1. Gleichschaltung and folk community
Week 13, January 20

2. Louise Solmitz’ family, 1928
Solmitz about Hitler’s visit in Hamburg on March 3, 1933:
“What an exhilarating day without any cloud, full of patriotic kick! We walked to the headquarters of the NSDAP. […] The pillars are wavering: Hitler is coming! Hitler is coming! […] We met masses of people coming towards us. […] On the connecting rail line stood a group of policemen, and I saw for the first time armlets with swastika. Everyone was wearing them, everyone! […] The hands went up to Hitler salute. It was like 1914, everyone could have hugged all out of the feeling for Hitler. It was like being drunk without wine.”
Bedrohung, Hoffnung, Skepsis: Vier Tagebücher des Jahres 1933, ed. Frak Bajohr, Beate Meyer, and Joachim Szodrzynski (Göttingen:Wallstein, 2013), illustration from here

3. Events before the Reichstag fire
Decree for the Protection of the German People (February 4)
Legal difference between law and decree
- For arresting without judicial warrant on charges of high treason for up to three months into protective custody
- SS and SA used the decree to arrest their political opponents
SPD and KPD don’t go into (violent) resistance
Upcoming elections March 5

4. Reichstag Fire, February 27
conspiracies:
Benjamin Hett recently pointed out that it very probably was a Wedding SA troop that set the Reichstag on fire

5. The accused Marinus van der Lubbe
At the trial, Leipzig vdL was sentenced for high treason and executed

6. Aftermath of the Reichstag Fire
Escalation of terror: political opponents arrested and brought into early concentration camps
By March 15, 10,000 communists arrested
Reichstag Fire Decree (February 28)
limit of freedom of press, of opinion, of personal freedom, in freedom of meetings, house searches, confiscation of property
control of the state govt over the lands
gave the judicial base for what followed

7. Election on March 5, 1933 No longer an independent election
People massively intimidated, especially in smaller towns and villages
NSDAP 43,9%; KPD 12,3; SPD 18,3; Zentrum 11,2; Kampffront (continuation DNVP) 8%
While the Nazis and the DNVP now had a majority, they still did not have two thirds in the parliament needed to change the constitution
Even in these rigged elections, Hitler did not receive a majority of the votes

8. Garnison church: Day of Potsdam, March old German and Prussian elites coalesce with the Nazis

9. Enabling law, March 23
Hitler: “give me four years time”  Four Year Plan
KPD’s mandates were annulled by the Reichstag decree  Communist MPs could not vote
Hitler secured two third majority to change the constitution
crucial margin of victory provided by the Zentrum
Only the SPD MPs voted against
Transformed Germany into a dictatorship
Legal base (together with the Reichstag decree) for the Third Reich

10. Memorial for the 96 murdered Reichstag deputies

11. Finalizing of the transformation of power
Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service (April 7)  removed Jews and political opponents from public service
Catholic church cautiously supported the new regime; Concordat of July 30
SPD prohibited and other parties dissolved
After Hindenburg’s death in August 34, the office of the Reich Chancellor and the president merged
New kind of state -- dictatorship

12. The economic revamping
Preceding administrations’ improvements
World-wide improvement in the economy
Highways (Fritz Todt, Albert Speer): over 100,000 jobs
Reinhardt programs: investment in job creation
Support of agricultural sector, hereditary farms
Marriage loan scheme: women at home
Creative way with statistics