The Fuehrer principle is officially recognized by the party, and the party interpretation thereof is set forth in the Party Organization Book (document 7 and charts 1 and 1-A, post pp. 186, 488, 489).

There are also included herein, as charts 2 and 2-A and 3 and 3-A (post pp. 490, 491, 492, 493), photostatic copies and translations of two charts from Der nationalsozialistische Staat (The National Socialist State) by Dr. Walther Gehl, published in 1935. These charts clearly show the concentration of authority in the Fuehrer and the subordinate relation of the minor leaders in both the state and the party.

The Party: Leadership by an Elite Class

1. Functions of the Party

The third pillar of the Nazi state, the link between Volk and Fuehrer, is the Nazi Party. According to Nazi ideology, all authority within the nation is derived ultimately from the people, but it is the party through which the people expresses itself. In Rechtseinrichtungen und Rechtsaufgaben der Bewegung (Legal Organization and Legal Functions of the Movement) (document 8, post p. 204), published in 1939, Otto Gauweiler states:

The will of the German people finds its expression in the party as the political organization of the people. It represents the political conception, the political conscience, and the political will. It is the expression and the organ of the people's creative will to life. It comprises a select part of the German people for "only the best Germans should be party members" ... The inner organization of the party must therefore bring the national life which is concentrated within itself to manifestation and development in all the fields of national endeavor in which the party is represented.[60]

Gauweiler defines the relationship of the party to the state in the following terms:

The party stands above and beside the state as the wielder of an authority derived from the people with its own sovereign powers and its own sphere of sovereignty ... The legal position of the party is therefore that of a completely sovereign authority whose legal supremacy and self-sufficiency rest upon the original independent political authority which the Fuehrer and the movement have attained as a result of their historical achievements.[61]

Neesse states that "It will be the task of National Socialism to lead back the German people to an organic structure which proceeds from a recognition of the differences in the characters and possibilities of human beings without permitting this recognition to lead to a cleavage of the people into two camps."[62] This task is the responsibility of the party. Although it has become the only political party in Germany, the party does not desire to identify itself with the state. It does not wish to dominate the state or to serve it. It works beside it and cooperates with it. In this respect, Nazi Germany is distinguished from the other one-party states of Europe: "In the one-party state of Russia, the party rules over the state; in the one-party state of Italy, the party serves the state; but in the one-party state of Germany, the party neither serves the state nor rules over it directly but works and struggles together with it for the community of the people."[63] Neesse contends that the party derives its legal basis from the law inherent in the living organism of the German Volk:

The inner law of the NSDAP is none other than the inner law of the German people. The party arises from the people; it has formed an organization which crystallizes about itself the feelings of the people, which seemed buried, and the strength of the people, which seemed lost.[64]

Neesse states that the party has two great tasks—to insure the continuity of national leadership and to preserve the unity of the Volk:

The first main task of the party, which is in keeping with its organic nature, is to protect the National Socialist idea and to constantly renew it by drawing from the depths of the German soul, to keep it pure and clear, and to pass it on thus to coming generations: this is predominantly a matter of education of the people.

The second great task, which is in keeping with its organizational nature, is to form the people and the state into the unity of the nation and to create for the German national community forms which are ever new and suited to its vital development: this is predominantly a matter of state formation. These two tasks, one of which deals with substance and the other with function, belong together. It is as impossible to separate them as it is to split up the party into organism and organization, form and content.[65]

Huber (document 1, post p. 155) describes the tasks of the party in similar terms. He states that the party is charged with the "education of the people to a political people" through the awakening of the political consciousness of each individual; the inculcation of a "uniform political philosophy," that is, the teaching of Nazi principles; "the selection of leaders," including the choice and training of especially promising boys to be the Fuehrers of the future; and the shaping of the "political will of the people" in accordance with the Fuehrer's aims.[66]

The educational tasks of the party are stressed by Beck, who develops the idea that the Volk can be divided into three main groups, "a supporting, a leading, and a creative class."[67] It is the duty of the leading class, that is, the party, from which the creative class of leaders is drawn, to provide for the education of the supporting class.

Every member of the body of the people must belong to the politically supporting class, that is, each one who bears within himself the basic racial, spiritual, and mental values of the people ... Here no sort of leading or creative activity is demanded but only a recognition of the leading and creative will ... Only those are called to leadership in political life who have recognized the community-bound law of all human life in purest clarity and in the all-embracing extent of its validity and who will place all the powers of their personal lives with the help of a politically moral character in the service of the formation of community life ... From the politically leading class arise the politically creative personalities. These are the mysterious elemental forces which are beyond all explanation by human reason and which through their action and by means of the living idea within them give to the community of the people an expression which is fresh, young, and eternal. Here is the fulfilment of the highest and purest political humanity ... The education of the socialist personality is essentially the forming of the politically supporting class within the German people and the encouragement of those political tendencies which make a man a political leader. To educate to political creativeness is just as impossible as to educate to genius. Education can only furnish the spiritual atmosphere, can only prepare the spiritual living-space for the politically creative personality by forming a uniform political consciousness in the socialistic personality, and in the development of politically creative personalities it can at the most give special attention to those values of character and spirit which are of decisive importance for the development of this personality.[68]

Goebbels in The Nature and Form of National Socialism (document 2, post p. 170) emphasizes the responsibility of the party for the leadership of the state:

The party must always continue to represent the hierarchy of National Socialist leadership. This minority must always insist upon its prerogative to control the state. It must keep the way open for the German youth which wishes to take its place in this hierarchy. In reality the hierarchy has fewer rights than duties! It is responsible for the leadership of the state and it solemnly relieves the people of this responsibility. It has the duty to control the state in the best interests and to the general welfare of the nation.[69]

Dr. Frick, German Minister of the Interior, in his chapter in Germany Speaks indicates the exclusive position of the party in the Third Reich:

National Socialist Germany, however, is not merely a unitary state: it is also a unitary nation and its governance is based on the principle of leadership ...

