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195-568: When Hitler obtained power in 1933 , 95% of Germans were Christian, with 63% being Protestant and 32% being Catholic. Many historians maintain that Hitler 's goal in the Kirchenkampf entailed not only ideological struggle, but ultimately the eradication of the churches. Other historians maintain no such plan existed. Some leading Nazis such as Alfred Rosenberg and Martin Bormann were vehemently anti-Christian, and sought to de-Christianize Germany in

390-566: A Free State of Brunswick government official by Dietrich Klagges , after an earlier attempt by Wilhelm Frick to convey citizenship as a Thuringian police official failed. Ernst Röhm , in charge of the SA, put Wolf-Heinrich von Helldorff , a vehement anti-Semite, in charge of the Berlin SA. The deaths mounted, with many more on the Rotfront side, and by the end of 1931 the SA had suffered 47 deaths and

585-597: A "blatant disregard" for the Concordat, and its signing was to him merely a first step in the "gradual suppression of the Catholic Church in Germany". Anton Gill wrote that "with his usual irresistible, bullying technique, Hitler then proceeded to take a mile where he had been given an inch" and closed all Catholic institutions whose functions weren't strictly religious: It quickly became clear that [Hitler] intended to imprison

780-480: A Catholic, Hitler came to reject the Judeo-Christian conception of God and religion. Though he retained some regard for the organizational power of Catholicism, he had nothing but utter contempt for its teachings, which he said, if taken to their conclusion, "would mean the systematic cultivation of the human failure". However, important German conservative elements, such as the officer corps, opposed Nazi attacks on

975-488: A German only. ... It was this mentality that made me draw the ultimate conclusion and do military service in the German Army. Under the threat of criminal deportation home to Austria, Hitler formally renounced his Austrian citizenship on 7 April 1925, and did not acquire German citizenship until almost seven years later; therefore, he was unable to run for public office. Hitler gained German citizenship after being appointed

1170-584: A KPD stronghold, and the two warring parties exchanged pistol and revolver fire. The German referendum of 1929 was important as it gained the Nazi Party recognition and credibility it had never had before. In the late 1920s, seeing the party's lack of breakthrough into the mainstream, Goebbels proposed that instead of focusing all of their propaganda in major cities where there was competition from other political movements, they should instead begin holding rallies in rural areas where they would be more effective. On

1365-399: A basic Prussian-Protestant attitude and from Luther's unfinished Reformation". Hitler himself disdained Christianity, as Alan Bullock noted: In Hitler's eyes, Christianity was a religion fit only for slaves; he detested its ethics in particular. Its teaching, he declared, was a rebellion against the natural law of selection by struggle and the survival of the fittest. Though he was born as

1560-520: A battle with Bolshevism. Wants to speak with Faulhaber". On 4 November 1936, Hitler met Faulhaber. Hitler spoke for the first hour, then Faulhaber told him that the Nazi government had been waging war on the church for three years – 600 religious teachers had lost their jobs in Bavaria alone – and the number was set to rise to 1700 and the government had instituted laws the church could not accept – like

1755-492: A blessing in disguise for Hitler, as it garnered him national fame. Hitler was sentenced to five years in prison, but would only serve nine months. During this time, Hitler wrote Mein Kampf , which became the vade mecum of National Socialism . Once released, Hitler switched tactics, opting to instead seize power through legal and democratic means. Hitler, armed with his newfound celebrity, began furiously campaigning. During

1950-623: A bolstering of support to the Catholic church, alienating an important religious minority. In 1878, Bismarck then introduced a number of anti-socialist laws that would be in effect from 1878 to 1890 in an attempt to alienate the Social Democratic Party . While some sections of German society were united by this, many industrial workers rallied to the SDP. Historians have expressed that as the German state

2145-507: A coalition government. The Centre Party's Heinrich Brüning was Chancellor from 1930 to 1932. Brüning and Hitler were unable to reach terms of co-operation, but Brüning himself increasingly governed with the support of the President and Army over that of the parliament. The 84-year-old President von Hindenburg , a conservative monarchist , was reluctant to take action to suppress the Nazis, while

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2340-580: A completely new constitution whereas Stalin did so. Technically the Weimar Constitution of 1919 remained in effect even after the Enabling Act, only losing force in 1945 when Germany surrendered at the end of World War II and ceased to be a sovereign state . The Enabling Act allowed the National Ministry (essentially the cabinet) to enact legislation, including laws deviating from or altering

2535-424: A couple weeks on guard duty at the city's main train station (Hauptbahnhof) through which soldiers had been traveling. During this time a number of notable Germans were assassinated, including socialist Kurt Eisner , who was shot dead by a German nationalist on 21 February 1919. His rival Erhard Auer was also wounded in an attack. Other acts of violence were the killings of both Major Paul Ritter von Jahreiß and

2730-458: A finger to save the republic". Leon Trotsky was especially critical of the shifting Comintern policy position under Joseph Stalin which directed German Communists to treat Social Democrats as " social fascists ". Historian Bertrand Patenaude believed that the Comintern policy following the " Great Break " facilitated the rise of Hitler's party. The Weimar political parties failed to stop

2925-553: A lecture Feder delivered in an army "education" course. The audience member (in Mein Kampf , Hitler disparagingly referred to him as the "professor") asserted that Bavaria should be wholly independent from Germany and should secede from Germany and unite with Austria to form a new South German nation. The volatile Hitler arose and scolded the man, eventually causing him to leave the meeting before its adjournment. Impressed with Hitler's oratory skills, Drexler encouraged him to join

3120-435: A local level". As time went on, anti-clericalism and anti-church sentiment among grass roots party activists "simply couldn't be eradicated" and they could "draw on the verbal violence of party leaders towards the churches for their encouragement. Hitler himself possessed radical instincts in relation to the continuing conflict with the Catholic and Protestant churches in Germany. Though he occasionally spoke of wanting to delay

3315-569: A meeting of the Bavarian League at the Löwenbräukeller . This federalist organization objected to the centralism of the Weimar Constitution but accepted its social program. The League was led by Otto Ballerstedt , an engineer whom Hitler regarded as "my most dangerous opponent". One Nazi, Hermann Esser , climbed upon a chair and shouted that the Jews were to blame for the misfortunes of Bavaria and

3510-524: A nazified international church established that the creator of the thirty-point program for the future of the German churches was Fritz Bildt, a fanatical Nazi and known troublemaker, rather than Alfred Rosenberg, who in 1937 tried to proclaim the program in the Garrison Church in Stettin shortly before the divine service began, he was forcibly removed from the pulpit and fined RMKS 500, having admitted to being

3705-501: A pastoral letter from their Fulda Conference , to be read from all pulpits on 6 July: "Again and again have the bishops brought their justified claims and complaints before the proper authorities... Through this pastoral declaration the Bishops want you to see the real situation of the church". The bishops wrote that the church faced "restrictions and limitations put on the teaching of their religion and on church life" and of great obstacles in

3900-410: A positive impetus: in this case that means the reconstruction of the German heritage in the widest and most comprehensive sense. Himmler saw the main task of his Schutzstaffel (SS) organization to be that of "acting as the vanguard in overcoming Christianity and restoring a 'Germanic' way of living" in order to prepare for the coming conflict between "humans and subhumans": Longerich wrote that, while

4095-484: A proposal to the Reichstag that if passed would immediately grant all legislative powers to the cabinet, and by extension Hitler. This would in effect allow Hitler's government to act without regard to the constitution. Despite outlawing the communists and repressing other opponents, the passage of the Enabling Act was not a certainty. Hitler allied with other nationalist and conservative factions, and they steamrolled over

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4290-582: A putsch. A pivotal moment came when Hitler led the Beer Hall Putsch , an attempted coup d'état on 8–9 November 1923. At the Bürgerbräukeller in Munich, Hitler and his deputies announced their plan: Bavarian government officials would be deposed, and Hitler installed at the head of government, with Munich then used as a base camp from which to march on Berlin. Nearly 2,000 Nazi Party members proceeded to

4485-413: A rivalry. The attacks continued and reached fever pitch when SA leader Axel Schaffeld was assassinated on 1 August. As the Nazi Party was now the largest party in the Reichstag, it was entitled to select the President of the Reichstag and were able to elect Göring for the post. Energised by the success, Hitler asked to be made chancellor. Hitler was offered the job of vice-chancellor by Chancellor Papen at

4680-585: A second book that was discovered and released posthumously as the Zweites Buch . At this time the SA began a period of deliberate antagonism to the Rotfront by marching into Communist strongholds and starting violent altercations. At the end of 1928, party membership was recorded at 130,000. In March 1929, Erich Ludendorff represented the Nazi Party in the Presidential elections. He earned 280,000 votes (1.1%) and

4875-481: A speech, voicing his party's support for the bill amid "concerns put aside", while Brüning notably remained silent. Only SPD chairman Otto Wels spoke against the Act, declaring that the proposed bill could not "destroy ideas which are eternal and indestructible." Kaas had still not received the written constitutional guarantees he had negotiated, but with the assurance it was being "typed up", voting began. Kaas never received

