Nazi Party

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This article is about the German Nazi Party that existed from 1920–1945. For the ideology, see Nazism. For other Nazi Parties, see Nazi Party (disambiguation).
National Socialist German Workers' Party
Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei
Leader Karl Harrer (1919–1920)
Anton Drexler (1920–1921)
Adolf Hitler (1921–1945)
Martin Bormann (1945)
Founder Anton Drexler
Slogan "Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer" (unofficial)
Founded 1920 (1920)
Dissolved 1945 (1945)
Preceded by German Workers' Party (DAP)
Succeeded by None (banned)
Ideologies continued with neo-Nazism
Headquarters Munich, Germany[1]
Newspaper Völkischer Beobachter
Student wing National Socialist German Students' League (NSDStB)
Youth wing

Hitler Youth (HJ)

Mlitary wings Sturmabteilung (SA)
Schutzstaffel (SS)
Sports organization Nationalsozialistischer Reichsbund für Leibesübungen (NSRL)
Womens' organization National Socialist Women's League (NSF)
Membership
  • Fewer than 60 in 1920
  • 8.5 million by 1945[2]
Ideology National Socialism
Fascism
Political position Far right[3][4]
Colors Black, white, red (German Imperial colors); brown
Party flag
Politics of Germany
Political parties
Elections

The National Socialist German Workers' Party (German:  Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (help·info), abbreviated NSDAP), commonly known in English as the Nazi Party, was a political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945. Its predecessor, the German Workers' Party (DAP), existed from 1919 to 1920. The term Nazi is German and stems from Nationalsozialist,[5] due to the pronunciation of Latin -tion- as -tsion- in German (rather than -shon- as it is in English), with German Z being pronounced as 'ts'.

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The party emerged from the German nationalist, racist and populist Freikorps paramilitary culture, which fought against the communist uprisings in post-World War I Germany.[6] Advocacy of a form of socialism by right-wing figures and movements in Germany became common during and after World War I, influencing Nazism.[7] Arthur Moeller van den Bruck of the Conservative Revolutionary movement coined the term "Third Reich",[8] and advocated an ideology combining the nationalism of the right and the socialism of the left.[9] Prominent Conservative Revolutionary member Oswald Spengler's conception of a "Prussian Socialism" influenced the Nazis.[10] The party was created as a means to draw workers away from communism and into völkisch nationalism.[11] Initially, Nazi political strategy focused on anti-big business, anti-bourgeois, and anti-capitalist rhetoric, although such aspects were later downplayed in order to gain the support of industrial entities, and in 1930s the party's focus shifted to antisemitic and anti-Marxist themes.[12]

To maintain the supposed purity and strength of a postulated "Aryan master race", the Nazis sought to exterminate or impose exclusionary segregation upon "degenerate" and "asocial" groups that included: Jews, homosexuals, Romani, blacks, the physically and mentally handicapped, Jehovah's Witnesses and political opponents.[13] The persecution reached its climax when the party-controlled German state organized the systematic murder of approximately six million Jews and five million people from the other targeted groups, in what has become known as the Holocaust.

The party's leader since 1921, Adolf Hitler, was appointed Chancellor of Germany by President Paul von Hindenburg in 1933. Hitler rapidly established a totalitarian regime[14][15][16][17] known as the Third Reich. Following the defeat of the Third Reich at the conclusion of World War II in Europe, the party was "completely and finally abolished and declared to be illegal" by the Allied occupying powers.

Etymology

The term Nazi derives from the first two syllables of Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP, Nazi Party).[18] The German term Nazi parallels the term Sozi (pronounced /zoːtsi/), an abbreviation of Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands (Social Democratic Party of Germany).[19][20] Members of the NSDAP referred to themselves as Nationalsozialisten (National Socialists), rarely as Nazis. In 1933, when Adolf Hitler assumed power of the German government, usage of the term Nazi diminished in Germany, although Austrian anti-Nazis continued to use the term as an insult.[20]

History

Origins and early existence: 1918–1923

The party grew out of smaller political groups with a nationalist orientation that formed in the last years of World War I. In 1918, a league called the Freien Arbeiterausschuss für einen guten Frieden (Free Workers' Committee for a good Peace)[21] was created in Bremen, Germany. On 7 March 1918, Anton Drexler, an avid German nationalist, formed a branch of this league in Munich called the "Committee of Independent Workmen".[22] Drexler was a local locksmith in Munich who had been a member of the militarist Fatherland Party[23] during World War I, and was bitterly opposed to the armistice of November 1918 and the revolutionary upheavals that followed. Drexler followed the typical views of militant nationalists of the day, such as opposing the Treaty of Versailles, having antisemitic, anti-monarchist and anti-Marxist views, as well as believing in the superiority of Germans whom nationalists claimed to be part of the Aryan "master race" (Herrenvolk), but he also accused international capitalism of being a Jewish-dominated movement and denounced capitalists for war profiteering in World War I.[24] Drexler saw the situation of political violence and instability in Germany as the result of the new Weimar Republic being out-of-touch with the masses, especially the lower classes.[24] Drexler emphasized the need for a synthesis of völkisch nationalism with a form of economic socialism, in order to create a popular nationalist-oriented workers' movement that could challenge the rise of Communism and internationalist politics.[25] These were all well-known themes popular with various Weimar paramilitary groups such as the Freikorps.

NSDAP emblem

Though very small, Drexler's movement did receive attention and support from some influential figures. Drexler's supporter Dietrich Eckhart brought military figure Count Felix Graf von Bothmer, a prominent supporter of the concept of "national socialism", to address the movement.[26] Later in 1918, Karl Harrer (a journalist and member of the Thule Society), along with Drexler and several others formed the Politischer Arbeiterzirkel (Political Workers' Circle).[21] The members met periodically for discussions with themes of nationalism and racism directed against the Jews.[21] In December 1918, Drexler decided a new political party should be formed based on the political principles which he endorsed by combining his Committee of Independent Workmen with the Political Workers' Circle.[21][27]

On 5 January 1919, Drexler created a new political party and proposed it be named the "German Socialist Worker's Party", but Harrer objected to the term "socialist"; the issue was settled by removing the term and the party was named the German Workers' Party (Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, DAP).[28] To ease concerns among potential middle-class supporters, Drexler made clear that unlike Marxists, the party supported the middle-class, and that the party's socialist policy was meant to give social welfare to German citizens deemed part of the Aryan race.[24] They became one of many völkisch movements that existed in Germany at the time. Like other völkisch groups, the DAP advocated the belief that through profit-sharing instead of socialisation Germany should become a unified "national community" (Volksgemeinschaft) rather than a society divided along class and party lines.[29] This ideology was explicitly antisemitic. As early as 1920, the party was raising money by selling a tobacco called Anti-Semit.[30]

The party card, 1939

From the outset, the DAP was opposed to non-nationalist political movements, especially on the left, including the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the newly formed Communist Party of Germany (KPD). Members of the DAP saw themselves as fighting against "Bolshevism" and anyone considered a part of or aiding so-called "international Jewry". The DAP was deeply opposed to the Versailles Treaty.[22] The DAP did not attempt to make itself public, and meetings were kept in relative secrecy, with public speakers discussing what they thought of Germany's present state of affairs, or writing to like-minded societies in Northern Germany.[29]

The DAP was a comparatively small group with fewer than 60 members.[29] Nevertheless, it attracted the attention of the German authorities, who were suspicious of any organisation that appeared to have subversive tendencies. In July 1919 while stationed in Munich, army Gefreiter Adolf Hitler was appointed a Verbindungsmann (intelligence agent) of the Reichswehr (army) by the head of press and propaganda in the Bavarian section, Captain Mayr.[31] Hitler's assignment was to influence other soldiers and to infiltrate the DAP.[21] While attending a party meeting on 12 September 1919, Hitler became involved in a heated argument with a visitor, Professor Baumann, who questioned the soundness of Gottfried Feder's arguments against capitalism and proposed that Bavaria should break away from Prussia and found a new South German nation with Austria. In vehemently attacking the man's arguments, he made an impression on the other party members with his oratory skills and, according to Hitler, the "professor" left the hall acknowledging unequivocal defeat.[32] According to August Kubizek, Drexler was so impressed that he whispered to a neighbour, "My he's got a gift of the gab. We could use him."[29] Drexler invited him to join, and Hitler accepted.[33] In less than a week, Hitler received a postcard from Drexler stating he had officially been accepted as a DAP member.[34] Among the party's earlier members were Ernst Röhm of the Army's District Command VII; well-to-do journalist Dietrich Eckart; then University of Munich student Rudolf Hess;[35] Freikorps soldier Hans Frank; and Alfred Rosenberg, often credited as the philosopher of the movement. All were later prominent in the Nazi regime.[31]