In National Socialist Germany, leadership is in the hands of an organized community, the National Socialist Party; and as the latter represents the will of the nation, the policy adopted by it in harmony with the vital interests of the nation is at the same time the policy adopted by the country ... The National Socialist Party is the only political party in Germany and therefore the true representative of the people ...[70]

To Dr. Ley, the party is identical with the Fuehrer. As he wrote in the Angriff on April 9, 1942 (document 6, post p. 184), "The National Socialist Party is Hitler, and Hitler is the party."

The role of the party in legislation, in political matters, and in the appointment of Government officials is indicated by the Fuehrer's decree of May 29, 1941,[71] as amplified by the order of January 16, 1942, concerning its execution.[72] (Document 9, post p. 212). This order provides that all legislative proposals and proposed laws and decrees, as well as any proposed changes therein, must pass through and receive the approval of the Party Chancelry.

2. Party Membership

Details concerning the qualifications and duties of party members are contained in the Party Organization Book for 1940 (document 7, post p. 186).

Membership is finally confirmed by the issuance of a membership card or a membership book. Anyone who becomes a party member does not merely join an organization but he becomes a soldier in the German freedom movement and that means much more than just paying his dues and attending the members' meetings. He obligates himself to subordinate his own ego and to place everything he has in the service of the people's cause. Only he who is capable of doing this should become a party member. A selection must be made in accordance with this idea.

Readiness to fight, readiness to sacrifice, and strength of character are the requirements for a good National Socialist. Small blemishes, such as a false step which someone has made in his youth, should be overlooked; the contribution in the struggle for Germany should alone be decisive. The healthy will naturally prevail over the bad if the will to health finds sufficient support in leadership and achievement. Admission to the party should not be controlled by the old bourgeois point of view. The party must always represent the elite of the people.[73]

German blood is one of the prerequisites for party membership. The Party Organization Book for 1940 (document 7, post p. 186) also states, "Only those racial comrades who possess German citizenship are eligible for admission."[74]

Party members shall not exceed ten per cent of the German population of the region. "The ideal proportion of the number of party members to the number of racial comrades is set at ten per cent. This proportion is to apply also to the individual Province [Gau]."[75]

3. Pledges and Symbols of Allegiance

Party members take an oath of loyalty to the Fuehrer in the following terms: "I pledge allegiance to my Fuehrer, Adolf Hitler. I promise at all times to respect and obey him and the leaders whom he appoints over me."[76]

(a) The Hitler Salute

A pledge of allegiance to the Fuehrer is also implied in the Nazi salute, which is usually accompanied by the greeting, "Heil Hitler." The phrase mit deutschen Gruss, which is commonly used as a closing salutation in letters, is another form of the Hitler greeting. Knaurs Konversations-Lexikon (Knaur's Conversational Dictionary), published in Berlin in 1934, contains the following definition:

German greeting, Hitler greeting: by raising the right arm; used by the old Germans with the spear as a greeting of arms [Waffengruss]. Communal greeting of the National Socialists; introduced into general use in 1933.

That this greeting was used by the Nazis as early as 1923 is demonstrated by a photograph which appeared in Das Buch der NSDAP, Werden, Kampf and Ziel der NSDAP (The Book of the NSDAP, Growth, Struggle, and Goal of the NSDAP) by Walter M. Espe (Berlin, 1934), illustration 34 (document 10, post p. 214).

In the same book (page 23 in the supplement entitled "Die NSDAP") the following distinction is made between the usual Nazi greeting and the Storm Troopers' salute:

While the German greeting consists merely in raising the right hand in any desired manner and represents rather a general comradely greeting, the SA salute is executed, in accordance with the specifications of the SA service regulations, by placing the left hand on the belt and raising the extended right arm.

The SA salute is to be given to all higher ranking leaders of the SA and the SS and of the veterans' organization which has been incorporated into the SA, as well as to the Army and the national and security police forces.

The comradely German greeting is to be exchanged between all equally ranking members of the SA and the SS and members of a corresponding rank in the Army, the police, the veterans' organization, the German air-sport league, the Hitler Youth, the railway guards, and the whole membership of the party so far as they are distinguishable by regulation uniforms.

(b) The Swastika

Early in its history the Nazi Party adopted the swastika banner as its official emblem.[77] It was designed by Hitler himself, who wrote in Mein Kampf:

I myself after countless attempts had laid down a final form: a flag with a background of red cloth, having a white circle, and, in its center, a black swastika....

As National Socialists we see our program in our flag. In the red we see the social idea of the movement, in the white the nationalistic idea, and in the swastika the fight for the victory of Aryan man and at the same time for the victory of the idea of creative work, which in itself always was and always will be anti-Semitic.[78]

The swastika banner came into general use after January 30, 1933 as a symbol of allegiance to the Hitler regime, but not until two years later was it made the German national flag by the Reich flag law of September 15, 1935.[79] Another law, decreed on April 7, 1937,[80] specified that:

The insignia which the NSDAP, its formations, and associated organizations use for their officers, their structure, their organization, and their symbols may not be used by other associations either alone or with embellishments.

It is interesting to note that party regulations forbid members to use passport photographs in which they appear in party uniform or wearing party insignia and that party members are forbidden to discuss foreign policy with foreigners unless they are officially designated by the Fuehrer to do so. The pertinent regulations read:

Pass Photos on Identification Cards

Members of the NSDAP must not use pass photos which show the holder of any identification card in a uniform of the party or of any of its formations. It is also forbidden to use as pass photos pictures which show the person wearing a party button.

