The Nazi State Handout

The Nazi State Handout

Dualism Between State and Party

- State Institutions

Reich Chancellery Coordinated the government Led by Lammers Drew up government legislation Executive organization for the government	Government Ministries Controlled certain aspects of society Included Transport, Education, and Economics These state institutions felt extreme Nazi influence
Judiciary Judiciary was pro-right wing, so the courts remained mostly free of Nazi influence That being said, in 1933 Special Courts were created for political offenses (without a jury) Additionally, the People’s Court was created in 1934 to try high treason with a jury of Nazi Party members	Regional State Governments Under Gleichschaltung, the regional governments were destroyed, subservient at best to Gauleiters

- Party Institutions

Party Structure There was a national structure of the party, with Hitler at the top, followed by  30 Gauleiters (Regional Leaders) and 760 Kreisleiters (District Leaders) ·         This structure was designed for building power, and once the Nazis took control the party was splintered, dominated by Fuhrerprinzip and the Gauleiters’ desire to please Hitler and keep their own power	Specialized Party Organizations Hitler Youth German Labor Front (DAF) Sturmabteilung (Brownshirts) and Schutzstaffel NSLB, NSF, NSDB, NSRB
Hess and Bormann These two men saw issues with the Party bureaucracy (disorganization, lack of control) Mandated civil service employees to be Nazis Department for Internal Party Affairs, Department for Affairs of State

• Ultimate ‘battle’ for control between party and state was never won
• Party never able to fully control existing state institutions
• Internal strife within the party

The Debate on the Functioning of the Third Reich

	Intentionalist Interpretation	Functionalist Interpretation
1. Hitler's role	Strong dictator; can implement his will	Weak dictator; depends on competing organizations
2. Structure of the state	Obedience to the dictator “Divide and Rule”	Rivalry of offices in spite of the dictator Four competing and relatively independent power blocks: economy, army, Nazi party/SS, state administration
3. Implementation of     policies	Hitler's will Long-term planning Realization of long-term goals Primacy of ideology	Spontaneous initiatives of organizations, improvisation, primacy of opportunism
4. Critique	Too personalistic, too much centered on Hitler, too rational, too apologetic of Germans in general	Ignores deliberate policies and the popularity of Hitler, overestimates independence of single organizations and apparatuses, too much focused on anonymous structures

Was Hitler an effective dictator?

• Hitler was nationally loved and had his goals, but gave no true direction for following
• Hitler relied on the initiatives of the organizations around him, and the SS to clean up and execute the rules
• Implemented his will whenever he chose to

Himmler and the SS

- Heinrich Himmler

• Born in 1900 in Bavaria and was an early member of the NSDAP
• 1929 - Appointed leader of the SS
• 1934 - Organized the Night of the Long Knives
• 1936 - Became the Reichsführer SS and Chief of all German Police
• 1943 - Appointed Minister of the Interior
• 1944 - Commander-in-Chief of the Volksstrum (Home Army)

- Structure of the SS

• Began as a section of the SA in 1925 (served as bodyguards for Hitler and the Nazi  Party)

  Allgemeine SS included the security forces of the Gestapo and the Sicherheitsdienst dealt with local police matters and ‘racial’ matters; also provided security	Waffen SS military wing of the SS established in 1940 and grew from 3 divisions to over 35 by the end of WWII rivalled the actual German army (Wehrmacht) in power and size
  Totenkopfverbände SS (Death’s Head Units) managed the concentration camps and administered the “Final Solution” Closely interrelated with the Waffen SS - Totenkopfverbände acted as reserves for Waffen SS	RSHA coordinated all policing and security intelligence-gathering, criminal investigation, overseeing foreigners, monitoring public opinion and Nazi indoctrination

The Police State

The Gestapo was able to: access documents that listed names of German people who were suspected of being “enemies of the state” have those arrested sign an “order for protective custody” that basically equated to an agreement to a prison sentence utilize the Gestapo Law that made all activities of the Secret Police free from review by a court of law	Heydrich and Himmler: ran their branches with notable “ruthlessness” feared by many weakness in the group was that they left some regions of Germany underrepresented such as Frankfurt
Consequences of arrest: torture interrogation concentration camps execution	Political “threats” or scapegoats formed by the Nazi Party: increased nationalistic views of the German people gave “evidence” for proof of a superior race Hitler’s version of Social Darwinism prevailed created a common enemy

Hitler's Religious Policies

Hitler’s Stance on Religion

• Originally, Hitler seemed to support religion
• religious observance permitted, wanted party to be built on base of Christianity
• feared the political power the church had, did not want to jeopardize his newly secured control over the country
• viewed the relationship between church and state purely in political terms
• did not practice Christianity but felt the need to mask his views on religion and the fact he was skeptical of religion in order to maintain the power he just obtained
• Hitler personally thought that Christianity was made up of false ideas that would cause religion to decline on its own.
• thought that scientific revelation would destroy religious myth
• believed all truths came from natural science
• believed science to be more reliable than religion
• truths of racial biology (natural selection, racial struggle)
• How did Hitler’s opinions on religion impact his policies?
• To bring the church under the control of the state, Hitler created the Ministry of Church Affairs in 1935. This ensured that the Catholics and Protestants fulfilled their obligations to the regime.
• Hitler led “immorality trials” for nuns and priests to eliminate the role of clergy in politics
• By 1935, Nazis were persecuting the churches through terror and intimidation. Clergymen were arrested and many sent to work camps
• Hitler’s appearance of supporting religious values made Protestants and Catholics willing to support the regime. Their early support made it hard for them to form resistance movements against Hitler later in his rule, which allowed him to more easily diminish the Church.
• Would Hitler be considered a Christian, an atheist, or neither?
• Hitler grew up and was confirmed Catholic but did not associate himself with Catholicism when he was in control of Germany. Also had a strong beliefs that associated with science