Hitler's membership card in the DAP (later NSDAP)

Hitler became the DAP's 55th member and received the number 555, as the DAP added '500' to every member's number to exaggerate the party's strength.[36] He later claimed to be the seventh party member (he was in fact the seventh executive member of the party's central committee;[37] he would later wear the Golden Party Badge number one). Hitler's first speech was held in the Hofbräukeller, where he spoke in front of 111 people as the second speaker of the evening. Hitler later declared that this was when he realised he could really "make a good speech".[29] At first Hitler only spoke to relatively small groups, but his considerable oratory and propaganda skills were appreciated by the party leadership. With the support of Anton Drexler, Hitler became chief of propaganda for the party in early 1920.[38] Hitler began to make the party more public, and he organised their biggest meeting yet of 2,000 people, on 24 February 1920 in the Staatliches Hofbräuhaus in München. Such was the significance of this particular move in publicity that Harrer resigned from the party in disagreement.[39] It was in this speech that Hitler, for the first time, enunciated the twenty-five points of the German Worker's Party's manifesto that had been drawn up by Drexler, Feder, and Hitler.[40] Through these points he gave the organisation a much bolder stratagem[38] with a clear foreign policy (abrogation of The Treaty of Versailles, a Greater Germany, Eastern expansion, exclusion of Jews from citizenship), and among his specific points were: confiscation of war profits, abolition of unearned incomes, the State to share profits of land, and land for national needs to be taken away without compensation.[41] In general, the manifesto was antisemitic, anti-capitalist, anti-democratic, anti-Marxist, and anti-liberal.[42] To increase its appeal to larger segments of the population, in February 1920 the DAP changed its name to the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party – NSDAP).[43] That year, the Nazi Party officially announced that only persons of "pure Aryan descent [rein arischer abkunft]" could become party members; if the person had a spouse, they also had to be a "racially pure" Aryan. Party members could not be related either directly or indirectly to a so-called "non-Aryan".[44]

Hitler quickly became the party's most active orator. Hitler's considerable oratory and propaganda skills were appreciated by the party leadership as crowds began to flock to hear his speeches.[45] Hitler always spoke about the same subjects: the Treaty of Versailles and the Jewish question.[42] This deliberate technique and effective publicising of the party contributed significantly to his early success,[42] about which a contemporary poster wrote 'Since Herr Hitler is a brilliant speaker, we can hold out the prospect of an extremely exciting evening'.[46] Over the following months, the party continued to attract new members,[37] while remaining too small to have any real significance in German politics.[47] By the end of the year, party membership was recorded at 2,000.[45] Many of whom Hitler and Röhm had brought into the party personally, or for whom Hitler's oratory had been their reason for joining.[48]

Hitler's talent as an orator, and his ability to draw new members, combined with his characteristic ruthlessness, soon made him the dominant figure. However, while Hitler was on a fundraising trip to Berlin in June 1921, a mutiny broke out within the Nazi Party in Munich. Members of its executive committee, some of whom considered Hitler to be too overbearing, wanted to merge with the rival German Socialist Party (DSP).[49] Hitler returned to Munich on 11 July and angrily tendered his resignation. The committee members realised that his resignation would mean the end of the party.[50] Hitler announced he would rejoin on the condition that he would replace Drexler as party chairman, and that the party headquarters would remain in Munich.[51] The committee agreed, and he rejoined the party on 26 July as member 3,680. He still faced some opposition within the NSDAP: Opponents of Hitler had Hermann Esser expelled from the party and they printed 3,000 copies of a pamphlet attacking Hitler as a traitor to the party.[51] In the following days, Hitler spoke to several packed houses and defended himself and Esser, to thunderous applause.[52]

Hitler was formally elected party chairman on 28 July 1921, with only one opposing vote. The committee was dissolved, and Hitler was granted nearly absolute powers as the party's sole leader.[52] This was a post he would hold for the remainder of his life. Hitler soon acquired the title Führer ("leader") and, after a series of sharp internal conflicts, it was accepted that the party would be governed by the Führerprinzip ("leader principle"). Under this principle, the party was a highly centralized entity that functioned strictly from the top down, with Hitler at the apex as the party's absolute leader. Hitler at this time saw the party as a revolutionary organization, whose aim was the overthrow of the Weimar Republic, which he saw as controlled by the socialists, Jews and the "November criminals" who had betrayed the German soldiers in 1918. The SA ("storm troopers", also known as "Brownshirts") were founded as a party militia in 1921, and began violent attacks on other parties.

Mein Kampf in its first edition cover.

For Hitler, the twin goals of the party were always German nationalist expansionism and antisemitism. These two goals were fused in his mind by his belief that Germany's external enemies – Britain, France and the Soviet Union – were controlled by the Jews, and that Germany's future wars of national expansion would necessarily entail a war against the Jews.[53] For Hitler and his principal lieutenants, national and racial issues were always dominant. This was symbolised by the adoption as the party emblem of the swastika or Hakenkreuz, at the time widely used in the western world. In German nationalist circles, the swastika was considered a symbol of an "Aryan race"; it symbolized the replacement of the Christian Cross with allegiance to a National Socialist State.

During 1921 and 1922, the Nazi Party grew significantly, partly through Hitler's oratorical skills, partly through the SA's appeal to unemployed young men, and partly because there was a backlash against socialist and liberal politics in Bavaria as Germany's economic problems deepened and the weakness of the Weimar regime became apparent. The party recruited former World War I soldiers, to whom Hitler as a decorated frontline veteran could particularly appeal, as well as small businessmen and disaffected former members of rival parties. Nazi rallies were often held in beer halls, where downtrodden men could get free beer. The Hitler Youth was formed for the children of party members, although it remained small until the late 1920s. The party also formed groups in other parts of Germany. Julius Streicher in Nuremberg was an early recruit, and became editor of the racist magazine Der Stürmer. Others to join the party around this time were WW I flying ace Hermann Göring and Heinrich Himmler. In December 1920 the party acquired a newspaper, the Völkischer Beobachter, of which NSDAP ideological chief Alfred Rosenberg became editor.

In 1922, a party with remarkably similar policies and objectives came into power in Italy, the National Fascist Party under the leadership of the charismatic Benito Mussolini. The Fascists, like the Nazis, promoted a national rebirth of their country; opposed communism and liberalism; appealed to the working-class; opposed the Treaty of Versailles; and advocated the territorial expansion of their country. The Italian Fascists used a straight-armed Roman salute and wore black-shirted uniforms. Hitler was inspired by Mussolini and the Fascists, borrowing their use of the straight-armed salute as a Nazi salute. When the Fascists came to power in 1922 in Italy through their coup attempt called the "March on Rome", Hitler began planning his own coup which would materialize one year later.

In January 1923, France occupied the Ruhr industrial region as a result of Germany's failure to meet its reparations payments. This led to economic chaos, the resignation of Wilhelm Cuno's government, and an attempt by the German Communist Party (KPD) to stage a revolution. The reaction to these events was an upsurge of nationalist sentiment. Nazi Party membership grew sharply, to about 20,000.[54] By November, Hitler had decided that the time was right for an attempt to seize power in Munich, in the hope that the Reichswehr (the post-war German military) would mutiny against the Berlin government and join his revolt. In this he was influenced by former General Erich Ludendorff, who had become a supporter—though not a member—of the Nazis.