* * * * *

Conversations With Foreigners

It is forbidden to all party members to engage in discussions of foreign policy with foreigners. Only such persons as have been designated by the Fuehrer are entitled to do so.[81]

The Totalitarian State

The Weimar Constitution, although never formally abrogated by the Nazis, was rendered totally ineffectual by two basic laws, promulgated within two months after the seizure of power by the party. The first of these was the "Decree of the Reich's President for the Protection of the People and State" (document 11-I, post p. 215), issued February 28, 1933, the day after the Reichstag was burned down. It suspended "until further notice"[82] articles of the Weimar Constitution guaranteeing essential democratic rights of the individual. Thus, according to article I of this decree, "restrictions on personal liberty, on the right of free expression of opinion, including freedom of the press, on the right of assembly and the right of association, and violations of the privacy of postal, telegraphic, and telephonic communications, and warrants for house-searches, orders for confiscations as well as restrictions on property, are also permissible beyond the legal limits otherwise prescribed."[83] The abrogation by the Nazis of these fundamental rights of democracy has never been repealed or amended. In fact, this decree represents the presupposition and confirmation of the police sway established throughout Germany by the Nazis.[84]

The second basic law, known as the "Enabling Act," the "Law To Remove the Distress of People and State," of March 24, 1933 (document 11-II, post p. 217), swept away parliamentary government entirely. By abrogating the pertinent articles of the Weimar Constitution, it enabled the Nazi Cabinet under Hitler's chancelorship to appropriate money and legislate without any responsibility to the Reichstag or any obligation to respect the Constitution.

The dissolution of democracy in Germany was sealed by the unification of the authoritarian Nazi Party with the German state. Soon after the party came to power in 1933, steps were taken to effect and secure this unity. The process is described by Huber (document 1, post p. 155) as follows:

On July 14, 1933 was issued the law against the formation of new parties which raised the NSDAP to the only political party in Germany [document 11-III] ... The overthrow of the old party-state was accompanied by the construction of the new movement-state [Bewegungsstaat]. Out of a political fighting organization the NSDAP grew to a community capable of carrying the state and the nation. This process was accomplished step by step in the first months after the National Socialist seizure of power. The assumption of the office of Chancelor by the Fuehrer of the movement formed the basis for this development. Various party leaders were appointed as Reichsminister; the governors of the provinces were national leaders or Gauleiter of the party, such as General von Epp; the Prussian government officials are as a rule Gauleiter of the party; the Prussian police chiefs are mostly high-ranking SA leaders. By this system of a union of the personnel of the party and state offices the unity of party and state was achieved.[85]

The culmination of this development was reached in the "Law To Safeguard the Unity of Party and State," of December 1, 1933 (document 11-IV, post p. 221), which proclaimed the NSDAP "the bearer of the German state-idea and indissolubly joined to the state." In order to guarantee the complete cooperation of the party and SA with the public officials, the Fuehrer's Deputy and the Chief of Staff of the SA were made members of the Cabinet.

With regard to the relation between the party and the state, Neesse writes:

The NSDAP is not a structure which stands under direct state control, to which single tasks of public administration are entrusted by the state, but it holds and maintains is claim to totality as the "bearer of the German state-idea" in all fields relating to the community—regardless of how various single functions are divided between the organization of the party and the organization of the state.[86]

To maintain cooperation between the party and state organizations, the highest state offices are given to the men holding the corresponding party offices. Gauweiler (document 8, post p. 204) attributes to the party supreme leadership in all phases of national life. Thus the state becomes merely an administrative machine which the party has set up in accordance with and for the accomplishment of its aims:

As the responsible bearer and shaper of the destiny of the whole German nation the party has created an entirely new state, for that which sought to foist itself upon her as a state was simply the product of a deep human confusion. The state of the past and its political ideal had never satisfied the longing of the German people. The National Socialist movement already carried its state within itself at the time of its early struggles. It was able to place the completely formed body of its own state at the disposal of the state which it had taken over.[87]

The official party interpretation of the relation between party and state, as set forth in the Party Organization Book for 1940, appears in the Appendix as document 7 (post p. 186).

Goebbels in his lecture on The Nature and Form of National Socialism (document 2, post p. 170) stressed the importance of Gleichschaltung or the penetration of Nazi ideology into all fields of national life. This to his mind must be the result of the National Socialist revolution. The same aims, ideals, and standards must be applied to economics and to politics, to cultural and social development, to education and religion, and to foreign and domestic relations.

The result of this concept of the totalitarian state has been the compulsory regimentation of all phases of German life to conform to the pattern established by the party. The totalitarian state does not recognize personal liberties for the individual. The legal position of the individual citizen in the Third Reich is clearly set forth by Huber (document 1, post p. 155):

Not until the nationalistic political philosophy had become dominant could the liberalistic idea of basic rights be really overcome. The concept of personal liberties of the individual as opposed to the authority of the state had to disappear; it is not to be reconciled with the principle of the nationalistic Reich. There are no personal liberties of the individual which fall outside of the realm of the state and which must be respected by the state. The member of the people, organically connected with the whole community, has replaced the isolated individual; he is included in the totality of the political people and is drawn into the collective action. There can no longer be any question of a private sphere, free of state influence, which is sacred and untouchable before the political unity. The constitution of the nationalistic Reich is therefore not based upon a system of inborn and inalienable rights of the individual.[88]

In place of these rights the constitution of the Third Reich guarantees to the individual his place in the community of the people:

The legal position of the individual member of the people forms an entirely new concept which is indispensable for the construction of a nationalistic order. The legal position of the individual is always related to the community and conditioned by duty. It is developed not for the sake of the individual but for the community, which can only be filled with life, power, and purpose when a suitable field of action is insured for the individual member. Without a concrete determination of the individual's legal position there can be no real community.

This legal position represents the organic fixation of the individual in the living order. Rights and obligations arise from the application of this legal position to specific individual relationships ... But all rights must be regarded as duty-bound rights. Their exercise is always dependent upon the fulfilment by the individual of those duties to which all rights are subordinate ...[89]

The concept of private property in the totalitarian state is also at variance with the democratic concept of private property. In the Third Reich the holder of property is considered merely as a manager responsible to the Volk for the use of the property in the common interest. Huber sets forth the Nazi view in the following words:

"Private property" as conceived under the liberalistic economic order was a reversal of the true concept of property. This "private property" represented the right of the individual to manage and to speculate with inherited or acquired property as he pleased, without regard for the general interests ... German socialism had to overcome this "private," that is, unrestrained and irresponsible view of property. All property is common property. The owner is bound by the people and the Reich to the responsible management of his goods. His legal position is only justified when he satisfies this responsibility to the community.[90]

Pursuant to this view of the nature of ownership, property may be confiscated whenever the state decides that public management would be in the interests of the community, or if the owner is found guilty of irresponsible management, in which case no compensation is paid him.

