The twentieth-century world, Year 10: the Depression and how Hitler took power (Germany 1890–1945 option)

6

HintAround one worker in three.

The whyUnemployment brought hunger and fear, and governments seemed helpless. Voters who had backed the moderate parties in the 1920s began to listen to parties that promised drastic change.

They recalled the loans Germany relied on

HintRemember what the Dawes Plan had provided.

The whyGerman businesses lost their credit and their export markets together. Factories closed, and unemployment rose to about six million in 1932.

The Communists (KPD)

HintIts supporters looked to Soviet Russia.

The whyThe Communist vote rose at every election from 1928 to November 1932. Fear of a communist revolution pushed many middle-class voters and business owners towards Hitler.

The SA (Sturmabteilung)

HintLed from 1931 by Ernst Röhm.

The whyIts marches made the Nazis look disciplined and strong, and its street fights with Communists added to the sense that the republic had lost control. By 1932 it had about 400,000 members.

By aeroplane

HintIt was a new way to campaign, and it made headlines.

The whyThe Nazis used new technology to look modern and unstoppable: sound recordings and films as well as flights. Their speakers also fitted the message to each audience, so that different groups each heard what mattered to them.

12; 107; 230

HintFrom a fringe party to the largest in the Reichstag in four years.

The whyIn July 1932 they took about 37 per cent of the vote: the largest party, but well short of a majority. Hitler never won a majority in a free election.

It fell, from 230 seats to 196

HintCompare it with July of the same year.

The whyThe Nazis were still the largest party, but they had lost about two million votes and were short of money. Some observers thought their rise was over.

Article 48

HintThe emergency-powers clause.

The whyFrom 1930 no Chancellor could command a majority in the Reichstag, so laws were issued by presidential decree. Germans grew used to government without parliament before Hitler ever took office.

Franz von Papen

HintHe had lost the chancellorship himself late in 1932.

The whyPapen wanted revenge on General von Schleicher, who had replaced him. He assured Hindenburg that Hitler could be kept under control in a government of conservatives.

30 January 1933

HintA winter date, after the two Reichstag elections of 1932.

The whyOnly three members of the new cabinet were Nazis: Hitler, Wilhelm Frick and Hermann Göring. That is why Papen and Hindenburg believed they had him boxed in.

Marinus van der Lubbe, a Dutch communist

HintA young man from the Netherlands.

The whyThe Nazis claimed the fire was the start of a communist uprising and used it to arrest thousands of Communists days before an election. Historians still disagree about whether van der Lubbe acted alone.

Suspend civil rights and imprison opponents without trial

HintThink of freedom of speech, of the press and of assembly.

The whyIt was signed by President Hindenburg under Article 48 and was never withdrawn while the Nazis ruled. It became a legal basis for the police state.

To make laws without the Reichstag

HintParliament voted itself out of a job.

The whyIt passed by 444 votes to 94. The Communist deputies had been arrested or were in hiding, SA men stood in the chamber, and only the Social Democrats voted against.

May; July

HintBoth fell between the Enabling Act in spring and the end of summer.

The whyUnion offices were occupied on 2 May, the day after a May Day holiday laid on for workers. On 14 July a law declared the Nazi Party the only legal party in Germany.

The SA's, including its chief Ernst Röhm

HintThe regular army saw this organisation as a rival.

The whyRöhm wanted the SA to absorb the army. Hitler needed the generals' support, so he had Röhm and other SA leaders shot, along with old opponents such as former Chancellor von Schleicher.

Merged it with his own and took the title Führer

HintHe did not hold an election for a successor.

The whyFrom then on every soldier swore an oath of loyalty to Hitler by name, not to Germany or its constitution. No person or institution could now lawfully remove him.