On the night of 8 November, the Nazis used a patriotic rally in a Munich beer hall to launch an attempted putsch (coup d'état). This so-called Beer Hall Putsch attempt failed almost at once when the local Reichswehr commanders refused to support it. On the morning of 9 November the Nazis staged a march of about 2,000 supporters through Munich in an attempt to rally support. Troops opened fire, and 16 Nazis were killed. Hitler, Ludendorff and a number of others were arrested, and were tried for treason in March 1924. Hitler and his associates were given very lenient prison sentences. While Hitler was in prison, he wrote his semi-autobiographical political manifesto Mein Kampf ("My Struggle").[55]

The Nazi Party was banned, though with support of the nationalist Völkisch-Social Bloc (Völkisch-Sozialer Block), continued to operate under the name of the "German Party" (Deutsche Partei or DP) from 1924 to 1925.[56] The Nazis failed to remain unified in the German Party, as in the north, the right-wing Volkish nationalist supporters of the Nazis moved to the new German Völkisch Freedom Party, leaving the north's left-wing Nazi members, such as Joseph Goebbels retaining support for the party.[57]

Rise to power: 1925–1933

Hitler with Nazi Party members in 1930
Further information: Adolf Hitler's rise to power

Adolf Hitler was released in December 1924. In the following year he re-founded and reorganized the Nazi Party, with himself as its undisputed Leader. The new Nazi Party was no longer a paramilitary organization, and disavowed any intention of taking power by force. In any case, the economic and political situation had stabilized and the extremist upsurge of 1923 had faded, so there was no prospect of further revolutionary adventures. The Nazi Party of 1925 was divided into the "Leadership Corps" (Korps der politischen Leiter), appointed by Hitler, and the general membership (Parteimitglieder). The party and the SA were kept separate, and the legal aspect of the party's work was emphasized. In a sign of this, the party began to admit women. The SA and the SS (founded in April 1925 as Hitler's bodyguard, commanded by Himmler) were described as "support groups", and all members of these groups had first to become regular party members.

The party's nominal Deputy Leader was Rudolf Hess, but he had no real power in the party. By the early 1930s the senior leaders of the party after Hitler were Himmler, Goebbels and Göring. Beneath the Leadership Corps were the party's regional leaders, the Gauleiters, each of whom commanded the party in his Gau ("region"). There were 98 Gaue for Germany and an additional seven for Austria, the Sudetenland (in Czechoslovakia), Danzig and the Territory of the Saar Basin (then under French occupation).[citation needed] Joseph Goebbels began his ascent through the party hierarchy as Gauleiter of Berlin-Brandenburg in 1926. Streicher was Gauleiter of Franconia, where he published his antisemitic newspaper Der Stürmer. Beneath the Gauleiter were lower-level officials, the Kreisleiter ("county leaders"), Zellenleiter ("cell leaders") and Blockleiter ("block leaders"). This was a strictly hierarchical structure in which orders flowed from the top, and unquestioning loyalty was given to superiors. Only the SA retained some autonomy. Being composed largely of unemployed workers, many SA men took the Nazis' socialist rhetoric seriously. At this time, the Hitler salute (borrowed from the Italian fascists) and the greeting "Heil Hitler!" were adopted throughout the party.

NSDAP election poster in Vienna in 1930. Translation: "We demand freedom and bread".

The Nazis contested elections to the national parliament, the Reichstag, and to the state legislatures, the Landtags, from 1924, although at first with little success. The "National-Socialist Freedom Movement" polled 3% of the vote in the December 1924 Reichstag elections, and this fell to 2.6% in 1928. State elections produced similar results. Despite these poor results, and despite Germany's relative political stability and prosperity during the later 1920s, the Nazi Party continued to grow. This was partly because Hitler, who had no administrative ability, left the party organization to the head of the secretariat, Philipp Bouhler, the party treasurer Franz Xaver Schwarz and business manager Max Amann. The party had a capable propaganda head in Gregor Strasser, who was promoted to national organizational leader in January 1928. These men gave the party efficient recruitment and organizational structures. The party also owed its growth to the gradual fading away of competitor nationalist groups, such as the DNVP. As Hitler became the recognized head of the German nationalists, other groups declined, or were absorbed.

The party expanded in the 1920s beyond its Bavarian base. Catholic Bavaria maintained its right-wing nostalgia for a Catholic monarch; and Westphalia, along with working-class "Red Berlin", were always the Nazis' weakest areas electorally, and even during the Third Reich itself. The areas of strongest Nazi support were in rural Protestant areas such as Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg, Pomerania and East Prussia. Depressed working-class areas such as Thuringia also gave a strong Nazi vote, while the workers of the Ruhr and Hamburg largely remained loyal to the SPD, the KPD, or the Catholic Centre Party. Nuremberg remained a party stronghold, and the first Nuremberg Rally was held there in 1927. These rallies soon became massive displays of Nazi paramilitary power, and attracted many recruits. The Nazis' strongest appeal was to the lower middle-class – farmers, public servants, teachers, small businessmen – who had suffered most from the inflation of the 1920s, so who feared Bolshevism more than anything else. The small business class were receptive to Hitler's antisemitism, since they blamed Jewish big business for their economic problems. University students, disappointed at being too young to have served in World War I and attracted by the Nazis' radical rhetoric, also became a strong Nazi constituency. By 1929, the party had 130,000 members.[58]

Despite these strengths, the Nazi Party might never have come to power had it not been for the Great Depression and its effects on Germany. By 1930 the German economy was beset with mass unemployment and widespread business failures. The SPD and KPD parties were bitterly divided and unable to formulate an effective solution: this gave the Nazis their opportunity, and Hitler's message, blaming the crisis on the Jewish financiers and the Bolsheviks, resonated with wide sections of the electorate. At the September 1930 Reichstag elections the Nazis won 18.3% of the vote, and became the second-largest party in the Reichstag after the SPD. Hitler proved to be a highly effective campaigner, pioneering the use of radio and aircraft for this purpose. His dismissal of Strasser and appointment of Goebbels as the party's propaganda chief was a major factor. While Strasser had used his position to promote his own leftish version of national socialism, Goebbels was totally loyal to Hitler, and worked only to burnish Hitler's image.

The 1930 elections changed the German political landscape by weakening the traditional nationalist parties, the DNVP and the DVP, leaving the Nazis as the chief alternative to the discredited SPD and the Zentrum, whose leader, Heinrich Brüning, headed a weak minority government. The inability of the democratic parties to form a united front, the self-imposed isolation of the KPD, and the continued decline of the economy, all played into Hitler's hands. He now came to be seen as de facto leader of the opposition, and donations poured into the Nazi Party's coffers. Some major business figures such as Fritz Thyssen were Nazi supporters and gave generously,[59] and some Wall Street figures were allegedly involved,[60] but many other businessmen were suspicious of the extreme nationalist tendencies of the Nazis, and preferred to support the traditional conservative parties instead.[61]

During 1931 and into 1932, Germany's political crisis deepened. In March 1932 Hitler ran for President against the incumbent President Paul von Hindenburg, polling 30.1% in the first round and 36.8% in the second against Hindenburg's 49 and 53%. By now the SA had 400,000 members, and its running street battles with the SPD and KPD paramilitaries (who also fought each other) reduced some German cities to combat zones. Paradoxically, although the Nazis were among the main instigators of this disorder, part of Hitler's appeal to a frightened and demoralised middle class was his promise to restore law and order. Overt antisemitism was played down in official Nazi rhetoric, but was never far from the surface. Germans voted for Hitler primarily because of his promises to revive the economy (by unspecified means), to restore German greatness and overturn the Treaty of Versailles, and to save Germany from communism.

On 20 July 1932, the Prussian government was ousted by a coup—the Preussenschlag, and a few days later at the July 1932 Reichstag election the Nazis made another leap forward, polling 37.4% and becoming the largest party in the Reichstag by a wide margin. Furthermore, the Nazis and the KPD between them won 52% of the vote and a majority of seats. Since both parties opposed the established political system, and neither would join or support any ministry, this made the formation of a majority government impossible. The result was weak ministries governing by decree. Under Comintern directives, the KPD maintained its policy of treating the SPD as the main enemy, calling them "social fascists", thereby splintering opposition to the Nazis.[62] Later, both the SPD and the KPD accused each other of having facilitated Hitler's rise to power by their unwillingness to compromise.