Reference has been made to the appointment of party members to important state offices. Gauweiler (document 8, post p. 204) points out that the party insured the infusion of the entire structure of the state with its ideology through the civil-service law (Beamtengesetz) of January 26, 1937,[91] which provides that a person appointed to a civil-service position must be "filled with National Socialist views, since only thus can he be an executor of the will of the state which is carried by the NSDAP. It demands of him that he be ready at all times to exert himself unreservedly in behalf of the National Socialist state and that he be aware of the fact that the NSDAP, as the mouthpiece of the people's will, is the vital force behind the concept of the German state."[92]

The infiltration of party members into the civil service has now proceeded to such a point that early in 1942 Pfundtner, the Secretary of State in the German Ministry of the Interior, could write in the periodical Akademie fuer deutsches Recht:

The German civil servant must furthermore be a National Socialist to the marrow of his bones and must be a member of the party or of one of its formations. The state will primarily see to it that the Young Guard of the movement is directed toward a civil-service career and also that the civil servant takes an active part in the party so that the political idea and service of the state become closely welded.[93]

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES TO FIRST SECTION

[Footnote 8: Huber, Verfassungsrecht des grossdeutschen Reiches (Hamburg, 1939), pp. 54-55.]

[Footnote 9: Ibid., pp. 153-155.]

[Footnote 10: Ibid., pp. 156-157.]

[Footnote 11: Ibid., p. 157.]

[Footnote 12: Ibid., p. 158.]

[Footnote 13: Ibid., p. 163.]

[Footnote 14: Ibid., p. 164.]

[Footnote 15: Ibid., pp. 165-166.]

[Footnote 16: Neesse, Die Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei—Versuch einer Rechtsdeutung (Stuttgart, 1935), p. 44.]

[Footnote 17: Ibid., p. 51.]

[Footnote 18: Ibid., p. 54.]

[Footnote 19: Ibid., p. 58.]

[Footnote 20: Ibid., pp. 54-56.]

[Footnote 21: Ibid., p. 59.]

[Footnote 22: Ibid., pp. 60-61.]

[Footnote 23: Ibid., pp. 65-66.]

[Footnote 24: Scurla, Die Grundgedanken des Nationalsozialismus und das Ausland (Berlin, 1938), pp. 10-11.]

[Footnote 25: Ibid., p. 9.]

[Footnote 26: Ibid.]

[Footnote 27: Ibid., p. 13.]

[Footnote 28: Beck, Die Erziehung im dritten Reich (Dortmund and Breslau, 1936), p. 20.]

[Footnote 29: Ibid., pp. 20-21.]

[Footnote 30: Ibid., p. 35.]

[Footnote 31: Ibid., pp. 52-55.]

[Footnote 32: Ibid., p. 46.]

[Footnote 33: Ibid., p. 57.]

[Footnote 34: Ibid., p. 118.]

[Footnote 35: Ibid., p. 140.]

[Footnote 36: Rosenberg, Der Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts (Munich, 1935), p. 28 (1st ed. 1930).]

[Footnote 37: Ibid., p. 114.]

[Footnote 38: Ibid., p. 479.]

[Footnote 39: Ibid., p. 542.]

[Footnote 40: Gottfried Feder, The Programme of the Party of Hitler (translated by E.T.S. Dugdale: Munich, 1932), p. 18.]

[Footnote 41: Rosenberg, Wesen, Grundsaetze und Ziele der NSDAP (Munich, 1933), pp. 16-18 (1st ed. 1922).]

[Footnote 42: Rosenberg, Der Mythus des 20. Jahrhunderts, p. 673.]

[Footnote 43: Beck, op. cit., p. 110.]

[Footnote 44: Ibid., p. 110.]

[Footnote 45: Huber, "Aufbau und Gefuege des Reiches," published in the book Idee und Ordnung des Reiches (ed. by Huber: Hamburg, Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, 1941), p. 12.]

[Footnote 46: Huber, Verfassungsrecht des grossdeutschen Reiches (Hamburg, 1939), pp. 194-198.]

[Footnote 47: Ibid., pp. 199-200.]

[Footnote 48: Ibid., pp. 207-208.]

[Footnote 49: Ibid., pp. 213-214.]

[Footnote 50: Ibid., p. 230.]

[Footnote 51: Neesse, op. cit., p. 146.]

[Footnote 52: Ibid., p. 143.]

[Footnote 53: Ibid., pp. 144-147.]

[Footnote 54: Germany Speaks (containing articles by twenty-one leading members of the Nazi Party and the German Government: London, 1938), p. 31.]

[Footnote 55: Reichsgesetzblatt (1942), p. 247. (All citations to the Reichsgesetzblatt refer to part I thereof.)]

[Footnote 56: Neesse, op. cit., p. 150.]

[Footnote 57: Beck, op. cit., p. 131.]

[Footnote 58: My New Order, p. 159.]

[Footnote 59: Huber, Verfassungsrecht des grossdeutschen Reiches (Hamburg, 1939), p. 410.]

[Footnote 60: Gauweiler, Rechtseinrichtungen und Rechtsaufgaben der Bewegung (Munich, 1939), p. 2.]

[Footnote 61: Ibid., p. 9.]

[Footnote 62: Neesse, op. cit,, p. 71.]

[Footnote 63: Ibid., p. 119.]

[Footnote 64: Ibid., p. 126.]

[Footnote 65: Ibid., pp. 139-140.]

