHitler took direct command in 1938

Role of the Nazi Party

Gauleiter• Regional party leaders

– Karl Hanke – Lower Silesia– Kark Kaufmann – Hamburg– Fritz Sauckel – Thuringia

• Gau = Reichstag electoral district

• Gauleiter = Reich Governor– Ensure people in his

district “toe the line”– Ran a hierarchical party

machine

Illustration showing Nazi Organisation

Key Leaders

Hans Heinrich LammersThe BureaucratChief of the Reich Chancellery

Martin BormannHitler’s FixerHitler’s secretaryHead of Party Chancellery

Rudolf HessSycophant or flattererDeputy Fuhrer