Chancellor Franz von Papen called another Reichstag election in November, hoping to find a way out of this impasse. The electoral result was the same, with the Nazis and the KPD winning 50% of the vote between them and more than half the seats, rendering this Reichstag no more workable than its predecessor. But support for the Nazis had fallen to 33.1%, suggesting that the Nazi surge had passed its peak – possibly because the worst of the Depression had passed, possibly because some middle-class voters had supported Hitler in July as a protest, but had now drawn back from the prospect of actually putting him into power. The Nazis interpreted the result as a warning that they must seize power before their moment passed. Had the other parties united, this could have been prevented, but their shortsightedness made a united front impossible. Papen, his successor Kurt von Schleicher, and the nationalist press magnate Alfred Hugenberg spent December and January in political intrigues that eventually persuaded President Hindenburg it was safe to appoint Hitler Reich Chancellor at the head of a cabinet including only a minority of Nazi ministers—which he did on 30 January 1933.

Ascension and consolidation

Reichsparteitag (Nuremberg Rally): NSDAP-leader Adolf Hitler and SA-leader Ernst Röhm, August 1933.

Hitler in Mein Kampf directly attacked both left-wing and right-wing politics in Germany.[63] However, a majority of scholars identify Nazism in practice as being a far-right form of politics.[64] When asked in an interview whether he and the Nazis were "bourgeois right-wing" as alleged by their opponents, Hitler responded that Nazism was not exclusively for any class, and indicated that it favoured neither the left nor the right, but preserved "pure" elements from both "camps", stating: "From the camp of bourgeois tradition, it takes national resolve, and from the materialism of the Marxist dogma, living, creative Socialism".[65]

The votes that the Nazis received in the 1932 elections established the Nazi Party as the largest parliamentary faction of the Weimar Republic government. Adolf Hitler was appointed as Chancellor of Germany on 30 January 1933.

The Reichstag fire on 27 February 1933 gave Hitler a raison d'état for suppressing his political opponents. The following day, 28 February, he persuaded Weimar Republic President Paul von Hindenburg to issue the Reichstag Fire Decree, which suspended most civil liberties. On 23 March, the Reichstag passed the Enabling Act of 1933, which gave the cabinet the right to enact laws without the consent of the Reichstag. In effect, this gave Hitler dictatorial powers. Now possessing virtually absolute power, the Nazis established totalitarian control; they abolished labour unions and political parties, and imprisoned their political opponents, first at wilde Lager, improvised camps, then in concentration camps. Nazism had been established, yet the Reichswehr remained impartial: Nazi power over Germany remained virtual, not absolute.

Federal election results

 Nazi Party election results[66]
Date Total
votes		 Votes,
percentage		 Reichstag
seats		 Notes
May 1, 1924May 1924 1,918,300 6.5 32 Hitler in prison
December 1, 1924December 1924 907,300 3.0 14 Hitler released from prison
May 1, 1928May 1928 810,100 2.6 12  
September 1, 1930September 1930 6,409,600 18.3 107 After the financial crisis
July 1, 1932July 1932 13,745,000 37.3 230 After Hitler was candidate for presidency
November 1, 1932November 1932 11,737,000 33.1 196  
March 1, 1933March 1933 17,277,180 43.9 288 During Hitler's term as Chancellor of Germany

Political program

Main article: National Socialist Program

The National Socialist Program was a formulation of the policies of the party. It contained 25 points and is thus also known as the '25 point plan' or the '25 point program'. It was the official party program, with minor changes, from its proclamation as such by Hitler in 1920, when the party was still the German Workers' Party, until its dissolution.

Party composition

Command structure

Top leadership

At the top of the Nazi Party was the party chairman ("Der Führer"), who held absolute power and full command over the party. All other party offices were subordinate to his position and had to depend on his instructions. In 1934, Hitler founded a separate body for the chairman, Chancellery of the Führer, with its own sub-units.

Below the Führer's chancellery was first the "Staff of the Deputy Führer" (headed by Rudolf Hess from 21 April 1933 to 10 May 1941) and then the "Party Chancellery" (Parteikanzlei) headed by Martin Bormann.

Reichsleiter

Directly subjected to the Führer were the Reichsleiter ("Reich Leader(s)"—the singular and plural forms are identical in German), whose number was gradually increased to eighteen. They held power and influence comparable to the Reich Ministers' in Hitler's Cabinet. The eighteen Reichsleiter formed the "Reich Leadership of the Nazi Party" (Reichsleitung der NSDAP), which was established at the so-called Brown House, in Munich. Unlike a Gauleiter, a Reichsleiter did not have individual geographic areas under their command, but were responsible for specific spheres of interest.

Political leadership corps

The political leadership corps of the Nazi Party were those persons who were most often associated as being "Nazis" in the stereotypical sense of the word, as it was these individuals who wore brown paramilitary Nazi uniforms, enforced Nazi doctrine, and ran local government affairs in accordance with instructions from the Nazi Party.[67]

The political leadership corps encompassed a vast array of paramilitary titles at the top of which were Gauleiter, who were Party leaders of large geographical areas. From the Gauleiters extended downwards through Nazi positions encompassing county, city, and town leaders, all of whom were unquestioned rulers in their particular areas and regions.[68]

To the very end of its existence, the Nazi Party claimed to respect the traditional government of Germany and, to that end, local and state governments were allowed to exist side-by-side with regional Nazi leaders. However, by 1936, the local governments had lost nearly all power to their Nazi counterparts or were now controlled by persons who held both government and Nazi titles alike. This led to the continued existence of German titles such as Bürgermeister, as well as the existence of German state legislatures (Landesrat), but without any real power to speak of.[69]

Ordinary members

The general Nazi Party membership were known by the title of Parteimitglieder. This generic term applied to any member of the Party who did not otherwise hold a political leadership position. Translated simply as "Party Member", the Parteimitglieder could (and did) hold positions in other Nazi groups, such as the SS or Sturmabteilung. The only insignia for the Parteimitglieder was a Nazi Party lapel-pin; Nazi Party members who held no leadership posts had no specific designated uniform. Such persons, however, often wore uniforms of other Nazi groups, uniforms of German government agencies, and could also serve in the German armed forces.

NSDAP offices

The Nazi Party had a number of party offices dealing with various political and other matters. These included:

Paramilitary groups

In addition to the NSDAP proper, several paramilitary groups existed which "supported" Nazi aims. All members of these paramilitary organizations were required to become regular Nazi Party members first and could then enlist in the group of their choice. A vast system of Nazi party paramilitary ranks developed for each of the various paramilitary groups.

The major Nazi Party paramilitary groups were as follows:

The Hitler Youth was a paramilitary group divided into an adult leadership corps and a general membership open to boys aged fourteen to eighteen. The League of German Girls was the equivalent group for girls.

Affiliated organizations

Certain nominally independent organizations had their own legal representation and own property, but were supported by the Nazi Party. Many of these associated organizations were labor unions of various professions. Some were older organizations that were nazified according to the Gleichschaltung policy after the 1933 takeover:

Regional administration

NSDAP Gaue 1926,1928,1933,1937,1939 and 1943
Administrative units of the NSDAP in 1944.
See also: Administrative divisions of Nazi Germany and List of Gauleiters

For the purpose of centralization in the Gleichschaltung process a rigidly hierarchal structure was established in the Nazi Party, which it later carried through in the whole of Germany in order consolidate total power under the person of Hitler (Führerstaat). It was regionally sub-divided into a number of Gaue (singular: Gau) headed by a Gauleiter, who received their orders directly from Hitler. The name (originally a term for sub-regions of the Holy Roman Empire headed by a Gaugraf) for these new provincial structures was deliberately chosen because of its mediaeval connotations. The term is approximately equivalent to the English shire.