[Footnote 66: Huber, Verfassungsrecht des grossdeutschen Reiches (Hamburg, 1939), pp. 293-296.]

[Footnote 67: Beck, op. cit., p. 37.]

[Footnote 68: Ibid., pp. 37-38.]

[Footnote 69: Goebbels, op. cit., p. 19.]

[Footnote 70: Germany Speaks, pp. 30-31.]

[Footnote 71: Reichsgesetzblatt (1941), p. 295.]

[Footnote 72: Ibid., (1942), p. 35.]

[Footnote 73: Organisationsbuch der NSDAP (ed. by the National Organizational Director of the NSDAP: Munich, 1940), p. 5.]

[Footnote 74: Ibid., p. 6b.]

[Footnote 75: Ibid., p. 6d.]

[Footnote 76: Ibid.]

[Footnote 77: The German pocket reference book for current events (Taschen-Brockhaus zum Zeitgeschehen: Leipzig, 1942) states that the swastika banner was designed by Hitler for the NSDAP in 1919.]

[Footnote 78: Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf (Munich, Verlag Frank Eher, G.m.b.H., 1933 [copyright 1925]), pp. 556-557.]

[Footnote 79: Reichsgesetzblatt (1935), p. 1145.]

[Footnote 80: Ibid. (1937), p. 442.]

[Footnote 81: Organisationsbuch der NSDAP (Munich, 1940), p. 8.]

[Footnote 82: Reichsgesetzblatt (1933), p. 83.]

[Footnote 83: Ibid.]

[Footnote 84: In his book Die deutsche Polizei (The German Police) (Darmstadt, L.C. Wittich Verlag, 1941), p. 24, the prominent Nazi police official, Dr. Werner Best, wrote that this law "is to be regarded not as a 'police law'—that is, as the regulation of police functions and activities—but as the expression of the new conception of the state as it has been transformed by the National Socialist revolution, from which the new 'police' concept is derived." Also, this law was for the police "the confirmation that the work already begun was in agreement with the law giving will of the Supreme Leadership of the Reich."]

[Footnote 85: Huber, Verfassungsrecht des grossdeutschen Reiches (Hamburg, 1939) p. 288.]

[Footnote 86: Neesse, op. cit., p. 131.]

[Footnote 87: Gauweiler, op. cit., p. 3.]

[Footnote 88: Huber, Verfassungsrecht des grossdeutschen Reiches (Hamburg, 1939), p. 361.]

[Footnote 89: Ibid., pp. 365-366.]

[Footnote 90: Ibid., pp. 372-373.]

[Footnote 91: Reichsgesetzblatt (1937), pp. 39-70.]

[Footnote 92: Gauweiler, op. cit., p. 156.]

[Footnote 93: Reported in a bulletin of the official German news agency, DNB, Apr. 14, 1942.]



NAZI AIMS AND METHODS

Political Aims

The political aims of National Socialism have been written so clearly in history in the past 10 years that it does not appear necessary to discuss them at length here.

The detailed program of the Nazi Party consists of the 25 points which were adopted on February 24, 1920 at a party mass meeting in Munich. (The 25-point program appears in the Appendix as document 12, post p. 222.) The points of particular interest in this study are the first four, which are set forth below:

1. We demand the union of all Germans to form a Great Germany on the basis of the right of the self-determination enjoyed by nations.

2. We demand equality of rights for the German People in its dealings with other nations, and abolition of the Peace Treaties of Versailles and St. Germain.

3. We demand land and territory (colonies) for the nourishment of our people and for settling our superfluous population.

4. None but members of the nation may be citizens of the State. None but those of German blood, whatever their creed, may be members of the nation. No Jew, therefore, may be a member of the nation.[94]

1. Internal Objectives

A statement of the internal objectives of National Socialism is made by Gauweiler in his Legal Organization and Legal Functions of the Movement (document 8, post p. 204). The laws of the Reich must seek to establish and promote the five basic values recognized by Nazi ideology:

1. Race: The legal protection of the race, which has created a new concept of nationality [Volkszugehoerigkeit], is consciously put in first place, for the most significant historical principle which has been established by the victory of National Socialism is that of the necessity for keeping race and blood pure. All human mistakes and errors can be corrected except one: "the error regarding the importance of maintaining the basic values of a nation."

The purpose of this legal protection of the basic value of race must be the prevention for all time of a further mixture of German blood with foreign blood, as well as the prevention of continued procreation of racially unworthy and undesirable members of the people.

2. Soil [Boden]: The living-space and the basis for the food supply of the German people are its territory and soil. The farmer is the first and deepest representative of the people since he nourishes the people from the fertility of the earth and he maintains the nation through the fertility of his own family. Here National Socialism had to accomplish two great legal ends: the reestablishment and the protection of the farmer class and the securing of its land for the farmer family.

3. Work: The nation's work as a basic national value is grounded on the leading concept of "work of the hands and of the head" within and for the community of the people and the elevation of work to the only criterion for the value of an individual within the community. In place of the idea of class warfare, National Socialism had to establish the national community legally; in place of the defamation of work and its degradation to an object of barter, National Socialism had to raise it to an ethical duty and the right to work had to become the most clearly defined personal right of the individual. The concept of the honor of work had to be established as the basic concept of the national honor.

4. The Reich: With the securing of the three basic values of race, soil, and work arises the National Socialist Reich.

The infusion of foreign cultural and legal influences in Germany was a consequence of the weakening of the central authority of the German Reich since the Middle Ages. The creation and insuring of a strong central authority in contrast to the disorganized, federalistic system of the Weimar Republic became one of the principal lines of National Socialist legal policy. In consequence of the National Socialist revolution, the Reich took on the legal form of a totalitarian state and received a supreme and completely authoritative lawgiver in the person of the Fuehrer. The principle of a division of power could no longer maintain itself: The formulation, the interpretation, and the execution of the law are all performed by the Fuehrer himself or under his authority.