5070-622: A strictly legal course. In 1914, after being granted permission from King Ludwig III of Bavaria , the 25-year-old Austrian-born Hitler enlisted in a Bavarian regiment of the German Army , although he was not yet a German citizen. For over four years (August 1914 – November 1918), Germany was a major participant in World War I. After fighting on the Western Front ended in November 1918, Hitler

5265-482: A tone of exclusion in early Germany, which had a lasting influence on later German nationalism. Bismarck sought to prevent the religious and political divisions in early Germany by rallying the populace against a common enemy. Initially Bismarck ran a campaign against the Catholic church from 1873 to the late 1870s, referred to as Kulturkampf , questioning whether they were loyal to Berlin or other Catholic states. Instead of uniting German people, it instead resulted in

5460-650: A total population of 30,000 sent to the concentration camps. Alfred Rosenberg , an "outspoken pagan", held among offices the title of "the Fuehrer's Delegate for the Entire Intellectual and Philosophical Education and Instruction for the National Socialist Party". He also saw Nazism and Christianity as incompatible. In his Myth of the Twentieth Century (1930), Rosenberg wrote that the main enemies of

5655-467: A unified Reich Church through Gleichschaltung ultimately failed, and Hitler became uninterested in supporting the so-called " German Christians " Nazi-aligned movement. Historian Susannah Heschel wrote that the Kirchenkampf is "sometimes mistakenly understood as referring to the Protestant churches' resistance to National Socialism, but the term in fact refers to the internal dispute between members of

5850-470: A workable coalition. The aggrieved Papen opened negotiations with Hitler, proposing a Nazi-Nationalist Coalition. Having nearly outmaneuvered Hitler, only to be trounced by Schleicher, Papen turned his attentions on defeating Schleicher, and concluded an agreement with Hitler. On 10 March 1931, with street violence between the Rotfront and SA increasing, breaking all previous barriers and expectations, Prussia re-enacted its ban on Brownshirts. Days after

6045-464: Is religious persecution ... indeed rarely has there been a persecution so grave, so terrible, so painful, so sad in its deep effects ... Our protest therefore could not be more explicit or more resolute before the whole world". In March 1938, Nazi Minister of State Adolf Wagner spoke of the need to continue the fight against Political Catholicism and Alfred Rosenberg said that the churches of Germany "as they exist at present, must vanish from

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6240-537: Is safe unless the Commandment, "Thous shalt not kill" is observed ... We the bishops, in the name of the Catholic people ... demand the return of all unlawfully confiscated and in some cases sequestered property ... for what happens today to church property may tomorrow happen to any lawful property. Kershaw wrote that the subjugation of the Protestant churches proved more difficult than Hitler had envisaged. With 28 separate regional churches, his bid to create

6435-558: Is the program of the NSDAP? Hitler : The program is not the question. The only question is power. Strasser : Power is only the means of accomplishing the program. Hitler : These are the opinions of the intellectuals. We need power! By early 1920, the DAP had grown to over 101 members, and Hitler received his membership card as member number 555 (the numbers started from 501). Hitler's considerable oratory and propaganda skills were appreciated by

6630-748: Is to be understood." Under Nazi youth leader Baldur von Schirach , Catholic youth organizations were disbanded and Catholic children corralled into the Hitler Youth . Pope Pius XI issued a message to the youth of Germany on 2 April 1934, noting propaganda and pressure being exerted to point German youth "away from Christ and back to paganism". The Pope again condemned the new paganism to 5,000 German pilgrims in Rome in May and in other addresses later that year. In January 1935, Nazi interior minister Wilhelm Frick urged "putting an end to Church influence over public life". In April,

6825-690: The Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (DAP; German Workers' Party). He rose to a place of prominence in the early years of the party. Being one of its most popular speakers, he was made the party leader after he threatened to otherwise leave. In 1920, the DAP renamed itself to the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei – NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers' Party, commonly known as the Nazi Party ). Hitler chose this name to win over left-wing German workers. Despite

7020-463: The Horst-Wessel-Lied . Goebbels seized upon the attack (and the weeks Wessel spent on his deathbed) to publicize the song, and the funeral was used as an anti-Communist propaganda opportunity for the Nazis. In May, Goebbels was convicted of "libeling" President Hindenburg and fined 800 marks. The conviction stemmed from a 1929 article by Goebbels in his newspaper Der Angriff . In June, Goebbels

7215-734: The Reichskonkordat treaty with the Vatican, which prohibited clergy from participating in politics. Kershaw wrote that the Vatican was anxious to reach agreement with the new government, despite "continuing molestation of Catholic clergy, and other outrages committed by Nazi radicals against the Church and its organisations". The Concordat was signed at the Vatican on 20 July 1933, by Germany's Deputy Reich Chancellor Franz von Papen , and Cardinal Secretary of State Eugenio Pacelli (later Pope Pius XII). In his 1937 anti-Nazi encyclical , Pope Pius XI said that

7410-608: The Schutzstaffel (SS). Inspired by Benito Mussolini 's March on Rome in 1922, Hitler decided that a coup d'état was the proper strategy to seize control of the German government. In May 1923, small elements loyal to Hitler within the Reichswehr helped the SA to illegally procure a barracks and its weaponry, but the order to march never came, possibly because Hitler had been warned by Army General Otto von Lossow that "he would be fired upon" by Reichswehr troops if they attempted

7605-564: The Allies in 1945, and was repealed by a law passed by the occupying powers in September of that year. After being appointed Chancellor of Germany on 30 January 1933, Hitler asked President von Hindenburg to dissolve the Reichstag . A general election was scheduled for 5 March 1933. A secret meeting was held between Hitler and 20 to 25 industrialists at the official residence of Hermann Göring in

7800-529: The Bekennende Kirche Confessing Church and members of the [Nazi-backed] Deutsche Christen German Christians for control of the Protestant church." In 1933, the "German Christians" wanted Nazi doctrines on race and leadership to be applied to a Reich Church but had only around 3,000 of Germany's 17,000 pastors. In July, church leaders submitted a constitution for a Reich Church, which the Reichstag approved. The Church Federation proposed

7995-455: The Bishop of Münster , derided the neo-pagan theories of Rosenberg as perhaps no more than "an occasion for laughter in the educated world", but warned that "his immense importance lies in the acceptance of his basic notions as the authentic philosophy of National Socialism and in his almost unlimited power in the field of German education. Herr Rosenberg must be taken seriously if the German situation

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8190-545: The Centre Party members' votes, he would get the necessary two-thirds majority. Hitler negotiated with the Centre Party's chairman, Ludwig Kaas , a Catholic priest, finalizing an agreement by 22 March. Kaas agreed to support the Act in exchange for assurances of the Centre Party's continued existence, the protection of Catholics' civil and religious liberties, religious schools and the retention of civil servants affiliated with

8385-631: The Communists' Rotfrontkämpferbund and the Nazis' Sturmabteilung (SA). Once the Nazi dictatorship was firmly established, the Nazis themselves created a mythology surrounding their rise to power. German propaganda described this time period as either the Kampfzeit (the time of struggle) or the Kampfjahre (years of struggle). Historians have commented on the influence of German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck 's process of "negative integration" as setting

8580-488: The Confessing Church and members of the (Nazi-backed) " German Christians " over control of the Protestant church. Pierre Aycoberry wrote that for Catholics the phrase kirchenkampf was reminiscent of the kulturkampf of Otto von Bismarck 's time – a campaign which had sought to reduce the influence of the Catholic Church in majority Protestant Germany. Nazism wanted to transform the subjective consciousness of

8775-480: The Democrats suffered severe losses to the Nazis at the polls. The Social Democrats were essentially a conservative trade union party, with ineffectual leadership. The Catholic Centre Party maintained its voting block, but was preoccupied with defending its own particular interests and wrote Bullock: "through 1932–3 ... was so far from recognizing the danger of a Nazi dictatorship that it continued to negotiate with

8970-518: The German Communist Party also began campaigning and called for a revolution. Business leaders, fearful of a communist takeover, began supporting the Nazi Party. Hitler ran for the presidency in 1932 but was defeated by the incumbent Paul von Hindenburg ; nonetheless, he achieved a strong showing of second place in both rounds. Following this, in July 1932 the Nazis became the largest party in

9165-632: The July 1932 federal election , the Nazis became the largest party in the Reichstag, yet without a majority. Hitler withdrew support for Papen and demanded the Chancellorship. He was refused by Hindenburg. Papen dissolved Parliament, and the Nazi vote declined at the November election . In the aftermath of the election, Papen proposed ruling by decree while drafting a new electoral system, with an upper house. Schleicher convinced Hindenburg to sack Papen, and Schleicher himself became Chancellor, promising to form

9360-520: The Marienplatz in Munich's city center, where they were met by a police cordon summoned to obstruct them. Sixteen Nazi Party members and four police officers were killed in the ensuing violence. Hitler briefly escaped the city but was arrested on 11 November 1923, and put on trial for high treason , which gained him widespread public attention. The trial began in February 1924. Hitler endeavored to turn