After the Anschluss a new type of administrative unit was introduced called a Reichsgau. In these territories the Gauleiters also held the position of Reichsstatthalter, thereby formally combining the spheres of both party and state offices. The establishment of this type of district was subsequently carried out for any further territorial annexations of Germany both before and during World War II.

The Gaue and Reichsgaue (state or province) were further sub-divided into Kreise (counties) headed by a Kreisleiter, which were in turn sub-divided into Zellen (cells) and Blocken (blocks), headed by a Zellenleiter and Blockleiter respectively.

A reorganization of the Gaue was enacted on 1 October 1928. The given numbers were the official ordering numbers. The statistics are from 1941, for which the Gau organization of that moment in time forms the basis. Their size and populations are not exact; for instance according to the official party statistics the Gau Kurmark/Mark Brandenburg was the largest in the German Reich.[70]

The table below uses the organizational structure that existed before its dissolution in 1945. More information on the older Gaue is in the second table.

Nazi Party Gaue

Nr. Gau Headquarters Area (km²) Inhabitants (1941) Gauleiter (exl. deputies)
01 Baden-Elsaß Karlsruhe, after 1940 Strasbourg 23,350 2,502,023 Robert Heinrich Wagner, from 1925 (later also Reichsstatthalter)
02 Bayreuth, renaming of Gau Bayerische Ostmark (Bavarian Eastern March) Bayreuth 29,600 2,370,658 Fritz Wächtler from 2 June 1942 to 19 April 1945, then from 19 April 1945 Ludwig Ruckdeschel.
03 Groß-Berlin Berlin 884 4,338,756 Ernst Schlange from 1925 to 1926, then from 1 November 1926 to 30 April 1945 Joseph Goebbels
04 Danzig-Westpreußen Danzig 26,057 2,287,394 Hans Albert Hohnfeldt from 1926 to 1928, then from 1928 to 1930 Walter Maass, then from 15 October 1930 onwards Albert Forster
05 Düsseldorf Düsseldorf 2,672 2,261,909 Friedrich Karl Florian from 1 January 1930
06 Essen Essen 2,825 1,921,326 Josef Terboven (Oberpräsident) from 1928
07 Franken Nuremberg 7,618 1,077,216 from 1929 to 1940 Julius Streicher ("Frankenführer"), then from 16 February 1940 to 1942 Hans Zimmermann, then from 19 March 1942 Karl Holz
08 Halle-Merseburg Halle an der Saale 10,202 1,578,292 from 1925 to 30 July 1926 Walter Ernst 1 August 1926 to 1927, then from 1927 to 1930 Paul Hinkler, then from 1930 to 20 April 1937 Rudolf Jordan, then from 20 April 1937 Joachim Albrecht Eggeling
09 Hamburg Hamburg 747 1,711,877 Joseph Klant from 1925 to 1926, then from 1927 to 1928 Albert Krebs, then from 1928 to 15 April 1929 Hinrich Lohse, then from 15 April 1929 Karl Kaufmann
10 Hessen-Nassau Frankfurt 15,030 3,117,266 Jakob Sprenger from 1933
11 Kärnten Klagenfurt 11,554 449,713 Hans vom Kothen from February 1933 to July 1934, then Peter Feistritzer from October 1936 to 20 February 1938, then from 1938 to 1939 Hubert Klausner, then from 1940 to 1941 Franz Kutschera, then from 1942 to 1944 Friedrich Rainer
12 Köln-Aachen Köln 8,162 2,432,095 Joseph Grohé from 1931
13 Kurhessen Kassel 9,200 971,887 Walter Schultz from 1926 to 1927, then from 1928 to 1943 Karl Weinrich, then from 1943 Karl Gerland
14 Magdeburg-Anhalt Dessau 13,910 1,820,416 from 1927 onwards, with a short-lived replacement by Paul Hofmann in 1933, to 23 October 1935 Wilhelm Friedrich Loeper, then from 1935 to 1937 Joachim Albrecht Leo Eggeling, then from 1937 Rudolf Jordan
15 Mainfranken, renaming of Gau Unterfranken Würzburg 8,432 840,663 Otto Hellmuth from 3 September 1928
16 Mark Brandenburg Berlin 38,278 3,007,933 Wilhelm Kube from 6 March 1933 to 7 August 1936, then Emil Stürtz
17 Mecklenburg Schwerin 15,722 900,427 Friedrich Hildebrandt from 1925 onwards with a short-lived replacement by Herbert Albrecht from July 1930 to 1931
18 Moselland, renaming of Gau Koblenz-Trier in 1942 Koblenz 11,876 1,367,354 Gustav Simon from 1 June 1931
19 München-Oberbayern, Munich 16,411 1,938,447 Adolf Wagner von 1933 to 1944, then from April 1944 Paul Giesler
20 Niederdonau Nominal capital: Krems, District Headquarters: Vienna 23,502 1,697,676 From 12 March 1938 to 24 May 1938 Roman Jäger, then from 24 May 1938 to 8 May 1945 Hugo Jury
21 Niederschlesien Breslau 26,985 3,286,539 Karl Hanke from 1940
22 Oberdonau Linz 14,216 1,034,871 Andreas Bolek from June 1927 to 1 August 1934, then from March 1935 August Eigruber
23 Oberschlesien Kattowitz 20,636 4,341,084 Fritz Bracht from 27 January 1941]
24 Ost-Hannover (also known as Hannover-Ost) Harburg, then Buchholz, after 1 April 1937 Lüneburg 18,006 1,060,509 from 1 October 1928 Otto Telschow
25 Ostpreußen Königsberg 52,731 3,336,777 Bruno Gustav Scherwitz from 1925 to 1927, then from 1928 Erich Koch
26 Pommern Stettin 38,409 2,393,844 Theodor Vahlen from 1925 to 1927, then from 1928 to 1931 Walter von Corswant, then from 1931 to 1934 Wilhelm Karpenstein, then from 1935 Franz Schwede-Coburg
27 Sachsen Dresden 14,995 5,231,739 Albert Wierheim around 1925/1926, Martin Mutschmann from 1925
28 Salzburg Salzburg 7,153 257,226 Leopold Malina from 1926 to ??, then Karl Scharizer from 1932 to 1934, then from 1939 to 1941 Friedrich Rainer, then from 1941 Gustav Adolf Scheel
29 Schleswig-Holstein Kiel 15,687 1,589,267 Hinrich Lohse from 1925
30 Schwaben Augsburg 10,231 946,212 Karl Wahl from 1928
31 Steiermark Graz 17,384 1,116,407 Walther Oberhaidacher from 25 November 1928 to 1934, then Sepp Helfrich from 1934 to 1938, then from 22 May 1938 Siegfried Uiberreither
32 Sudetenland, until 1939 known as Gau Sudetengau Reichenberg 22,608 2,943,187 Konrad Henlein from 1939
33 Südhannover-Braunschweig Hannover 14,553 2,136,961 from 1 October 1928 to November 1940 Bernhard Rust, then from November 1940 Hartmann Lauterbacher
34 Thüringen Weimar 15,763 2,446,182 Artur Dinter from 1925 to 1927, then from 1927 Fritz Sauckel
35 Tirol-Vorarlberg Innsbruck 13,126 486,400 Franz Hofer from 1932
36 Wartheland, until 29 January 1940 known as Gau Warthegau) Posen 43,905 4,693,722 Arthur Karl Greiser from 21 October 1939
37 Weser-Ems Oldenburg 15,044 1,839,302 Carl Röver from 1929 to 1942, then from 1942 Paul Wegener
38 Westfalen-Nord Münster 14,559 2,822,603 Alfred Meyer from 1932
39 Westfalen-Süd Bochum 7,656 2,678,026 Josef Wagner from 1932 to 1941, Paul Giesler from 1941 to 1943/44, then from 1943/44 Albert Hoffmann
40 Westmark, renaming of Gau Saar-Pfalz (also known as Saarpfalz) Neustadt an der Weinstraße, after 1940 Saarbrücken 14,713 1,892,240 Josef Bürckel from 1935 to 28 September 1944, then from 28 September 1944 Willi Stöhr
41 Wien Vienna 1,216 1,929,976 Alfred Eduard Frauenfeld from 1932 to 1938, then from May 1938 to January 1939 Odilo Globocnik, then from 1939 to 1940 Josef Bürckel, and then from 1940 Baldur von Schirach
42 Württemberg-Hohenzollern Stuttgart 20,657 2,974,373 Eugen Mander from 1925 to 1928, then from 1928 Wilhelm Murr
43 Auslandsorganisation (also known as NSDAP/AO) Berlin Hans Nieland from 1930 to 1933, then from 8 May 1933 Ernst Wilhelm Bohle

Later Gaue:

Gaue dissolved before 1945

Simple re-namings of existing Gaue without territorial changes is marked with the initials RN in the column "later became". The numbering is not based on any official former ranking, but merely listed alphabetically.