German Faith Movement

• Jakob Wilhelm Hauer
• studied at Tübingen University and went on to become a theology teacher at the school
• founder and leader of the German Faith Movement in 1932
• Anti-Semitic as well as anti- Christianity
• wanted a national regeneration that would give birth to a community of one Volk
• Völkisch worldview would put priority on a group and personality above the individual and individualism (emphasis on Hinduism when creating the Faith Movement)
• Introduced anti-Semitic views by stating that Jews belonged to another Volk
• revolved around four main themes
• he propagation of the ‘Blood and Soil’ ideology
• celebrating the relationship of people to the land they occupy and cultivate, and it places a high value on the virtues of rural living
• the replacement of Christian ceremonies and ideas/symbols by pagan equivalents
• searched for traditional Germanic forms of religious expressions
• provided equivalents of marriage ceremonies and baptisms
• the most favored pagan deity being the sun, as can be seen from the flag of the faith movement
• the wholesale rejection of Christian ethics
• Christianity was seen as tainted by Judaism because it was the product of a Jewish culture, rejected the ‘Jewish’ Old Testament
• Went along with creating one Volk for Germany that did not include the Jews
• the cult of Hitler’s personality
• come leader/fuhrer
• Had a following of less than half a million in 1933 and unsuccessfully petitioned for full recognition as the official religion of Germany.
• Hitler then lost interest in making room for church in the state (1935) and removed Hauer from power
• How successful was the German Faith Movement?
• Not very successful
• less than half a million people joined creating very little influence
• did not achieve the goal of converting people to this new religion, the majority of the population still associated with Christianity
• What are similarities and differences between the German faith and Christian faith?
• German faith emphasised the importance of purity within a Volk and it was focused on race

1933 Concordat

• Agreement between The Vatican’s secretary of state, Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli (the future Pope Pius XII) and Germany’s vice chancellor, Franz von Papen,
• July 20, 1933.
• Nazis guaranteed Catholic Church religious freedom
• Nazis would not interfere with the Church’s property and legal rights
• Nazis would accept the Church’s control over its own education
• Catholic Church would in return give diplomatic recognition to the Nazi government.  
• The Catholic Church concessions:
• clergy could not engage in political activities and not hold political offices.
• Bishops were required to swear an oath of loyalty to the Reich and its legally constituted government.
• No religious publications were explicitly protected under the concordat, so they were left vulnerable to the state’s suppression.

• Why did the Catholic Church agree to sign the concordat?
• Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli (future Pope Pius XII) hoped that the agreement would allow the German Catholic Church to operate freely of any interference from the Nazi Party.
• He suspected that the Church would be eliminated if they did not support the rising Third Reich and thought the concordat was his only way of preventing the removal of the Catholic Church.
• The Nazis agreed to ensure the Church’s religious freedom, not interfere with their property or legal rights, and allow the Church to have control over its own education system.
• It was a threat to the Church to refuse the agreement- if they did not negotiate with the legally appointed government, Hitler would have claimed that the Vatican was anti-Nazi and obstructionist.
• As the Nazis were rapidly gaining in power, it seemed as if any written agreement protecting religious rights was better than no legal agreement at all.
• What were Hitler’s goals in establishing the concordat?
• In the past elections many German Christians had not voted for Hitler, so he wanted to neutralize any political threat from organized religion.
• Hitler wanted the church’s approval, as it would give him international legitimacy and recognition.
• Hitler considered the Catholic Church a real threat to the Nazi regime and thought that the institution needed to be controlled and uprooted from the German life. This concordat was a way to control the Church and force them to support the regime.
• How successful was the concordat in achieving these goals?
• Hitler was successful in temporarily controlling the Church under a false sense of agreement, which he used to take advantage of the situation and slowly undermine the Catholic Church.
• The concordat was successful in forcing the Church, which had been a formidable force, to support the Nazi regime and in asserting the international influence of the party.
• By the end of 1933, the Nazis were already dispersing anti-Catholic ideas- the concordat was successful in taming the Church’s influence so that Hitler could take control.

Relationship Between Church and State

• Nazi leaders have limited success in controlling the Churches
• Total suppression
• Alienation of large number of Germans
• Limited persecution
• Too much independence for Churches
• Slow Destabilization of Churches
• Establishment of the Ministry of Church Affairs and Hanns Kerrl appointed leader
• Anti-religious measures
• Closing Church schools
• Discouragement of Catholic youth groups
• Reduction in Church funds
• Arrest of Church figures (priests, pastors, eg.)
• Overall state of Churches weakened
• Allowed for certain figures to stand against Nazi Regime
• Pastor Niemoller stands for Protestants and states “we must obey God rather than man”
• The Pope attacks Nazi system in 1937

• Did Hitler’s tactics to weaken the church eventually work?
• Nazi Regime didn’t last long enough for the effects of their plans to be noticed
• Too much overall commitment to Christianity among the citizens made it difficult for churches to become weak over night
• Launching fundamental assault on Churches difficult because of individuals standing up to regime
• Loyalty to Church survived longer than Nazism

• How did the relationship between the Church and State evolve?
• Although it seemed as if relationship was positive for both sides, Nazi regime slowly wanted to diminish all of the Church’s influence over the German people