9555-575: The Nazi Party – after the First World War, and set the violent tone of the movement early, by forming the Sturmabteilung (SA) paramilitary. Catholic Bavaria resented rule from Protestant Berlin , and Hitler at first saw revolution in Bavaria as a means to power. An early attempt at a coup d'état, the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch in Munich , proved fruitless, however, and Hitler was imprisoned for leading

9750-418: The Nazi Party , was appointed as chancellor, the head of the German government. On 27 February, the German parliament building – the Reichstag – caught fire . Acting as chancellor, Hitler immediately accused the Communists of being the perpetrators of the fire and claimed the arson was part of a larger effort to overthrow the German government. Using this justification, Hitler persuaded Hindenburg to enact

9945-409: The Reichstag , albeit short of an absolute majority. 1933 was a pivotal year for Hitler and the Nazi Party. Traditionally, the leader of the party who held the most seats in the Reichstag was appointed Chancellor. However, President von Hindenburg was hesitant to appoint Hitler as chancellor. Following several backroom negotiations – which included industrialists, Hindenburg's son Oskar ,

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10140-526: The Reichstag Fire Decree , which severely curtailed the liberties and rights of German citizens. Using the decree, Hitler began eliminating his political opponents. Following its passage, Hitler began arguing for more drastic means to curtail political opposition and proposed the Enabling Act of 1933 . Once enacted this law gave the German government the power to override individual rights prescribed by

10335-477: The Reichstag Fire Decree . The decree abolished most civil liberties, including the right to speak, assemble, protest, and due process. Using the decree, the Nazis declared a state of emergency and began a violent crackdown against their political enemies. As Hitler cleared the political arena of anyone willing to challenge him, he contended that the decree was insufficient and required sweeping policies that would safeguard his emerging dictatorship. Hitler submitted

10530-541: The Social Democrats in the 5 March 1933 German federal election . Germans voted in an atmosphere of extreme voter intimidation perpetrated by the Nazi Sturmabteilung (SA) militia. Contrary to popular belief, Hitler did not win an outright majority in the Reichstag as the majority of Germans did not vote for the Nazi Party. The election was a setback for the Nazis; however, it was insufficient in stopping

10725-657: The Surrender of Germany in World War II. Article 9 of the German Constitution , enacted in 1949, allows for social groups to be labeled verfassungsfeindlich ("hostile to the constitution") and to be proscribed by the federal government. Political parties can be labeled enemies to the constitution only by the Bundesverfassungsgericht ( Federal Constitutional Court ), according to Art. 21 II. The idea behind

10920-507: The United States under the Dawes Plan . The German political landscape was dramatically affected by the 1929 Wall Street Crash , which hampered economic aid to Germany. The Great Depression brought the German economy to a halt and further polarized German politics. Hitler and the Nazis began to exploit the crisis and loudly criticized the ruling government. During this tumultuous time,

11115-453: The "dominant political force on the right". An unprecedented amount of money was thrown behind the campaign and political success increased the party's momentum as it recorded over 100,000 new members in the next few months following the election. Well over one million pamphlets were produced and distributed; sixty trucks were commandeered for use in Berlin alone. In areas where Nazi campaigning

11310-529: The "principle of Christian mercy", both of which he saw as a dangerous obstacle to his planned battle with "subhumans". In 1937 he wrote: We live in an era of the ultimate conflict with Christianity. It is part of the mission of the SS to give the German people in the next half century the non-Christian ideological foundations on which to lead and shape their lives. This task does not consist solely in overcoming an ideological opponent but must be accompanied at every step by

11505-515: The "temporary" dictatorial powers with which he went on to permanently dismantle the Weimar Republic , Hitler promised the Reichstag on 23 March 1933, that he would not interfere with the rights of the churches. However, with power secured in Germany, Hitler quickly broke this promise. He divided the Lutheran Church (Germany's main Protestant denomination) and instigated a brutal persecution of

11700-492: The 1920s, Hitler and the Nazis ran on a platform consisting of anti-communism , antisemitism , and ultranationalism . Nazi party leaders vociferously criticized the ruling democratic government and the Treaty of Versailles , while proselytizing their desire to turn Germany into a world power. At this time, most Germans were indifferent to Hitler's rhetoric as the German economy was beginning to recover in large part due to loans from

11895-899: The 1933 Concordat, reiterated complaints of the suffocation of Catholic schooling, presses and hospitals and said that the "Catholic faith has been restricted to such a degree that it has disappeared almost entirely from public life" and even worship within churches in Germany "is frequently restricted or oppressed", while in the conquered territories (and even in the Old Reich), churches had been "closed by force and even used for profane purposes". The freedom of speech of clergymen had been suppressed and priests were being "watched constantly" and punished for fulfilling "priestly duties" and incarcerated in Concentration camps without legal process. Religious orders had been expelled from schools, and their properties seized, while seminaries had been confiscated "to deprive

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12090-473: The 1933 Concordat, the Anti-Christian nature of its ideology and its attacks on Christian values. It accused the government of sowing the "tares of suspicion, discord, hatred, calumny, of secret and open fundamental hostility to Christ and His Church" and Pius noted on the horizon the "threatening storm clouds" of religious wars of extermination over Germany. The Vatican had the text smuggled into Germany and printed and distributed in secret. Written in German, not

12285-421: The Act had formally given legislative powers to the government as a whole, these powers were for all intents and purposes exercised by Hitler himself. After its passage, there were no longer serious deliberations in Cabinet meetings. Its meetings became more and more infrequent after 1934, and it never met in full after 1938. Due to the great care that Hitler took to give his dictatorship an appearance of legality,

12480-457: The Act, the government had acquired the authority to enact laws without either parliamentary consent or control. These laws could (with certain exceptions) even deviate from the Constitution. The Act effectively eliminated the Reichstag as an active player in German politics. While its existence was protected by the Enabling Act, for all intents and purposes it reduced the Reichstag to a mere stage for Hitler's speeches. It only met sporadically until

12675-438: The Bavarian Supreme Court, he was released from jail on 20 December 1924, after serving just nine months, against the state prosecutor's objections. Hitler used the time in Landsberg Prison to reconsider his political strategy and dictate the first volume of Mein Kampf ( My Struggle ; originally entitled Four and a Half Years of Struggle against Lies, Stupidity, and Cowardice ), principally to his deputy Rudolf Hess . After

12870-428: The Beer Hall Putsch, the Nazi Party was banned in Bavaria , but it participated in 1924's two elections by proxy as the National Socialist Freedom Movement (NSFB) (combination of the Deutschvölkische Freiheitspartei (DVFP) and the Nazi Party (NSDAP)). In the May 1924 German federal election the party gained seats in the Reichstag, with 6.6% (1,918,329) voting for the Movement. In the December 1924 federal election ,

13065-410: The Bible quickly alienated sections of the Protestant church. Pastor Martin Niemöller responded with the Pastors Emergency League which re-affirmed the Bible. The movement grew into the Confessing Church , from which some clergymen opposed the Nazi regime. Nazi takeover Adolf Hitler's rise to power began in the newly established Weimar Republic in September 1919 when Hitler joined

13260-438: The Catholic Church as one of the main enemies of Nazism. The church responded on 16 February 1934 with the banning of Rosenberg's book. The Sanctum Officium recommended that Rosenberg's book be put on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum (forbidden books list of the Catholic Church) for scorning and rejecting "all dogmas of the Catholic Church, indeed the very fundamentals of the Christian religion". Clemens August Graf von Galen ,

13455-444: The Catholic priesthood of successors". The bishops denounced the Nazi euthanasia program and declared their support for human rights and personal freedom under God and "just laws" of all people: We demand juridical proof of all sentences and release of all fellow citizens who have been deprived of their liberty without proof ... We the German bishops shall not cease to protest against the killing of innocent persons. Nobody's life

13650-431: The Catholics, as it were, in their own churches. They could celebrate mass and retain their rituals as much as they liked, but they could have nothing at all to do with German society otherwise. Catholic schools and newspapers were closed, and a propaganda campaign against the Catholics was launched. The Concordat, wrote William Shirer , "was hardly put to paper before it was being broken by the Nazi Government". On 25 July,

13845-408: The Centre Party. It has also been suggested that some members of the SPD were intimidated by the presence of the Nazi Sturmabteilung (SA) throughout the proceedings. Some historians, such as Klaus Scholder , have maintained that Hitler also promised to negotiate a Reichskonkordat with the Holy See , a treaty that formalized the position of the Catholic Church in Germany on a national level. Kaas

14040-577: The Christian and a heroic-German world view". Worried about the dissention caused by the Kirchenkampf, Hitler told Goebbels in the summer of 1935 he sought "peace with the Churches" – "at least for a period of time". As with the "Jewish problem", the radicals nonetheless pushed the church struggle forward, especially in Catholic areas, so that by the winter of 1935–1936 there was growing dissatisfaction with

14235-454: The Christian life has been rendered difficult. All that remains of the once great Catholic press in Germany are a few Parish magazines. The threat of a national religion is looming increasingly over all religious life. This national religion is based solely on the Fuhrer's will". On 26 July 1941, Bishop August Graf von Galen wrote to the government to complain "The Secret Police has continued to rob