5. Honor: The fifth great value of the nation is its honor. The honor of the people, the Reich, the party, the Fuehrer, and the individual citizen are all regarded as goods to be protected by law. The basis of national honor is loyalty. National Socialist criminal law is therefore essentially organized as a system of punishment for breaches of faith. Every crime and offense against the community is a breach of faith which must result in loss of honor.[95]

2. Foreign Policy

The close connection between the internal political program of the National Socialist movement, as expressed in the foregoing paragraphs, and its foreign policy was indicated by Hitler when he wrote in Mein Kampf (document 13-I, post p. 226):

As National Socialists we can further set forth the following principle with regard to the nature of the foreign policy of a folk-state:

It is the task of the foreign policy of a folk-state to secure the existence on this planet of the race which is encompassed by the state and at the same time to establish a healthy, viable, natural relation between the number and growth of the folk on the one hand and the size and quality of its soil and territory on the other hand.[96]

And in the same work he states:

Yes, we can only learn from the past that we must undertake the setting of aims for our political activity in two directions: Soil and territory as the goal of our foreign policy, and a new, philosophically firm and uniform foundation as the goal of our domestic political activity.[97]

The political objectives of National Socialism, then, by definition of Hitler himself, are the internal unification of the German people and external expansion.

While the Nazis have never concealed the first of these objectives, the second was the subject for a great deal of dissimulation up to the outbreak of the present war. Typical of the false front which the Nazis presented to the outside world with reference to their foreign policy objectives are the statements made by Dr. Scurla in Basic Principles of National Socialism With Special Reference to Foreign Countries. Dr. Scurla quotes Hitler's speech of May 17, 1933 in which he said, "We see the European nations around us as given facts. French, Poles, etc., are our neighbor peoples, and we know that no conceivable historic occurrence could change this reality,"[98] and comments:

This folk principle, which has grown out of the National Socialist ideology, implies the recognition of the independence and the equal rights of each people. We do not see how anyone can discern in this a "pan-Germanic" and imperialistic threat against our neighbors. This principle does not admit the difference between "great powers" and "minor states," between majority peoples and minorities. It means at the same time a clear rejection of any imperialism which aims at the subjugation of foreign peoples or the denationalization of alien populations. It demands the unqualified acknowledgment of the right to live of every folk, and of every folk-group, which is forced to live as a foreign group in another state. The western European national state together with its parliamentary democracy was not able to do justice to the natural and living entities, the peoples, in their struggle for existence.[99]

Farther on in the same work Scurla states:

Out of its fundamental ideologic view, however, Germany rejects every form of imperialism, even that of peaceful penetration. It is unable to concede to any people the authority to develop ideas and ways of living, to which then another people has to subordinate itself, even if some other order is suited to its essential nature ... It does not at all, however, consider the German order obligatory for other peoples. National Socialism, as has been said a hundred times, is exclusively the sum total of the German world-view.[100]

Similar assurances by Nazi leaders were frequently made in order to induce a sense of security in neighboring countries. Hitler, for example, in a proclamation opening the party congress at Nuremberg on September 11, 1935 said:

National Socialism has no aggressive intentions against any European nation. On the contrary, we are convinced that the nations of Europe must continue their characteristic national existence, as created by tradition, history and economy; if not, Europe as a whole will be destroyed.[101]

But such assurances, which were intended exclusively for foreign consumption, were refuted by the basic policy laid down in Mein Kampf, which has been persistently pursued throughout the 10 years of the Nazi regime and has been realized to the extent that Germany now dominates and is in control of most of the European continent. In Mein Kampf (document 13-I, post p. 226) Hitler wrote:

Our task, the mission of the National Socialist movement, however, is to lead our folk to such political insight that it will see its future goal fulfilled not in the intoxicating impression of a new Alexandrian campaign but rather in the industrious work of the German plow, which waits only to be given land by the sword.[102]

Hitler suggests a future foreign policy for Germany which would assure Lebensraum and domination of the European continent. In Mein Kampf he states:

But the political testament of the German nation for its outwardly directed activity should and must always have the following import:

Never tolerate the establishment of two continental powers in Europe. See an attack against Germany in every attempt to organize a second military power on the German borders, even if it is only in the form of the establishment of a state which is a potential military power, and see therein not only the right but also the duty to prevent the formation of such a state with all means, even to the use of force, or if it has already been established, to destroy it again. See to it that the strength of our folk has its foundations not in colonies but in the soil of the European homeland. Never regard the foundations of the Reich as secure, if it is not able to give every off-shoot of our folk its own bit of soil and territory for centuries to come. Never forget that the most sacred right in the world is the right to the soil which a man wishes to till himself, and the most sacred sacrifice is the blood which he spills for this soil.[103]

It is impossible to adduce from the writings of Hitler, or other Nazi leaders direct statements indicating that they aspire to the domination of the entire world. Such expressions, however, may be inferred not only from the direction of German foreign policy and the effusions of the geopoliticians but also from the following statement made by Hitler in Mein Kampf (document 13-I, post p. 226):

... If the German folk, in its historical development, had possessed that herdlike unity which other peoples have enjoyed, the German Reich would today be mistress of the globe. World history would have taken another course, and no one can tell whether in this way that might not have been attained which so many deluded pacifists are hoping today to wheedle by moaning and whining: a peace supported not by the palm branches of tearful pacifistic female mourners but founded by the victorious sword of a master race [Herrenvolk] which places the world in the service of a higher culture.[104]

Like Hitler, Rosenberg envisaged the extension of Nazi power far beyond the borders of Germany. In his Nature, Principles, and Aims of the NSDAP he stated, "But National Socialism also believes that, far beyond Germany's borders, its principles and its ideology ... will lead the way in the unavoidable struggles for power in the other countries of Europe and America."[105]

Propaganda

1. Professed Peaceful Intentions as a Cloak for Imperialistic Designs

The falsity of Nazi propaganda has been demonstrated repeatedly during the past decade. That its keynote was set by Hitler himself becomes evident upon an examination of his statements on foreign policy over a period of years. Not only has his policy been marked by a series of shifts and turns, so that the policy of one year was frequently canceled by the policy of the next, but a comparison of his words with his subsequent deeds makes it evident that he deliberately sought to lull other countries into a feeling of security until he was ready to move against them. On May 17, 1933 he asserted:

No fresh European war is capable of putting something better in the place of unsatisfactory conditions which exist to-day ... The outbreak of such madness without end would lead to the collapse of existing social order in Europe ... The German Government are convinced that to-day there can be only one great task, and that is to assure the peace of the world ... The German Government wish to settle all difficult questions with other Governments by peaceful methods. They know that any military action in Europe, even if completely successful, would, in view of the sacrifice, bear no relation to the profit to be obtained ...