Nr. Gau consisted of later became ... together with Gauleiter
01 Anhalt Magdeburg-Anhalt (1927) Elbe-Havel Gustav Hermann Schmischke
02 Baden Baden-Elsaß (22 March 1941) RN see above
03 Bayerische Ostmark Oberfranken & Niederbayern-Oberpfalz (II) (19 January 1933) Bayreuth (2 Juni 1942) RN Hans Schemm from 19 January 1933 to 5 March 1935, then from 5 March 1935 Fritz Wächtler
04 Berlin Berlin-Brandenburg (1. Oktober 1928) Groß-Berlin RN Dr. Joseph Goebbels
05 Berlin-Brandenburg Berlin & Brandenburg (1 October 1928) Ernst Schlange from 1925 to 1926, then from 1 November 1926 Joseph Goebbels
06 Brandenburg Berlin-Brandenburg (1 October 1928) Kurmark (6 March 1933) Ostmark from 1 October 1928 to 1932 Emil Holtz and from 18 October 1932 to 16 March 1933 Dr. Ernst Schlange
07 Braunschweig Süd-Hannover-Braunschweig (1 Oktober 1928) Hannover-Süd from 1925 to 30 September 1928 Ludolf Haase (perhaps also only for Hannover-Süd)
08 Danzig Danzig-Westpreußen (1939) RN see above
09 Elbe-Havel Magdeburg-Anhalt (1927) Anhalt from 25 November 1925 to 1926 [?] Alois Bachschmidt
10 Groß-München ("Traditionsgau") München-Oberbayern (1933) Oberbayern [?]
11 Hannover-Süd Süd-Hannover-Braunschweig (1 October 1928) Braunschweig from 1925 to 30 September 1928 Ludolf Haase (perhaps also only Braunschweig)
12 Hessen-Darmstadt Hessen-Nassau (1933) Hessen-Nassau-Süd from 1 March 1927 to 9 January 1931 Friedrich Ringshausen, then only in 1931 Peter Gemeinder, then from 1932 to 1933 Karl Lenz
13 Hessen-Nassau-Nord Kurhessen (1934) [?]
14 Hessen-Nassau-Süd Hessen-Nassau (1933) Hessen-Darmstadt from 1925 to 1926 Anton Haselmayer, then from 1926 to 1927 Dr. Walter Schultz, then from 1927 to 1933 Jakob Sprenger
15 Koblenz-Trier Rheinland-Süd (1931) Moselland (1942) merger [?]
16 Kurmark Ostmark & Brandenburg ([?]) Mark Brandenburg (1938) RN see above
17 Lüneburg-Stade Ost-Hannover (1928) RN from 22 March 1925 to 30 September 1928 Bernhard Rust
18 Mittelfranken Franken (1929) Nuremberg-Forth-Erlangen Julius Streicher ("Frankenführer")
19 Niederbayern Niederbayern-Oberpfalz (I) (1 Oktober 1928) Niederbayern-Oberpfalz (II) (1 April 1932) Oberpfalz from 1 October 1928 to 1929 Gregor Strasser, then from 1929 to 1 April 1932 Otto Erbersdobler
20 Niederbayern-Oberpfalz (I) Oberpfalz & Niederbayern (1 Oktober 1928) from 1925 to 30 September 1928 Gregor Strasser
21 Niederbayern-Oberpfalz (II) Oberpfalz & Niederbayern (1 April 1932) Bayerische Ostmark (19 January 1933) Oberfranken from 1 April 1932 to 19 January 1933 Franz Mayerhofer
22 Niederösterreich Niederdonau ([?]) RN [??] from 1927 to 1937 Josef Leopold [possibly Lücke from 1937 to 1939, since he is the first Gauleiter for Niederdonau who is actually known]
23 Nuremberg-Forth-Erlangen Franken (1929) Mittelfranken from 3 September 1928 Wilhelm Grimm
24 Oberbayern München-Oberbayern (1933) Groß-München [?]
25 Oberfranken Bayerische Ostmark (19 January 1933) Niederbayern-Oberpfalz (II) from 1928 Hans Schemm
26 Oberösterreich Oberdonau ([?]) RN [precise moment of leader designation unknown, see also "Oberdonau"]
27 Oberpfalz Niederbayern-Oberpfalz (I) (1 October 1928) Niederbayern-Oberpfalz (II) (1 April 1932) Niederbayern from 1 October 1928 to 1 April 1932 Franz Mayerhofer
28 Ostmark Kurmark (6 March 1933) Brandenburg from 2 January 1928 to 1933 Wilhelm Kube
29 Rheinland Saar-Pfalz (1935) Saar(land) from 1926 Josef Bürckel (from 1 March 1933 also administrator of Saarland)
30 Rheinland-Nord Ruhr (1926) Westfalen from 1925 to 1926 Karl Kaufmann
31 Rheinland-Süd [?Koblenz-Trier also autonomous before 1931?] Köln-Aachen & Koblenz-Trier (1931) 1925 Heinrich Haake (also known as "Heinz Haake"), then from 1925 to 1931 Robert Ley
32 Ruhr Rheinland-Nord & Westfalen (1926) Westfalen-Nord & Westfalen-Süd (1932) Düsseldorf (1930) partially; creation of Düsseldorf nicht gesichert from 1926 to 1929 Karl Kaufmann, then from 1929 to 1931 [?not 1932?] Josef Wagner
33 Saarland, also merely Saar Saar-Pfalz (1935) Rheinland from August 1929 to 28 February 1933 Karl Brück, from 1 March 1933 Josef Bürckel (also administrator of Rheinland)
34 Saar-Pfalz, also Saarpfalz Rheinland & Saar(land) (1935) Westmark (1937) RN see above
35 Schlesien Niederschlesien & Oberschlesien (1940) from 15 March 1925 to 25 December 1935 (possibly until only 12 December 1934) Helmuth Brückner, then to 1940 Josef Wagner
36 Sudetengau Sudetenland (1939) RN [?]
37 Unterfranken Mainfranken (1935) RN see above
38 Warthegau Wartheland (29 January 1940) RN see above
39 Westfalen Ruhr (1926) Rheinland-Nord from 1925 to 1926 Franz Pfeffer von Salomon

Associated organizations abroad

See also: NSDAP/AO

Gaue in Switzerland

The illegal Swiss branch of the NSDAP also established a number of Party Gaue in that country, most of them named after their regional capitals. These included Gau Basel-Solothurn, Gau Schaffhausen, Gau Luzern, Gau Bern and Gau Zürich.[71][72][73] The cantons of St. Gallen, Thurgau und Appenzell were administered under Gau Ostschweiz (East Switzerland).[74]

Membership

General membership

Party membership of the NSDAP from 1939.

The general membership of the Nazi Party mainly consisted of the urban and rural lower middle classes. 7% belonged to the upper class, another 7% were peasants, 35% were industrial workers and 51% were what can be described as middle class. In early 1933, just before Hitler's appointment to the chancellorship, the party showed an under-representation of "workers", who made up 29.7% of the membership but 46.3% of German society. Conversely, white-collar employees (18.6% of members and 12% of Germans), the self-employed (19.8% of members and 9.6% of Germans), and civil servants (15.2% of members and 4.8% of the German population) had joined in proportions greater than their share of the general population.[75] These members were affiliated with local branches of the party, of which there were 1,378 throughout the country in 1928. In 1932, the number had risen to 11,845, reflecting the party's growth in this period.[76]

When it came to power in 1933, the Nazi Party had over 2 million members. In 1939, the membership total rose to 5.3 million with 81% being male and 19% being female. It continued to attract many more and by 1945 the party reached its peak of 8 million with 63% being male and 37% being female.[2]

Military membership

Nazi members with military ambitions were encouraged to join the Waffen-SS, but a great number enlisted in the Wehrmacht and even more were drafted for service after World War II began. Early regulations required that all Wehrmacht members be non-political, and therefore any Nazi member joining in the 1930s was required to resign from the Nazi Party.