14430-605: The Church Struggle, beginning around April. Goebbels noted heightened verbal attacks on the clergy from Hitler in his diary and wrote that Hitler had approved the start of trumped up "immorality trials" against clergy and anti-church propaganda campaign. Goebbels' orchestrated attack included a staged "morality trial" of 37 Franciscans. In his Christmas Eve 1937 address, Pope Pius XI told the College of Cardinals, that despite what "some people" had been saying, "In Germany, in fact, there

14625-480: The Church struggle and was prepared to restrain his anti-clericalism out of political considerations, his "own inflammatory comments gave his immediate underlings all the license they needed to turn up the heat in the 'Church Struggle, confident that they were 'working towards the Fuhrer'". Bullock wrote that the churches and the army were the only two institutions to retain some independence in Nazi Germany and "among

14820-637: The Churches must yield to the 'primacy of the state', railing against any compromise with 'the most horrible institution imaginable'." Martin Bormann became Hitler's private secretary and de facto "deputy" Führer in April 1941. He was a leading advocate of the Kirchenkampf. Bormann was a rigid guardian of Nazi orthodoxy and saw Christianity and Nazism as "'incompatible,' primarily because the essential elements of Christianity were 'taken over from Judaism.'" He said publicly in 1941 that "National Socialism and Christianity are irreconcilable". Bormann's view of Christianity

15015-592: The Communists (KPD) were expected to vote against the Act. The government had already arrested all Communist and some Social Democrat deputies under the Reichstag Fire Decree. The Nazis expected the parties representing the middle class, the Junkers and business interests to vote for the measure, as they had grown weary of the instability of the Weimar Republic and would not dare to resist. Hitler believed that with

15210-502: The Communists were responsible for the fire, KPD membership was an act of treason. Thus, for all intents and purposes, the KPD was banned as of 6 March, the day after the election. Göring also declared that any deputy who was "absent without excuse" was to be considered as present, in order to overcome obstructions. Leaving nothing to chance, the Nazis used the provisions of the Reichstag Fire Decree to detain several SPD deputies. A few others saw

15405-453: The Communists, the Nazis did not formally ban the KPD right away. Not only did they fear a violent uprising, but they hoped the KPD's presence on the ballot would siphon off votes from the SPD. However, it was an open secret that the KPD deputies would never be allowed to take their seats; they were thrown in jail as quickly as the police could track them down. Courts began taking the line that since

15600-496: The DAP to the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei  – NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers' Party), later known to the rest of the world as the Nazi Party . Hitler designed the party's banner of a swastika in a white circle on a red background. He was discharged from the army in March 1920 and began working full-time for the Nazi Party. Although the NSDAP claimed that Hitler received no income from them and lived on

15795-434: The DAP. On the orders of his army superiors, Hitler applied to join the party. Within a week, Hitler received a postcard stating he had officially been accepted as a member and he should come to a "committee" meeting to discuss it. Hitler attended the "committee" meeting held at the run-down Alte Rosenbad beerhouse. Later Hitler wrote that joining the fledgling party "...was the most decisive resolve of my life. From here there

15990-655: The Distress of People and Reich ' ), was a law that gave the German Cabinet – most importantly, the Chancellor – the power to make and enforce laws without the involvement of the Reichstag or Weimar President Paul von Hindenburg , leading to the rise of Nazi Germany . Critically, the Enabling Act allowed the Chancellor to bypass the system of checks and balances in the government. In January 1933, Adolf Hitler , leader of

16185-581: The Enabling Act had been breached two weeks earlier by the " Law on the Reconstruction of the Reich " (30 January 1934), which dissolved the state parliaments, transferred the states' sovereign powers to the Reich and effectively rendered the Reichsrat irrelevant. Article 2 stated that laws passed under the Enabling Act could not affect the institutions of either chamber. In August, Hindenburg died, and Hitler seized

16380-413: The Enabling Act was renewed twice, in 1937 and 1941. However, its renewal was practically assured since all other parties were banned. Voters were presented with a single list of Nazis and Nazi-approved "guest" candidates under far-from-secret conditions. In 1942, the Reichstag passed a law giving Hitler power of life and death over every citizen, effectively extending the provisions of the Enabling Act for

16575-421: The Enabling Act was signed into law by President Paul von Hindenburg. Unless extended by the Reichstag, the act would expire after four years. With the Enabling Act now in force, the cabinet (in practice, the chancellor) could pass and enforce laws without legislative oversight. The combined effect of the Enabling Act and the Reichstag Fire Decree transformed Hitler's government into a legal dictatorship and laid

16770-552: The Enabling Act with the support of 83% of the deputies. The session took place under such intimidating conditions that even if all SPD deputies had been present, it would have still passed with 78.7% support. The same day in the evening, the Reichsrat also gave its approval, unanimously and without prior discussion. The Act was then signed into law by President Hindenburg, Hitler as Chancellor, Wilhelm Frick as Interior Minister, Konstantin von Neurath as Foreign Minister, and Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk as Finance Minister. Under

16965-576: The Fatherland, and brave service of Catholics soldiers. It accused the regime of seeking to rid Germany of Christianity: For years a war has raged in our Fatherland against Christianity and the Church, and has never been conducted with such bitterness. Repeatedly the German bishops have asked the Reich Government to discontinue this fatal struggle; but unfortunately our appeals and our endeavours were without success. The letter outlined serial breaches of

17160-400: The German people – their attitudes, values, and mentalities – into a single-minded, obedient Volksgemeinschaft or "National People's Community". According to Ian Kershaw , in order to achieve this, the Nazis believed they would have to replace class, religious and regional allegiances by a "massively enhanced national self-awareness to mobilize the German people psychologically for

17355-433: The German people... the existence of Christianity in Germany is at stake. The following year, on 22 March 1942, the German bishops issued a pastoral letter on "The Struggle against Christianity and the Church": The letter launched a defence of human rights and the rule of law and accused the Reich Government of "unjust oppression and hated struggle against Christianity and the Church", despite the loyalty of German Catholics to

17550-576: The Germans were the "Russian Tartars" and "Semites" – with "Semites" including Christians, especially the Catholic Church. Joseph Goebbels , the Nazi Minister for Propaganda, was among the more anti-clerical Nazi activists. Goebbels helped stage the "immorality trials" against the clergy in 1936 and 1937, as the war progressed, on the "Church Problem", he wrote "after the war it has to be generally solved... There is, namely, an insoluble opposition between

17745-550: The Head of State.). Debate within the Centre Party continued until the day of the vote, 23 March 1933, with Kaas advocating voting in favour of the act, referring to an upcoming written guarantee from Hitler, while former Chancellor Heinrich Brüning called for a rejection of the Act. The majority sided with Kaas, and Brüning agreed to maintain party cohesion by voting for the Act. The Reichstag, led by its president, Hermann Göring , changed its rules of procedure to make it easier to pass

17940-478: The Holy See had signed the Concordat "In spite of many serious misgivings" and in the hope it might "safeguard the liberty of the church in her mission of salvation in Germany". The treaty consisted of 34 articles and a supplementary protocol. Article 1 guaranteed "freedom of profession and public practice of the Catholic religion" and acknowledged the right of the church to regulate its own affairs. Within three months of

18135-518: The Jehovah's Witnesses . He dishonoured a Concordat signed with the Vatican and permitted attacks on Catholic organizations and education. A special Priests Barracks was established at Dachau Concentration Camp for clergy who had opposed the Hitler regime – its occupants were mainly Polish Catholic clergy. Leading Nazis varied in the importance they attached to the Church Struggle. Kershaw wrote that, to

18330-523: The KPD candidate Thälmann gained a meagre percentage of the vote (10.2% 3,706,759). At this time, the Nazi Party had just over 800,000 members. On 13 April 1932, following the presidential elections, the German government banned the Nazi Party paramilitaries, the SA and the SS, on the basis of the Emergency Decree for the Preservation of State Authority. This action was prompted by details uncovered by

18525-690: The Limitations of the Authority of the State"), issued 20 October 1939, was the first papal encyclical issued by Pope Pius XII, and established some of the themes of his papacy. During the drafting of the letter, the Second World War commenced with the Nazi/Soviet invasion of Catholic Poland. Couched in diplomatic language, Pius endorses Catholic resistance, and states his disapproval of the war, racism, anti-semitism,

18720-511: The Munich Hofbräuhaus . After Hitler had spoken for some time, the meeting erupted into a melée in which a small company of SA defeated the opposition. For his part in these events, Hitler was eventually sentenced in January 1922 to three months' imprisonment for "breach of the peace", but only spent a little over one month at Stadelheim Prison in Munich. In 1922 and early 1923, Hitler and

18915-474: The NSDAP being a right-wing party, it had many anti-capitalist and anti-bourgeois elements. Hitler later initiated a purge of these elements and reaffirmed the Nazi Party's pro-business stance. By 1922 Hitler's control over the party was unchallenged, and he attempted a coup, the Beer Hall Putsch , in Bavaria one year later. After the coup's failure, Hitler was arrested and put on trial. The trial proved to be