Germany will tread no other path than that laid down by the Treaties. The German Government will discuss all political and economic questions only within the framework of, and through, the Treaties.

The German people have no thought of invading any country.[106] (Document 14, post pp. 282-233.)

And on March 7, 1936 he stated:

After three years I believe that I can regard the struggle for German equality as concluded to-day. I believe, moreover, that thereby the first and foremost reason for our withdrawal from European collective collaboration has ceased to exist. We have no territorial demands to make in Europe.[107] (Document 14, post p. 237.)

Moreover, he did not shrink from giving specific assurances of Germany's peaceful intentions toward his subsequent victims:

There are Germans and Poles in Europe, and they ought to live together in agreement. The Poles cannot think, of Europe without the Germans and the Germans cannot think of Europe without the Poles. (Oct. 24, 1933)

Germans and Poles must reconcile themselves as to the fact of each others' existence. It has seemed to me necessary to demonstrate by an example that it is possible for two nations to talk over their differences without giving the task to a third or a fourth ...

The assertion that the German Reich plans to coerce the Austrian State is absurd and cannot be substantiated or proved ... The assertion of the Austrian Government that from the side of the Reich an attack would be undertaken or planned I must emphatically reject ... The German Reich is always ready to hold out a hand for a real understanding, with full respect for the free will of Austrian Germans ... (Jan. 13, 1934)

The lie goes forth again that Germany to-morrow or the day after will fall upon Austria or Czecho-Slovakia. I ask myself always: Who can these elements be who will have no peace, who incite continually, who must so distrust, and want no understanding? Who are they? I know they are not the millions who, if these inciters had their way, would have to take up arms. (May 1, 1936)

Germany and Poland are two nations, and these nations will live, and neither of them will be able to do away with the other. I recognized all of this, and we all must recognize that a people of 33,000,000 will always strive for an outlet to the sea ... We have assured all our immediate neighbors of the integrity of their territory as far as Germany is concerned. That is no hollow phrase; it is our sacred will ... (Sept. 26, 1938)[108] (Document 14, post pp. 233, 234, 238, 240-241.)

Yugoslavia is a State that has increasingly attracted the attention of our people since the war. The high regard that the German soldiers then felt for this brave people has since been deepened and developed into genuine friendship. Our economic relations with this country are undergoing constant development and expansion, just as is the case with the friendly countries of Bulgaria, Greece, Rumania, Turkey, Switzerland, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and the Baltic States. (Jan. 30, 1939)[109]

In Hitler's Reichstag speech of April 28, 1939, in which he replied to President Roosevelt's telegraphic message inviting him and Mussolini to pledge themselves not to attack 31 countries mentioned by name, he stated:

... All states bordering on Germany have received much more binding assurances, and above all suggestions, than Mr. Roosevelt asked from me in his curious telegram ...

The German Government is nevertheless prepared to give each of the States named an assurance of the kind desired by Mr. Roosevelt on the condition of absolute reciprocity, provided that the State wishes it and itself addresses to Germany a request for such an assurance together with appropriate proposals.[110]

And on September 1, 1939, with reference to the recently concluded pact between Germany and Russia, he said:

You know that Russia and Germany are governed by two different doctrines. There was only one question that had to be cleared up. Germany has no intention of exporting its doctrine. Given the fact that Soviet Russia has no intention of exporting its doctrine to Germany, I no longer see any reason why we should still oppose one another. On both sides we are clear on that. Any struggle between our people would only be of advantage to others. We have, therefore, resolved to conclude a pact which rules out forever any use of violence between us.[111]

Additional assurances of this nature are quoted in a series of extracts from Hitler's speeches, dating from February 10, 1933 to September 1, 1939, which was printed in the London Times of September 26, 1939 (document 14, post p. 232).

2. Internal Propaganda

Within Germany the notorious propaganda machine of Dr. Goebbels, together with a systematic terrorization of oppositionist elements, has been the principle support of the rise and triumph of the Nazi movement. In his Legal Organization and Legal Functions of the Movement (document 8, post p. 204), Gauweiler gives an idea of the permeation of all phases of national life with a propaganda designed to make Nazi "legal principles" acceptable to the masses. He makes it clear that all of the Nazi propaganda machinery is in the service of this program; political lecturers, the press, the radio, and the films all play a part in helping the people to understand and appreciate the new legal code. The schools and Hitler Youth groups provide instruction for all young people in the fundamentals of National Socialist law, and pupils in those schools which train the carefully selected future leaders are given an especially strong dose of Nazi legal theory and practice.

