Machtergreifung
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The Nazis described the rather grubby deal which made Hitler Chancellor as 'the first Revolution'. The succeediing year, which in most History books is called the 'consolidation of power', they called the Machtergreifung - the 'power-grab'.
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Going DeeperThe following links will help you widen your knowledge: Four BBC Bitesize webpages on the creation of a dictatorship, 1933-34 The History Place has a useful narrative account of the critical period 5-23 March Infographic from versushistory
Podcasts
YouTube Hitler establishes power - excellent BBC video (watch the first 9 minutes). Mr Portman's clear video - Chancellor to Dictator Pete Jackson on the establishment of Hitler's dictatorship
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Eight Steps to Becoming Dictator[Rigged German Election Leads To Psycho Nazi Fuhrer]After he became Chancellor in January 1933, Hitler transformed his democratic position into dictatorial power:
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1. Reichstag Fire - 27 Feb 1933The Reichstag (the German Parliament) burned down. A Dutch Communist named van der Lubbe was caught red-handed with matches and fire-lighting materials. Hitler used it as an excuse to arrest many of his Communist opponents, and as a major platform in his election campaign of March 1933. The fire was so convenient that many people at the time claimed that the Nazis had burned it down, and then just blamed the Communists. Modern historians, however, tend to believe that van der Lubbe did cause the fire.
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BBC Bitesize on the Reichstag Fire History Place - narrative account |
2. General Election - 5 March 1933Hitler held a general election, appealing to the German people to give him a clear mandate. Only 44% of the people voted Nazi, which did not give him a majority in the Reichstag, so Hitler arrested the 81 Communist deputies (which did give him a majority). Goering became Speaker of the Reichstag.
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3. Enabling Act - 23 March 1933The Reichstag voted to give Hitler the power to make his own laws. Nazi stormtroopers stopped opposition deputies going in, and beat up anyone who dared to speak against it. Remembering those days in 1942, the German lawyer Franz Neumann commented: “If the Centrists had not capitulated and given their support to the bill, a reign of terror would unquestionably have been unleashed”. It is important to avoid three common misconceptions about the Enabling Act:
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History Place - narrative account Guardian newspaper report of 1933 Re-interpreting the Enabling Act - have we got it wrong? |
4. Local government and the Police- 26 April 1933The Nazis took over local government and the police. The Nazis started to replace anti-Nazi teachers and University professors. Hitler set up the Gestapo (the secret police) and encouraged Germans to report opponents and 'grumblers'. Tens of thousands of Jews, Communists, Protestants, Jehovah's Witnesses, gypsies, homosexuals, alcoholics and prostitutes were arrested and sent to concentration camps for 'crimes' as small as writing anti-Nazi graffiti, possessing a banned book, or saying that business was bad. In February 1934, the Reichsrat was abolished, and all the powers of the German States transferred to the Chancellor.
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BBC Bitesize on the Police State History Place - narrative account of the establishment of the Gestapo |
5. Trade Unions banned - 2 May 1933The Trade Unions offices were closed, their money confiscated, and their leaders put in prison. In their place, Hitler put the German Labour Front which reduced workers' pay and took away the right to strike.
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6. Political Parties banned - 14 July 1933The Law against the Formation of Parties declared the Nazi Party the only political party in Germany. All other parties were banned, and their leaders were put in prison.
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7. Night of the Long Knives - 30 June 1934The SA were the thugs who Hitler had used to help him come to power. They had defended his meetings, and attacked opponents. By 1934 there were more than a million of them. Historians have often wondered why Hitler turned on the SA. But Hitler was in power in 1934, and there was no opposition left - the SA were an embarrassment, not an advantage. Also, Rohm, the leader of the SA, was talking about a Socialist revolution and about taking over the army. On the night of 30 June 1934 - codeword 'Hummingbird - Hitler ordered the SS to kill more than 400 SA men. |
History Place - narrative account A homosexual Kristallnacht - this gay website see the Night of the Long Knives as homophobia. |
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Source AThis David Low cartoon from 3 July 1934 shows Hitler (with a smoking gun) and Goering (shown as Thor, the God of War) glowering at - not the traditional Nazi salute - but terrified SA men with their hands up. Some SA men already lie dead on the ground. The caption reads: 'They salute with both hands now'. Low was fiercely anti-Nazi, and portrays Hitler as a brazen murderer keeping his men in check by naked fear, while Goebbels is shown as Hitler's poodle. |
8. Führer - 19 August 1934When Hindenburg died, Hitler took over the office of President and leader of the army (the soldiers had to swear to die for Adolf Hitler personally). Hitler called himself 'Führer'.
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History Place - narrative account
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InterpretationsHere are some things that have written about the Nazi consolidation of power, 1933-34: Source BThe Enabling Act ... is regarded as the 'foundation stone' of the Third Reich and allowed Hitler to secure closer control of the nation. It quickly resulted in the suspension of civil liberties, the imposition of censorship and control of the press, the abolition of trade unions and the disbanding of all political parties apart from the Nazi Party. In this way Hitler created a 'dictatorship'. Steve Waugh & John Wright, Germany in Transition (2016).
Source CThe Nazis consolidation of power can be grouped into three main themes: pseudo-legality, terror and intimidation and pseudo-moderation. The Weiner Holocaust Library; 'psuedo' means 'not genuine'/ 'sham'.
Source DThe levers of political power fell into the hands of people who came from outside the established political elites, who refused to recognize the normal constraints which are essential to civilized behaviour, and who made their horrible ideology real... Adolf Hitler and his band of racist political gangsters, backed by the greatest mass movement with the broadest popular appeal that Germany had ever seen, were able to gain control of the most powerful advanced industrial state in Europe. Richard Bessel, Understanding Nazi Germany (2004)
Source EWhat the Nazis were trying to achieve was a cultural revolution, in which alien cultural influences - notably the Jews but also modernist culture more generally -were eliminated and the German spirit reborn. Germans did not just have to acquiesce in the Third Reich, they had to support it with all their heart and soul Richard Evans, The Third Reich in Power (2012)
Source FSurely nobody will doubt the fact that during the last four years a revolution of the most momentous character has passed like a storm over Germany. I am speaking of a National Socialist Revolution... Adolf Hitler, speaking in 1937.
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Consider:1. Do you agree with KD Bracher that the Fire was more important in the consoldiation of power than the EnablingAct? 2. In §3 on the Enabling Act, I suggest that the Act was (a) a subterfuge, and (b) illegal. If true, does this contradict Source B? 3. Study the different interpretations of the Nazi consolidation of power in Sources B to F. Which interpetation seems to you most true to the facts on what you have just learned about the year 1933-34? Write a few paragraphs explaining why ... and why the other Sources do not.
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