19110-596: The National Reich Church of Germany was to claim exclusive control over all churches in the Reich; (5) "the strange and foreign Christian faiths imported into Germany in the ill-omened year 800" were to be exterminated; (7) priests/pastors were to be replaced with National Reich Orators; (13) publication of the Bible was to cease; (14) Mein Kampf was to be considered the foremost source of ethics; (18) crucifixes, Bibles and saints to be removed from altars; (19) Mein Kampf

19305-543: The National Socialist Freedom Movement lost 18 seats, only holding on to 14 seats, with 3% (907,242) of the electorate voting for Hitler's party. The Barmat Scandal was often used later in Nazi propaganda, both as an electoral strategy and as an appeal to anti-Semitism. After some reflection, Hitler had determined that power was to be achieved not through revolution outside of the government, but rather through what he called "the path of legality" within

19500-631: The Nazi Party formed two organizations that would grow to have huge significance. The first began as the Jungsturm Adolf Hitler and the Jugendbund der NSDAP ; they would later become the Hitler Youth . The other was the Stabswache (Staff Guard), which in May 1923 was renamed the Stoßtrupp-Hitler (Shock Troop-Hitler). This early incarnation of a bodyguard unit for Hitler would later become

19695-638: The Nazi Party, culminating in the Night of the Long Knives . Once the purges of the Nazi Party and German government concluded, Hitler had total control over Germany. Armed with the Enabling Act, Hitler could begin German rearmament and achieve his aggressive foreign policy aims which ultimately resulted in the Second World War . The Enabling Act was renewed twice, but was rendered moot when Nazi Germany surrendered to

19890-474: The Nazi extremists." Because the Nazi Gleichschaltung policy of forced coordination encountered such forceful opposition from the churches, Hitler decided to postpone the struggle until after the war. During the war, Rosenberg, the party's official ideologist outlined the future envisioned for religion in Germany, with a thirty-point program for the future of the German churches. Among its articles: (1)

20085-486: The Nazi movement as a whole launched itself against Jews and Communists, "by linking de-Christianization with re-Germanization, Himmler had provided the SS with a goal and purpose all of its own." He set about making his SS the focus of a "cult of the Teutons". Goebbels noted the mood of Hitler in his diary on 25 October 1936: "Trials against the Catholic Church temporarily stopped. Possibly wants peace, at least temporarily. Now

20280-522: The Nazi regime. By mid-March, the government began sending communists, labor union leaders, and other political dissidents to Dachau , the first Nazi concentration camp. The passing of the Enabling Act marked the formal transition from the democratic Weimar Republic to the totalitarian Nazi dictatorship. From 1933 onward, Hitler continued to consolidate and centralize power via purges and propaganda. In 1934, Hitler and Heinrich Himmler began removing non-Nazi officials together with Hitler's rivals within

20475-457: The Nazi rise. Germany's Weimar political system made it difficult for chancellors to govern with a stable parliamentary majority, and successive chancellors instead relied on the president's emergency powers to govern. In 1931 the Nazi Party altered its strategy to engage in perpetual campaigning across the country, even outside of election time. From 1931 to 1933, the Nazis combined terror tactics with conventional campaigning – Hitler criss-crossed

20670-481: The Nazi/Soviet invasion of Poland and the brutal attacks on the churches. In March 1941, Vatican Radio decried the wartime position of the Catholic Church in Germany: "The religious situation in Germany is pathetic. All young men that feel their vocation is to take Holy Orders must forego this desire. The number of monasteries and convents which have been dissolved has become even larger. The development and maintenance of

20865-411: The Nazis in those areas. Kershaw noted that in early 1937, Hitler again told his inner circle that he "did not want a 'Church struggle" at this juncture", he expected "the great world struggle in a few years' time". Nevertheless, Hitler's impatience with the churches "prompted frequent outbursts of hostility. In early 1937 he was declaring that 'Christianity was ripe for destruction' ( Untergang ), and that

21060-490: The Nazis promulgated their sterilization law, an offensive policy in the eyes of the Catholic Church. Five days later, moves began to dissolve the Catholic Youth League. Clergy, nuns and lay leaders began to be targeted, leading to thousands of arrests over the ensuing years, often on trumped up charges of currency smuggling or "immorality". In Hitler's bloody night of the long knives purge of 1934, Erich Klausener ,

21255-403: The Nazis shouted demands that Ballerstedt yield the floor to Hitler. The Nazis beat up Ballerstedt and shoved him off the stage into the audience. Hitler and Esser were arrested and Hitler commented notoriously to the police commissioner, "It's all right. We got what we wanted. Ballerstedt did not speak". Less than two months later, 4 November 1921, the Nazi Party held a large public meeting in

21450-540: The Nazis". The Communists meanwhile were engaging in violent clashes with Nazis on the streets, but Moscow had directed the Communist Party to prioritise destruction of the Social Democrats, seeing more danger in them as a rival for the loyalty of the working class. Nevertheless, wrote Bullock, the heaviest responsibility lay with the German right wing, who "forsook a true conservatism" and made Hitler their partner in

21645-471: The Prussian police that indicated the SA was ready for a takeover of power by force after an election of Hitler. The lifting of the ban and staging of new elections were the price Hitler demanded in exchange for his support of a new cabinet. The law was repealed on 16 June by Franz von Papen , Chancellor of Germany as part of his agreement with Hitler. In the federal election of July 1932 , the Nazis won 37.3% of

21840-502: The Reichstag Presidential Palace, aimed at financing the election campaign of the Nazi Party . The burning of the Reichstag was depicted by the Nazis as the beginning of a communist revolution, and Hitler urged Hindenburg to pass the presidential Reichstag Fire Decree . The decree significantly curbed civil rights for German citizens and suspended freedom of press and habeas corpus rights just five days before

22035-542: The Rotfront recorded losses of approximately 80 killed. Street fights and beer hall battles resulting in deaths occurred throughout February and April 1932, all against the backdrop of Adolf Hitler's competition in the presidential election which pitted him against the monumentally popular Hindenburg. In the first round on 13 March, Hitler had polled over 11 million votes but was still behind Hindenburg. The second and final round took place on 10 April: Hitler (36.8% 13,418,547) lost to Paul von Hindenburg (53.0% 19,359,983) while

22230-402: The SA had gathered at Innitzer's cathedral during a service Catholic Youth and started "counter-shouts and whistlings: 'Down with Innitzer! Our faith is Germany'". The mob later gathered at the cardinal's residence and the following day stoned the building, broke in and ransacked it – bashing a secretary unconscious, and storming another house of the cathedral curia and throwing its curate out

22425-515: The Security Police, and the SD were responsible for suppressing internal and external enemies of the Nazi state. Among those enemies were "political churches" – such as Lutheran and Catholic clergy who opposed the Hitler regime. Such dissidents were arrested and sent to concentration camps. According to Himmler biographer Peter Longerich , Himmler was vehemently opposed to Christian sexual morality and

22620-555: The ambitious Major-General Kurt von Schleicher , as Minister handling army and navy matters hoped to harness their support. With Schleicher's backing, and Hitler's stated approval, Hindenburg appointed the Catholic monarchist Franz von Papen to replace Brüning as Chancellor in June 1932. Papen had been active in the resurgence of the Harzburg Front . He had fallen out with the Centre Party. He hoped ultimately to outmaneuver Hitler. At

22815-472: The ban, SA-men shot dead two communists in a street fight, which led to a ban being placed on the public speaking of Goebbels, who sidestepped the prohibition by recording speeches and playing them to an audience in his absence. When Hitler's citizenship became a matter of public discussion in 1924, he had a public declaration printed on 16 October 1924: The loss of my Austrian citizenship is not painful to me, as I never felt as an Austrian citizen but always as

23010-481: The behest of President Hindenburg, but he refused. Hitler saw this offer as placing him in a position of "playing second fiddle" in the government. In his position of Reichstag president, Göring asked that decisive measures be taken by the government over the spate of murders of Nazi Party members. On 9 August, amendments were made to the Reichstrafgesetzbuch statute on "acts of political violence", increasing

23205-474: The bill. Under the Weimar Constitution , a quorum of two-thirds of the entire Reichstag membership was required to be present in order to bring up a constitutional amendment bill. In this case, 432 of the Reichstag's 647 deputies would have normally been required for a quorum. However, Göring reduced the quorum to 378 by not counting the 81 KPD deputies. Despite the virulent rhetoric directed against

23400-480: The cabinet, in its first post-election meeting on 15 March, draw up plans for an Enabling Act which would give the cabinet legislative power for four years. The Nazis devised the Enabling Act to gain complete political power without the need of the support of a majority in the Reichstag and without the need to bargain with their coalition partners. The Nazi regime was unique compared to its contemporaries, most famously Joseph Stalin 's, because Hitler did not seek to draft

23595-406: The churches and, in office, Hitler restrained his own anticlerical instincts out of political considerations, as well as the anticlericalism of his underlinings. Hitler biographer Ian Kershaw wrote that, while many ordinary people were apathetic, after years of warning from Catholic clergy, Germany's Catholic population greeted the Nazi takeover with uncertainty, while among German Protestants, there

