Berenice Ings – Democracy and Dictatorships in Germany 1919-63
The establishment of the Nazi dictatorship and
its domestic policies Feb 1933 - 1939
Why and how as Hitler able to consolidate his power in the
period up to the death of Hindenburg in August 1934?
The reichstag fire
• Within 24 hours of appointment -> new election
• Fire = 27th February - Dutch communist Van Der Lubbe
• ‘decree for the protection of the people + the state’
• Arrested nazi opponents - limited opposition
March elections
• Increased turnout of 88%
• Vote increased 33% to 44% however, still not majority and needed
nationalist support
Enabling act
• 23rd March - transferred full power to himself
• Only SDs voted against him - 444 to 94
• Achieved through promise to the catholic centre party
Creation of a one party state
• Control over federal states, trade unions + other political parties
1. Federal states - regional governments dissolved 31st march 1933 -> state
government, reich governors created, jan 1934 regional parliaments
abolished
2. Trade unions - tricked labour day, neck day premises, funds and leaders
seized, independent unions - german labour front DAF - can’t negotiate
3. Political parties - communists banned after fire, SDs on 22nd June, others
agreed to remove themselves - ‘the law against the establishment of
parties on 14th July
• HOWEVER, not influence everything - church, army, big businesses, civil
service and education, needed their support
The night of long knives
• 30th June 1934
• Merging of army + SA - Hitler backed SA
• NOLK - ended SA + other opponents - left wing and right wing
• Army - personal oath of loyalty to Hitler
• SS emerged as a potent force
Death of Hindenburg
1
, Berenice Ings – Democracy and Dictatorships in Germany 1919-63
• 2nd august
• No opposition - no political crisis, merged roles -> fuher
Reasons for dictatorship:
1. Weakness of opposition
2. Legality
3. Terror
4. Propaganda
5. Deception
How effectively was Nazi Germany governed?
Role of Hitler in the government
• Lacked experience, absent from Berlin - effective government difficult
• Limited role in day to day government - decline in cabinet
Administration
• Old institutions not destroyed - often conservative - judiciary
• Overlap and confusion with party organisation
• SS - party organisation but also ran alongside police
• Reich chancellery - difficult to coordinate institutions
• Conflict between state and party
How important were terror, censorship and propaganda in
maintaining Nazi control?
Censorship and propaganda
• Goebbels - minister of public enlightenment and propaganda
• Radio - reich radio company, cheap radios - ownership increased 25% ->
70% by 1939
• Newspaper - editors law of 1933, quality decreased and readership
decreased
• Theatres had to have a license
• Literature - the reich chamber of literature burning banned books
• Art - modern banned, german hero’s and nature
• Film - weekly review in all showings
• Social rituals - Heil Hitler, salute, Horst Wessex anthem and the uniforms
Courts
• Establishment of new courts
• Harsher sentences
• Judges removed + senior court officials replaced with Nazis
The SS + Gestapo
• SS = bodyguards, originally part of SA -> independent and important
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