This regulation was soon waived, however, and there is ample evidence that full Nazi Party members served in the Wehrmacht in particular after the outbreak of World War II. The Wehrmacht Reserves also saw a high number of senior Nazis enlisting, with Reinhard Heydrich and Fritz Todt joining the Luftwaffe, as well as Karl Hanke who served in the army.

Student membership

In 1926, the NSDAP formed a special division to engage the student population, known as the National Socialist German Students' League (NSDStB). A group for university lecturers, the National Socialist German University Lecturers' League, (NSDDB) existed until July 1944.

Women membership

The National Socialist Women's League was the women's organization of the party. By 1938 it had approximately 2 million members.

Membership outside of Germany

Party members who lived outside of Germany were pooled into the Auslands-Organisation (NSDAP/AO, "Foreign Organization"). The organization was limited only to so-called "Imperial Germans"; "Ethnic Germans" (Volksdeutsche) who did not hold German citizenship were not permitted to join.

Under Beneš decree No. 16/1945 Coll., in case of citizens of Czechoslovakia, membership of NSDAP was punishable by 5–20 years of imprisonment.

Deutsche Gemeinschaft

Deutsche Gemeinschaft was a branch of the Nazi Party founded in 1919, created for Germans with Volksdeutsche status.[77] It is not to be confused with the post-war right-wing Deutsche Gemeinschaft (see de:Deutsche Gemeinschaft) party founded in 1949.

Notable members included:[78]

Party symbols

  • Nazi flags: The Nazi party used a right-facing swastika as their symbol and the red and black colors were said to represent Blut und Boden ("blood and soil"). Another definition of the flag describes the colours as representing the ideology of National Socialism, the swastika representing the Aryan race and the Aryan nationalist agenda of the movement; white representing Aryan racial purity; and red representing the socialist agenda of the movement. Black, white and red were in fact the colors of the old North German Confederation flag (invented by Otto von Bismarck, based on the Prussian colours black and white and the red used by northern German states). In 1871, with the foundation of the German Reich, the flag of the North German Confederation became the German Reichsflagge ("Reich's flag"). Black, white and red became the colours of the nationalists through the following history (for example World War I and the Weimar Republic).
The Parteiflagge design, with the centered swastika disc, served as the NSDAP flag since 1920. Between 1933 (when the NSDAP came to power) and 1935, it was used as the National flag (Nationalflagge) and Merchant flag (Handelsflagge), but interchangeably with the black-white-red horizontal tricolour. In 1935, the black-white-red horizontal tricolour was scrapped (again), and the flag with the off-center swastika and disc was instituted as the only national flag, and was to remain as such until 1945. The flag with the centered disk continued to be used after 1935, but exclusively as the Parteiflagge of the NSDAP.
  • German eagle: The Nazi party used the traditional German eagle, standing atop of a swastika inside a wreath of oak leaves. It is also known as the Iron Eagle. When the eagle is looking to its left shoulder, it symbolises the Nazi party, and was called the Parteiadler. In contrast, when the eagle is looking to its right shoulder, it symbolises the country (Reich), and was therefore called the Reichsadler. After the Nazi party came to power in Germany, they replaced the traditional version of the German eagle with the modified party symbol throughout the country and all its institutions.

  • Parteiflagge ("party flag"), used 1920-45. Also used as the national flag between 1933–35, interchangeably with the black-white-red horizontal tricolour.

  • Flag with the off-center swastika and disc. Used as the national flag of Germany after 1935. It was never used to represent the NSDAP.

  • Party emblem, design variant

  • Reichsadler design, representing Germany in general as the national insignia (Hoheitszeichen)

  • 5-Reichsmark coins before (1936) and after adding the Nazi swastika (1938)

Slogans and songs

  • Nazi slogan: "Sieg Heil!"
  • Nazi slogan: "Heil Hitler"