23790-441: The city secure. In the aftermath of arrests and executions, Hitler denounced a fellow liaison, Georg Dufter, as a Soviet "radical rabble-rouser". Other testimony he gave to the military board of inquiry allowed them to root out other members of the military that "had been infected with revolutionary fervor." For his anti-communist views he was allowed to avoid discharge when his unit was disbanded in May 1919. In June 1919, Hitler

23985-400: The coming struggle and to boost their morale during the inevitable war". According to Anton Gill , the Nazis disliked universities, intellectuals and the Catholic and Protestant churches, their long term plan being to "de-Christianise Germany after the final victory". The Nazis co-opted the term Gleichschaltung (coordination) to mean conformity and subservience to the Nazi Party line: "there

24180-481: The concept is the notion that even a majority rule of the people cannot be allowed to install a totalitarian or autocratic regime such as with the Enabling Act of 1933, thereby violating the principles of the German constitution. In his book, The Coming of the Third Reich , British historian Richard J. Evans argued that the Enabling Act was legally invalid. He contended that Göring had no right to arbitrarily reduce

24375-540: The confines of the democratic system established by Weimar. In the May 1928 federal election , the Nazi Party achieved just 12 seats in the Reichstag. The highest provincial gain was again in Bavaria (5.1%), though in three areas the Nazis failed to gain even 1% of the vote. Overall, the party gained 2.6% of the vote (810,100 votes). Partially due to the poor results, Hitler decided that Germans needed to know more about his goals. Despite being discouraged by his publisher, he wrote

24570-475: The conservative MP Heinrich Osel . In this political chaos Berlin sent in the military – called the "White Guards of Capitalism" by the communists. On 3 April 1919, Hitler was elected as the liaison of his military battalion and again on 15 April. During this time, he urged his unit to stay out of the fighting and not to join either side. The Bavarian Soviet Republic was officially crushed on 6 May, when Lieutenant General Burghard von Oven and his forces declared

24765-475: The constitution, and vested the Chancellor (Hitler) with emergency powers to pass and enforce laws without parliamentary oversight. The law came into force in March and by April, Hitler held de facto dictatorial powers and used them to order the construction of the first Nazi concentration camp at Dachau for communists and other political opponents. Hitler's rise to power was completed in August 1934 when, following

24960-410: The constitution, without the consent of the Reichstag. Because this law allowed for departures from the constitution, it was itself considered a constitutional amendment. Thus, its passage required the support of two-thirds of those deputies who were present and voting. A quorum of two-thirds of the entire Reichstag was required to be present in order to call up the bill. The Social Democrats (SPD) and

25155-405: The daily publication of religious papers was banned and soon after, censorship of weekly periodicals was introduced. The American National Catholic Welfare Conference complained that anti-church songs were chanted by Hitler Youth and "anti-Christian slogans were chanted from trucks, which bore on their sides scurrilous cartoons of priests and nuns" while Catholic Youth organizations were "accused of

25350-466: The death of President von Hindenburg, Hitler merged the chancellery with the presidency and became Führer , the sole leader of Germany. In retrospect, Hitler's rise to power was aided in part by his willingness to use violence in advancing his political objectives and to recruit party members willing to do the same. The party engaged in electoral battles in which Hitler participated as a speaker and organizer. Street battles and violence also erupted between

25545-544: The duration of the war. At least two, and possibly three, of the penultimate measures Hitler took to consolidate his power in 1934 violated the Enabling Act. On 14 February 1934, the Reichsrat , representing the states, was abolished by the " Law on the Abolition of the Reichsrat " even though Article 2 of the Enabling Act specifically protected the existence of both the Reichstag and the Reichsrat . It also can be argued that

25740-606: The election. Hitler used the decree to have the Communist Party 's offices raided and its representatives arrested, effectively eliminating them as a political force. Although they received five million more votes than in the previous election, the Nazis failed to gain an absolute majority in parliament, and depended on the 8% of seats won by their coalition partner, the German National People's Party , to reach 52% in total. To free himself from this dependency, Hitler had

25935-487: The end of World War II , held no debates and enacted only a few laws. Within three months of the passage of the Enabling Act, all parties except the Nazi Party were banned or pressured into dissolving themselves, followed on 14 July by a law that made the Nazi Party the only legally permitted party in the country. With this, Hitler had fulfilled what he had promised in earlier campaign speeches: "I set for myself one aim ... to sweep these thirty parties out of Germany!" During

26130-460: The evening of 14 January 1930, at around ten o'clock, Horst Wessel was fatally shot in the face at point-blank range by two members of the KPD in Friedrichshain . The attack occurred after an argument with his landlady, who was a member of the KPD and contacted one of her Rotfront friends, Albert Hochter, who shot Wessel. Wessel had penned a song months before which would become a Nazi anthem as

26325-408: The fees he received from public speaking at non-party events, he was actually supported financially by several wealthy patrons and party sympathisers. In 1920, a small "hall protection" squad was organised around Emil Maurice . The group was first named the "Order troops" ( Ordnertruppen ). Later in August 1921, Hitler redefined the group, which became known as the "Gymnastic and Sports Division" of

26520-432: The fields of Catholic education, freedom of service and religious festivals, the practice of charity by religious orders and the role of preaching morals. Catholic presses had been silenced and kindergartens closed and religious instruction in schools nearly stamped out: Dear Members of the diosceses: We Bishops... feel an ever great sorrow about the existence of powers working to dissolve the blessed union between Christ and

26715-448: The former chancellor Franz von Papen , and Hitler – Hindenburg acquiesced and on 30 January 1933, he formally appointed Adolf Hitler as Germany's new chancellor. Although he was chancellor, Hitler was not yet an absolute dictator. The groundwork for the Nazi dictatorship was laid when the Reichstag was set on fire in February 1933. Asserting that the communists were behind the arson, Hitler convinced von Hindenburg to pass

26910-517: The government the right to draw up the budget, approve treaties, and enact any laws whatsoever without input from the Reichstag. By the rules of pre-1933 (and post-1945, if such a law were not now unconstitutional) German legal interpretation, this means that such laws are put to vote in the Cabinet and there decided by majority vote (which was not followed). - Note the position of the Chancellor in Article 3. In

27105-400: The groundwork for his totalitarian regime. By July, the NSDAP was the only legally permitted party in Germany. The Reichstag from 1933 onward effectively became the rubber stamp parliament that Hitler had desired. The conservative elite, which included the vice-chancellor Franz von Papen , who miscalculated the true intention of the Nazis to monopolize state power, were soon marginalized by

27300-819: The guards' regiment in Munich and from 30 May the head of the "Education and Propaganda Department" of the General Command von Oven and the Group Command No. 4 (Department Ib). In this capacity as head of the intelligence department, Mayr recruited Hitler as an undercover agent in early June 1919. Under Captain Mayr, "national thinking" courses were arranged at the Reichswehrlager Lechfeld near Augsburg , with Hitler attending from 10 to 19 July. During this time Hitler so impressed Mayr that he assigned him to an anti- Bolshevik "educational commando" as 1 of 26 instructors in

27495-450: The head of Catholic Action, was assassinated by the Gestapo. Catholic publications were shut down. The Gestapo began to violate the sanctity of the confessional. In January 1934, Hitler appointed Alfred Rosenberg as the cultural and educational leader of the Reich. Rosenberg was a neo-pagan and notoriously anti-Catholic. In his Myth of the Twentieth Century (1930), Rosenberg had described

27690-469: The letter. At this stage, the majority of deputies already supported the bill, and any deputies who might have been reluctant to vote in favour were intimidated by the SA troops surrounding the meeting. In the end, all parties except the SPD voted in favour of the Enabling Act. With the KPD banned and 26 SPD deputies arrested or in hiding, the final tally was 444 in favour of the Enabling Act against 94 (all Social Democrats) opposed. The Reichstag had adopted

27885-620: The life of our people". In the space of a few months, Bishop Johannes Baptista Sproll of Rothenberg, Cardinal Michael von Faulhaber of Munich, and Cardinal Theodor Innitzer of Vienna were physically attacked by Nazis. After initially offering support to the Anschluss, Austria's Innitzer became a critic of the Nazis. With power secured in Austria, a Nazi mob ransacked his residence, after he had denounced Nazi antisemitism and violence. L'Osservatore Romano reported on 15 October that Hitler Youth and

28080-413: The long term in favor of a racialized form of Germanic paganism . The Nazi Party saw the church struggle as an important ideological battleground. Hitler biographer Ian Kershaw wrote of the struggle in terms of an ongoing and escalating conflict between the Nazi state and the Christian churches. Historian Susannah Heschel wrote that the Kirchenkampf refers only to an internal dispute between members of

28275-606: The most courageous demonstrations of opposition during the war were the sermons preached by the Catholic Bishop of Munster and the Protestant Pastor, Dr Niemoller ..." but that "Neither the Catholic Church nor the Evangelical Church, however, as institutions, felt it possible to take up an attitude of open opposition to the regime". In the Nazi police state, the ability of the church and its members to oppose Nazi policy

28470-466: The nation by air, while SA troops paraded in the streets, beat up opponents, and broke up their meetings. Systematic statistical analyses demonstrate that voters responded the way they do in most modern elections, which explains why certain identifiable groups turned to the Nazis and others turned away. A middle-class liberal party strong enough to block the Nazis did not exist – the People's Party and

28665-454: The negotiations between the government and the political parties, it was agreed that the government should inform the Reichstag parties of legislative measures passed under the Enabling Act. For this purpose, a working committee was set up, co-chaired by Hitler and Centre Party chairman Kaas. However, this committee met only three times without any major impact, and rapidly became a dead letter even before all other parties were banned. Though

28860-507: The new Nazi government, Race policy and the 'Church Struggle' were among the most important ideological spheres: "In both areas, the party had no difficulty in mobilizing its activists, whose radicalism in turn forced the government into legislative action. In fact the party leadership often found itself compelled to respond to pressures from below, stirred up by the Gauleiter playing their own game, or emanating sometimes from radical activists at

29055-404: The nickname of the "Lion of Munster". The sermons were printed and distributed illegally. He denounced the lawlessness of the Gestapo, the confiscations of church properties and the cruel program of Nazi euthanasia. He attacked the Gestapo for seizing church properties and converting them to their own purposes – including use as cinemas and brothels. On 26 June 1941, the German bishops drafted

29250-414: The old economic systems voted for the Nazis and the Communists , who made great gains at the 1930 federal election . The Nazis and Communists between them secured almost 40% of Reichstag seats, which required the moderate parties to consider negotiations with anti-democrats. "The Communists", wrote historian Alan Bullock , "openly announced that they would prefer to see the Nazis in power rather than lift

29445-598: The palpable absurdity of communist plotting". On 12 May, members of the Hitler Youth attacked Caspar Klein , the Archbishop of Paderborn . Goering issued a decree against Political Catholicism in July. In August, Nazi stormtroopers held anti-clerical protests in Munich and Freiberg-im-Breisgau. Nazi propagandist Julius Streicher accused clergy and nuns of sexual perversion. The "morality trials" of Catholic clergy and nuns began in

29640-547: The party ( Turn- und Sportabteilung ). By the autumn of 1921 the group was being called the Sturmabteilung ("Storm Detachment") or SA, and by November 1921 the group was officially known by that name. Also in 1920, Hitler began to lecture in Munich beer halls, particularly the Hofbräuhaus , Sterneckerbräu and Bürgerbräukeller . Only Hitler was able to bring in the crowds for the party speeches and meetings. By this time,

29835-531: The party leadership. With the support of Anton Drexler, Hitler became chief of propaganda for the party in early 1920 and his actions began to transform the party. He organised their biggest meeting yet, of 2,000 people, on 24 February 1920 in the Staatliches Hofbräuhaus in München . There Hitler announced the party's 25-point program ( see National Socialist Program ). He also engineered the name change of

30030-401: The party on 26 July as member 3,680. In the following days, Hitler spoke to several packed houses and defended himself, to thunderous applause. His strategy proved successful: at a general membership meeting, he was granted absolute powers as party chairman, with only one nay vote cast. On 14 September 1921, Hitler and a substantial number of SA members and other Nazi Party adherents disrupted

30225-496: The penalty to "lifetime imprisonment, 20 years hard labour[,] or death". Special courts were announced to try such offences. When in power less than half a year later, Hitler would use this legislation against his opponents with devastating effect. Enabling Act of 1933 Final solution Parties The Enabling Act of 1933 ( German : Ermächtigungsgesetz ), officially titled Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich ( lit.   ' Law to Remedy

30420-486: The police were already monitoring the speeches, and their own surviving records reveal that Hitler delivered lectures with titles such as Political Phenomenon, Jews and the Treaty of Versailles . At the end of the year, party membership was recorded at 2,000. In June 1921, while Hitler and Dietrich Eckart were on a fundraising trip to Berlin, a mutiny broke out within the Nazi Party in Munich, its organizational home. Members of its executive committee wanted to merge with

30615-505: The popular vote (13,745,000 votes), an upswing by 19 percent, becoming the largest party in the Reichstag, with 230 out of 608 seats. Dwarfed by Hitler's electoral gains, the KPD turned away from legal means and increasingly towards violence. One resulting battle in Silesia resulted in the army being dispatched, each shot sending Germany further into a potential civil war. By this time both sides marched into each other's strongholds hoping to spark

30810-481: The possibilities for a comprehensive understanding between church and state". However, so far no evidence for a link between the Enabling Act and the Reichskonkordat signed on 20 July 1933 has surfaced. As with most of the laws passed in the process of Gleichschaltung , the Enabling Act is quite short, especially considering its implications. The full text, in German and English, follows: Articles 1 and 4 gave

31005-611: The president of the High Court of Justice, not the chancellor, first in the line of succession to the presidency—and even then on an interim basis pending new elections. However, the Enabling Act provided no remedy for any violations of Article 2, and these actions were never challenged in court. The Enabling Act was formally declared to be repealed by the Allied Control Council in Control Council Law No. 1 , following

31200-407: The president's powers for himself in accordance with a law passed the previous day , an action confirmed via a referendum later that month . Article 2 stated that the president's powers were to remain "undisturbed" (or "unaffected", depending on the translation), which has long been interpreted to mean that it forbade Hitler from tampering with the presidency. A 1932 amendment to the constitution made

31395-424: The property of highly respected German men and women merely because they belonged to Catholic orders". Often Galen directly protested to Hitler over violations of the Concordat. When in 1936, Nazis removed crucifixes in school, protest by Galen led to public demonstration. Like Konrad von Preysing , he assisted with the drafting of the 1937 papal encyclical. His three powerful sermons of July and August 1941 earned him

31590-427: The putsch. He used this time to write Mein Kampf , in which he argued that effeminate Jewish–Christian ethics were enfeebling Europe, and that Germany was in need of an uncompromising strongman to restore itself and build an empire. Learning from the failed coup, he decided on the tactic of pursuing power through legal means rather than seizing control of the government by force against the state and instead proclaimed

31785-399: The quorum required to bring the bill up for a vote. While the Enabling Act only required the support of two-thirds of those present and voting, two-thirds of the entire Reichstag's membership had to be present in order for the legislature to consider a constitutional amendment. According to Evans, while Göring was not required to count the KPD deputies in order to get the Enabling Act passed, he

31980-432: The ratification of the Enabling Act. In order to obtain the act's passage, the Nazis implemented a strategy of coercion, bribery, and manipulation. Hitler removed any remaining political obstacles so his coalition of conservatives, nationalists, and Nazis could begin building the Nazi dictatorship. Once the Enabling Act was introduced, it was hastily passed by the Reichstag and Reichsrat on 23 March 1933. Later that day,

32175-414: The restaurant Fuerstenfelder Hof in Munich. While he studied the activities of the DAP, Hitler became impressed with Drexler's antisemitic, nationalist, anti-capitalist and anti-Marxist ideas. During the 12 September 1919 meeting, Hitler took umbrage with comments made by an audience member that were directed against Gottfried Feder , the speaker, a crank economist with whom Hitler was acquainted due to

32370-439: The rival German Socialist Party (DSP). Hitler returned to Munich on 11 July and angrily tendered his resignation. The committee members realised that the resignation of their leading public figure and speaker would mean the end of the party. 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. The committee agreed, and he rejoined

32565-412: The sake of freedom of worship, being too impressed by Hitler's early foreign policy successes and the restoration of the German economy. Few paused to reflect "that under the leadership of Rosenberg, Bormann and Himmler, who were backed by Hitler, the Nazi regime intended to destroy Christianity in Germany, if it could, and substitute the old paganism of the early tribal Germanic gods and the new paganism of

32760-482: The signing of the document, Cardinal Adolf Bertram , head of the German Catholic Bishops Conference, was writing in a pastoral letter of "grievous and gnawing anxiety" with regard to the government's actions towards Catholic organizations, charitable institutions, youth groups, press, Catholic Action and the mistreatment of Catholics for their political beliefs. According to Paul O'Shea, Hitler had

32955-541: The sole author and distributor of the program. A clearly threatening yet sporadic attacks on Catholic parties, organizations and press followed the Nazi seziure of power, which was done quickly to eliminate Political Catholicism . Two thousand functionaries of the Bavarian People's Party were rounded up by police in late June 1933, and it, along with the national Catholic Centre Party , ceased to exist in early July. Vice Chancellor Franz von Papen meanwhile negotiated

33150-405: The sterilization of criminals and the handicapped. While the Catholic Church respected the notion of authority, nevertheless, "when your officials or your laws offend Church dogma or the laws of morality, and in so doing offend our conscience, then we must be able to articulate this as responsible defenders of moral laws". Hitler told Faulhaber that the radical Nazis could not be contained until there