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Rick Steves. Rick Steves' Snapshot Munich, Bavaria & Salzburg. Berkeley, California, USA; New York, New York, USA: Avalon Travel, 2010. p. 28. "Though the Nazis eventually gained power in Berlin, they remembered their roots, dubbing Munich "Capital of the Movement". The Nazi headquarters stood near today's obelisk on Brienner Strasse..."
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 McNab, Chris (2011). Hitler's Master Plan, Amber Books Ltd. pp 22, 23. ISBN 1-907446-96-6
  3. ↑ Davidson, Eugene. The Making of Adolf Hitler: The Birth and Rise of Nazism. University of Missouri Press. p. 241. 
  4. ↑ Orlow, Dietrich. The Nazi Party 1919-1945: A Complete History. Enigma Books. p. 29. 
  5. ↑ "Online Etymology Dictionary". Etymonline.com. Retrieved 12 November 2010. 
  6. ↑ Thomas D. Grant. Stormtroopers and Crisis in the Nazi Movement: Activism, Ideology and Dissolution. London, England, UK; New York, New York, USA: Routledge, 2004. pp. 30–34, 44.
  7. ↑ Stern, Fritz Richard. The Politics of Cultural Despair: A Study in the Rise of the Germanic Ideology. University of California Press, 1974 [1961]. p. 296.
  8. ↑ Burleigh, Michael The Third Reich: A New History. Pan MacMillan, 2001. p. 75.
  9. ↑ Redles, David Nazi End Times; The Third Reich as a Millennial Reich in Kinane,Karolyn & Ryan, Michael A. (eds). End of Days: Essays on the Apocalypse from Antiquity to Modernity. McFarland and Co., 2009. p. 176.
  10. ↑ Heinrich August Winkler, Alexander Sager. Germany: The Long Road West. English edition. Oxford, England, UK: Oxford University Press, 2006. p. 414.
  11. ↑ Otis C. Mitchell. Hitler's Stormtroopers and the Attack on the German Republic, 1919–1933. Jefferson, North Carolina, USA: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2008. p. 47.
  12. ↑ Frank McDonough. Hitler and the Rise of the Nazi Party. Pearson/Longman, 2003. p. 64.
  13. ↑ Simone Gigliotti, Berel Lang. The Holocaust: a reader. Malden, Massachusetts, USA; Oxford, England, UK; Carlton, Victoria, Australia: Blackwell Publishing, 2005. p. 14.
  14. ↑ Arendt, Hannah. The Origins of Totalitarianism. London; New York; San Diego: Harvest Book. p. 306.
  15. ↑ Curtis, Michael. Totalitarianism. New Brunswick (US); London: Transactions Publishers, 1979. p. 36.
  16. ↑ Burch, Betty Brand. Dictatorship and Totalitarianism: Selected Readings. 1964. p. 58.
  17. ↑ Bruhn, Jodi; Hans Maier. Totalitarianism and Political Religions: Concepts for the Comparison of Dictatorships. Routledge: Oxon (U.K.); New York, 2004. p. 32.
  18. ↑ , pronounced German pronunciation: [natsjoˈnaːlzotsiaːˌlistiʃə ˈdɔytʃə ˈarbaitɐparˌtai]
  19. ↑ or Sozialdemokrat (pronounced /zo'tsjaːldemoˌkraːt/) (social democrat).
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 Franz H. Mautner (1944). "Nazi und Sozi". Modern Language Notes (Modern Language Notes, Vol. 59, No. 2) 59 (2): 93–100. doi:10.2307/2910599. JSTOR 2910599. 
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 21.2 21.3 21.4 Kershaw 2008, p. 82.
  22. ↑ 22.0 22.1 The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Arrow Books Ltd (2 May 1991), p.33
  23. ↑ The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Arrow Books Ltd (2 May 1991), p.34
  24. ↑ 24.0 24.1 24.2 Spector, Robert, World Without Civilization: Mass Murder and the Holocaust, History, and Analysis (University of America Press, 2004), p.137
  25. ↑ Griffen, Roger (ed). 1995. Fascism. New York: Oxford University Press. Pp. 105.
  26. ↑ Theodore Fred Abel. The Nazi Movement. Aldine Transaction, 2012 (original edition in 1938). Pp. 55.
  27. ↑ Carlsten, F. L. The Rise of Fascism. University of California Press. Pp. 91
  28. ↑ Carlsten, Pp. 91
  29. ↑ 29.0 29.1 29.2 29.3 29.4 Fest, Joachim, The Face of the Third Reich (Penguin books, 1979), pp 37–38
  30. ↑ Dan van der Vat: The Good Nazi: The Life and Lies of Albert Speer, page 30. George Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1997 ISBN 0-297-81721-3
  31. ↑ 31.0 31.1 T. L. Jaman, The Rise and Fall of Nazi Germany (New York University Press, 1956), pg. 88
  32. ↑ Kershaw 2008, p. 75.
  33. ↑ Stackelberg 2007, p. 9.
  34. ↑ Kershaw 2008, pp. 75, 76.
  35. ↑ The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Arrow Books Ltd (2 May 1991), p.43
  36. ↑ Toland, John, Adolf Hitler: The Definitive Biography (Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, 1 October 2008), pg.131
  37. ↑ 37.0 37.1 Rees, Laurence, The Nazis – A Warning from History (BBC Books, 2 March 2006), pg. 23
  38. ↑ 38.0 38.1 T. L. Jaman, The Rise and Fall of Nazi Germany (New York University Press, 1956), pg. 89
  39. ↑ The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Arrow Books Ltd (2 May 1991), p.36
  40. ↑ The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Arrow Books Ltd (2 May 1991), p.37
  41. ↑ Johnson, Paul, A History of the Modern World: From 1917 to the 1980s (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 13 September 1984), pg. 133
  42. ↑ 42.0 42.1 42.2 Fest, Joachim, The Face of the Third Reich (Penguin books, 1979), pg.42
  43. ↑ Kershaw 2008, p. 87.
  44. ↑ Eric Ehrenreich (2007). The Nazi Ancestral Proof: Genealogy, Racial Science, and the Final Solution. Indiana University Press. p. 58. ISBN 0-253-11687-2. 
  45. ↑ 45.0 45.1 Kershaw 2008, p. 89.
  46. ↑ Franz-Willing, Die Hilterbewegung
  47. ↑ The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Arrow Books Ltd (2 May 1991), p.38
  48. ↑ Fest, Joachim, The Face of the Third Reich (Penguin books, 1979), pg.40
  49. ↑ Kershaw 2008, pp. 100, 101.
  50. ↑ Kershaw 2008, p. 102.
  51. ↑ 51.0 51.1 Kershaw 2008, p. 103.
  52. ↑ 52.0 52.1 Kershaw 2008, pp. 83, 103.
  53. ↑ Hakim, Joy (1995). A History of Us: War, Peace and all that Jazz. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-509514-6. 
  54. ↑ Kershaw 2008, p. 110.
  55. ↑ Hitler 1998.
  56. ↑ Jablonsky, David. 1989. The Nazi Party in Dissolution: Hitler and the Verbotzeit, 1923–1925. Routledge. Pp. 57
  57. ↑ Jablonsky, Pp. 57
  58. ↑ Kershaw 2008, p. 194.
  59. ↑ Evans 2005, p. 372.
  60. ↑ Sutton, Antony C.: Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler (1976, 1999)
  61. ↑ Kershaw 2008, pp. 224.
  62. ↑ "Social democracy is objectively the moderate wing of fascism. ... These organisations (ie Fascism and social democracy) are not antipodes, they are twins." (J.V. Stalin: Concerning the International Situation (September 1924), in Works, Volume 6, 1953; p.294.) This later led Otto Wille Kuusinen to conclude that "The aims of the fascists and the social-fascists are the same." (Report To the 10th Plenum of ECCI, in International Press Correspondence, Volume 9, no.40, (20 August 1929), p.848.)
  63. ↑ Hitler stated: "Today our left-wing politicians in particular are constantly insisting that their craven-hearted and obsequious foreign policy necessarily results from the disarmament of Germany, whereas the truth is that this is the policy of traitors [...] But the politicians of the Right deserve exactly the same reproach. It was through their miserable cowardice that those ruffians of Jews who came into power in 1918 were able to rob the nation of its arms." Adolf Hitler. Mein Kampf. Bottom of the Hill Publishing, 2010. p. 287.
  64. ↑ Fritzsche, Peter. 1998. Germans into Nazis. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press; Eatwell, Roger, Fascism, A History, Viking/Penguin, 1996, pp. xvii–xxiv, 21, 26–31, 114–140, 352. Griffin, Roger. 2000. "Revolution from the Right: Fascism," chapter in David Parker (ed.) Revolutions and the Revolutionary Tradition in the West 1560–1991, Routledge, London.
  65. ↑ Adolf Hitler, Max Domarus. The Essential Hitler: Speeches and Commentary. pp. 171, 172-173.
  66. ↑ Kolb, Eberhard (2005) [1984]. The Weimar Republic. London; New York: Routledge. pp. 224–225. ISBN 978-0-415-34441-8. 
  67. ↑ Zentner, Christian Ed; Bedürftig, Friedemann Ed (1991). "The Encyclopedia of the Third Reich". New York: Macmillan. p 631
  68. ↑ Deutsche Uniformen, National Socialist German Workers Part (1938)
  69. ↑ Speer, Albert (1970). Inside the Third Reich. New York and Toronto: Macmillan
  70. ↑ Buchquelle zur Gaugröße Kurmarks/Mark-Brandenburgs. Google Books. 1995. ISBN 978-3-05-002508-7. Retrieved 12 November 2010. 
  71. ↑ Walter Wolf (1969). Faschismus in der Schweiz. Flamberg, p 121, 253, 283. (in German)
  72. ↑ Alan Morris Schom. "Examples of NSDAP and National Front meetings and agendas in northern Switzerland, 1935, 1937". A Survey of Nazi and Pro-Nazi Groups in Switzerland: 1930–1945. Simon Wiesenthal Center. Retrieved 17 October 2010. 
  73. ↑ Historischer Verein des Kantons Bern (1973). Archiv des Historischen Vereins des Kantons Bern, vol 57–60. Stämpfliche Verlagshandlung. p. 150. 
  74. ↑ Beat Glaus (1969). Die Nationale front. Zürich. p. 147. 
  75. ↑ Panayi, P. Life and Death in a German Town: Osnabrück from the Weimar Republic to World War II and Beyond. New York: Tauris Academic Studies, 2007. p 40.
  76. ↑ Panayi 2007, p. 40.
  77. ↑ Fakty wypaczone przez Erikę Steinbach Bogdan Musiał 24 06 2009 Rzeczpospolita
  78. ↑ Wolfgang Rosar: Deutsche Gemeinschaft. Seyss-Inquart und der Anschluß. Europa-Verlag, Wien 1971. ISBN 3-203-50384-0.

References

  • Evans, R. J. (2005). The Third Reich in Power 1933–1939. London: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-7139-9649-8. 
  • Heiden, Konrad (15 September 1933-09-15). "Les débuts du national-socialisme". Revue d'Allemagne (in French) 7 (71). 
  • Höhne, Heinz (2000) [1969]. The Order of the Death's Head: The Story of Hitler's SS (Der Orden unter dem Totenkopf: Die Geschichte der SS). London: Penguin. ISBN 978-0-14-139012-3. 
  • Kershaw, Ian (2008). Hitler: A Biography. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0-393-06757-2. 
  • Shirer, William L. (1991) [1960]. The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. London: Arrow Books Ltd. ISBN 978-0749306977. 
  • Stackelberg, Roderick (2007). The Routledge Companion to Nazi Germany. New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-30860-1. 

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