33345-414: The summer of 1919. In July 1919, Hitler was appointed Verbindungsmann (intelligence agent) of an Aufklärungskommando (reconnaissance commando) of the Reichswehr , both to influence other soldiers and to infiltrate the German Workers' Party (DAP). The DAP had been formed by Anton Drexler , Karl Harrer and others, through amalgamation of other groups, on 5 January 1919 at a small gathering at

33540-402: The summer of 1935 and the "threat of criminal prosecution on charges designed by the Propaganda Ministry as a goad to drive the clergy to accept the subversion of Christian teachings in the Reich". In the 1936 campaign against the monasteries and convents, the authorities charged 276 members of religious orders with the offence of "homosexuality". Under Reinhard Heydrich and Heinrich Himmler ,

33735-426: The tables and put democracy and the Weimar Republic on trial as traitors to the German people. Hitler was convicted and on 1 April sentenced to five years' imprisonment at Landsberg Prison . He received friendly treatment from the guards; he had a room with a view of the river, wore a tie, had regular visitors to his chambers, was allowed mail from supporters and was permitted the use of a private secretary. Pardoned by

33930-458: The usual Latin, it was read from the pulpits of all German Catholic churches on one of the church's busiest Sundays, Palm Sunday . According to Gill, "Hitler was beside himself with rage. Twelve presses were seized, and hundreds of people sent either to prison or the camps." This despite Article 4 of the Concordat giving a guarantee of freedom of correspondence between the Vatican and the German clergy. The Nazis responded with, an intensification of

34125-412: The violent instincts necessary to prevent inferior races from dominating Aryans". Aggressive anti-church radicals like Alfred Rosenberg and Martin Bormann saw the conflict with the churches as a priority concern, and anti-church and anti-clerical sentiments were strong among grassroots party activists. East Prussian Party Gauleiter Erich Koch on the other hand, said that Nazism "had to develop from

34320-426: The well-qualified Pastor Friedrich von Bodelschwingh to be the new Reich Bishop, but Hitler endorsed his friend Ludwig Müller , a Nazi and former naval chaplain, to serve as Reich Bishop. The Nazis terrorized supporters of Bodelschwingh, and dissolved various church organizations, ensuring the election of Muller as Reich Bishop. But Müller's heretical views against Paul the Apostle and the Semitic origins of Christ and

34515-428: The window. The American National Catholic Welfare Conference wrote that Pope Pius, "again protested against the violence of the Nazis, in language recalling Nero and Judas the Betrayer, comparing Hitler with Julian the Apostate." On 10 February 1939, Pope Pius XI died. Eugenio Pacelli was elected his successor three weeks later and became Pius XII . Europe was on the brink of World War II. Summi Pontificatus ("On

34710-401: The writing on the wall and fled into exile. Later that day, the Reichstag assembled under intimidating circumstances, with SA men swarming inside and outside the chamber. Hitler's speech, which emphasised the importance of Christianity in German culture, was aimed particularly at appeasing the Centre Party's sensibilities and incorporated Kaas' requested guarantees almost verbatim. Kaas gave

34905-487: The years immediately preceding, government had relied on Article 48 emergency decrees; those had to be decided by the President; also, all laws issued in the regular manner were, not decided, but still enacted by the President. In the passing of Enabling-Act-based laws however, the President had no role to play at all (Thus creating, until Hitler effectively became President in 1934, the unique situation in German history that laws were passed entirely without any contribution by

35100-402: Was a close associate of Cardinal Pacelli, then Vatican Secretary of State (and later Pope Pius XII ). Pacelli had been pursuing a German concordat as a key policy for some years, but the instability of Weimar governments as well as the enmity of some parties to such a treaty had blocked the project. The day after the Enabling Act vote, Kaas went to Rome in order to, in his own words, "investigate

35295-435: Was and could be no turning back. ... I registered as a member of the German Workers' Party and received a provisional membership card with the number 7". Normally, enlisted army personnel were not allowed to join political parties. However, in this case, Hitler had Captain Mayr's permission to join the DAP. Further, Hitler was allowed to stay in the army and receive his weekly pay of 20 gold marks. Otto Strasser : What

35490-464: Was charged with high treason by the prosecutor in Leipzig based on statements Goebbels had made in 1927, but after a four-month investigation it came to naught. Against this backdrop, Hitler's party gained a significant victory in the Reichstag, obtaining 107 seats (18.3%, 6,409,600 votes) in the September 1930 federal election . The Nazis thereby became the second-largest party in Germany, and as historian Joseph Bendersky notes, they essentially became

35685-399: Was deeply religious". By early 1937, the church hierarchy in Germany, which had initially attempted to co-operate with the new government, had become highly disillusioned. In March, Pope Pius XI issued the Mit brennender Sorge ( German : "With burning concern" ) encyclical. The Pope asserted the inviolability of human rights and expressed deep concern at the Nazi regime's flouting of

35880-448: Was discharged on 19 November from the Pasewalk hospital and returned to Munich, which at the time was in a state of socialist upheaval . Arriving on 21 November, he was assigned to 7th Company of the 1st Replacement Battalion of the 2nd Infantry Regiment. In December he was reassigned to a prisoner-of-war camp in Traunstein as a guard. He remained there until the camp dissolved in January 1919, after which he returned to Munich and spent

36075-451: Was epitomized in a confidential memo to Gauleiters in 1942; it reignited the fight against Christianity which had been in a détente, stating that the power of the churches "must absolutely and finally be broken" as Nazism "was completely incompatible with Christianity." William Shirer wrote that the German people were not greatly aroused by the Nazi attacks on the churches. The great majority were not moved to face death or imprisonment for

36270-435: Was less rigorous, the total share of the vote was as low as 9%. The Great Depression was also a factor in Hitler's electoral success. Against this legal backdrop, the SA began its first major anti-Jewish action on 13 October 1930, when groups of Nazi brownshirts smashed the windows of Jewish-owned stores at Potsdamer Platz . The Wall Street Crash of 1929 heralded worldwide economic disaster. The people of Germany, tired of

36465-433: Was more optimism that the Nazi takeover would bring about a strengthened Germany might bring with it "inner, moral revitalisation". However, within a short period, the Nazi government's tensions with the Christian Churches was to become a source of dissatisfaction in more religious circles. The Kirchenkampf can be divided into five stages. Prior to the Reichstag vote for the Enabling Act of 1933 under which Hitler gained

36660-399: Was moved to the demobilization office of the 2nd Infantry Regiment. Around this time the German military command released an edict that the army's main priority was to "carry out, in conjunction with the police, stricter surveillance of the population ... so that the ignition of any new unrest can be discovered and extinguished." In May 1919, Karl Mayr became commander of the 6th Battalion of

36855-421: Was peace with the church and that either the Nazis and the church would fight Bolshevism together, or there would be war against the church. Kershaw cites the meeting as an example of Hitler's ability to "pull the wool over the eyes even of hardened critics" for "Faulhaber – a man of sharp acumen, who had often courageously criticized the Nazi attacks on the Catholic Church – went away convinced that Hitler

37050-402: Was required to "recognize their existence" by counting them for purposes of the quorum needed to call it up, making his refusal to do so "an illegal act". (Even if the Communists had been present and voting, the session's atmosphere was so intimidating that the Act would have still passed with, at the very least, 68.7% support.) He also argued that the act's passage in the Reichsrat was tainted by

37245-466: Was severely restricted. In 1935, when Protestant pastors read a protest statement from the pulpits of Confessing churches, the Nazi authorities briefly arrested over 700 pastors and the Gestapo confiscated copies of Pius XI 's 1937 anti-Nazi papal encyclical Mit brennender Sorge from diocesan offices throughout Germany. For refusing to declare loyalty to the Reich, or be conscripted into the army, Jehovah's Witnesses were declared "enemies", with 6000 of

37440-399: Was still very new at the time, it was therefore impressionable; Bismarck's strategy of confrontation rather than consensus set a tone of either being loyal to the government or an enemy of the state, which directly influenced German nationalist sentiment and the later Nazi movement. Adolf Hitler became involved with the fledgling German Workers' Party – which he would later transform into

37635-474: Was the only candidate to poll fewer than a million votes. The battles on the streets grew increasingly violent. After the Rotfront ( Roter Frontkämpferbund ) interrupted a speech by Hitler, the SA marched into the streets of Nuremberg and killed two bystanders. Seeking revenge, the SA also stormed a Rotfront meeting on 25 August and days later the Berlin headquarters of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) itself. In September, Goebbels led his men into Neukölln ,

37830-421: Was to be no law but Hitler, and ultimately no god but Hitler". Other authors, such as Richard Steigmann-Gall , argue that there were anti-Christian individuals in the Nazi Party but that they did not represent the movement's position. Nazi ideology conflicted with traditional Christian beliefs in various respects – Nazis criticized Christian notions of "meekness and guilt" on the basis that they "repressed

38025-431: Was to be placed on altars "to the German nation and therefore to God the most sacred book"; (30) the Christian cross to be removed from all churches and replaced with the swastika. Albeit an investigation led by the Gestapo in 1941 in response to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's accusation of a Nazi conspiracy "to abolish all existing religions -- Catholic, Protestant, Mohammedan, Hindu, Buddhist, and Jewish alike" and impose

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