In order to appeal to the broadest audience, Nazi propaganda has always sought to present all questions in the simplest possible terms. Goebbels himself, in his Nature and Form of National Socialism (document 2, post p. 170), wrote as follows:

National Socialism has simplified the thinking of the German people and led it back to its original primitive formulas. It has presented the complicated processes of political and economic life in their simplest terms. This was done with the well-considered intention of leading the broad masses of the people once again to take part in political life. In order to find understanding among the masses, we consciously practiced a popular [volksgebundene] propaganda. We have taken complexes of facts which were formerly accessible only to a few specialists and experts, carried them to the streets, and hammered them into the brain of the little man. All things were presented so simply that even the most primitive mind could grasp them. We refused to work with unclear or insubstantial concepts but we gave all things a clearly defined sense. Here lay the secret of our success.[112]

The character and quality of Nazi propaganda was fully presaged in Mein Kampf. Here Hitler paid a striking tribute to the power of lies, commenting on—

the very correct principle that the size of the lie always involves a certain factor of credibility, since the great mass of a people will be more spoiled in the innermost depths of its heart, rather than consciously and deliberately bad. Consequently, in view of the primitive simplicity of its mind it is more readily captivated by a big lie than by a small one, since it itself often uses small lies but would be, nevertheless, too ashamed to make use of big lies. Such an untruth will not even occur to it, and it will not even believe that others are capable of the enormous insolence of the most vile distortions. Why, even when enlightened, it will still vacillate and be in doubt about the matter and will nevertheless accept as true at least some cause or other. Consequently, even from the most impudent lie something will always stick ...[113]

A number of other passages display Hitler's low opinion of the intellectual capacities and critical faculties of the masses:

All propaganda has to appeal to the people and its intellectual level has to be set in accordance with the receptive capacities of the most-limited persons among those to whom it intends to address itself. The larger the mass of men to be reached, the lower its purely intellectual level will have to be set.[114]

The receptive capacity of the great masses is very restricted, its understanding small. On the other hand, however, its forgetfulness is great. On account of these facts all effective propaganda must restrict itself to very few points and impress these by slogans, until even the last person is able to bring to mind what is meant by such a word.[115]

The task of propaganda is, for instance, not to evaluate diverse rights but to emphasize exclusively the single right of that which it is representing. It does not have to investigate objectively the truth, so far as this is favorable to the others, in order then to present it to the masses in strict honesty, but rather to serve its own side ceaselessly.[116]

If one's own propaganda even once accords just the shimmer of right to the other side, then the basis is therewith laid for doubt regarding one's own cause. The masses are not able to distinguish where the error of the other side ends and the error of one's own side begins.[117]

But all talent in presentation of propaganda will lead to no success if a fundamental principle is not always strictly followed. Propaganda has to restrict itself to a few matters and to repeat these eternally. Persistence is here, as with so many other things in the world, the first and most important presupposition for success.[118]

In view of their slowness of mind, they [the masses] require always, however, a certain period before they are ready even to take cognizance of a matter, and only after a thousandfold repetition of the most simple concept will they finally retain it.[119]

In all cases in which there is a question of the fulfilment of apparently impossible demands or tasks, the entire attention of a people must be concentrated only on this one question, in such a way as if being or non-being actually depends on its solution ...

...The great mass of the people can never see the entire way before them, without tiring and doubting the task.[120]

In general the art of all truly great popular leaders at all times consists primarily in not scattering the attention of a people but rather in concentrating it always on one single opponent. The more unified this use of the fighting will of a people, the greater will be the magnetic attractive force of a movement and the more powerful the force of its push. It is a part of the genius of a great leader to make even quite different opponents appear as if they belonged only to one category, because the recognition of different enemies leads weak and unsure persons only too readily to begin doubting their own cause.

When the vacillating masses see themselves fighting against too many enemies, objectivity at once sets in and raises the question whether really all the others are wrong and only one's own people or one's own movement is right.[121] (Document 13-II, post pp. 229-231.)

It has been the aim of Nazi propaganda, then, to unite the masses of the people in hatred of certain enemies, designated by such conveniently broad and simple terms as "Jews," "democrats," "plutocrats," "bolshevists," or "Anglo-Saxons," which so far as possible were to be identified with one another in the public mind. The Germans were represented to themselves, on the other hand, as a racial folk of industrious workers. It then became possible to plunge the people into a war on a wave of emotional hatred against those nations which were pictured as combining to keep Germany from attaining her rightful place in the sun.

The important role which propaganda would have to play in the coming war was fully recognized by Ewald Banse, an ardent Nazi military theorist of the geopolitical school and professor of military science at Brunswick Military College. In his book Raum und Volk im Weltkrieg (Space and People in the World War) which appeared in 1932 (an English translation by Alan Harris was published under the title Germany Prepares for War (New York, Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1934)), he stated:

Preparation for future wars must not stop at the creation, equipment and training of an efficient army, but must go on to train the minds of the whole people for the war and must employ all the resources of science to master the conditions governing the war itself and the possibility of endurance. In 1914 we had a first-class army, but our scientific mobilization was bad, and the mobilization of men's minds a thing undreamed of. The unveiling of war memorials, parades of war veterans, flag-waggings, fiery speeches and guard-mounting are not of themselves enough to prepare a nation's mind for the dangers that threaten. Conviction is always more lasting than enthusiasm.

... Such teaching is necessary at a time and in a world in which countries are no longer represented by monarchs or a small aristocracy or by a specialist army, but in which the whole nation, from the commander-in-chief to the man in the ranks, from the loftiest thought to the simplest wish, from corn to coal, from the treasury vaults to the last trouser-button, must be permeated through and through with the idea of national defense, if it is to preserve its national identity and political independence. The science of national defense is not the same as military science; it does not teach generals how to win battles or company commanders how to train recruits. Its lessons are addressed first and foremost to the whole people. It seeks to train the popular mind to heroism and war and to implant in it an understanding of the nature and prerequisite conditions of modern warfare. It teaches us about countries and peoples, especially our own country and its neighbors, their territories and economic capacity, their communications and their mentality—all for the purpose of creating the best possible conditions for waging future wars in defense of the national existence.[122]

Infiltration Tactics

The Nazis, while entirely without scruple in the pursuit of their objectives, endeavor whenever possible to give their actions the cloak of legality. This procedure was followed in Germany to enable them to gain control of the Government of the Reich and in their foreign policy up to September 1, 1939. It has been a cardinal principle of the Nazis to avoid the use of force whenever their objectives may be attained in another manner and they have assiduously studied their enemies in an effort to discover the weak points in their structure which will enable the Nazis to accomplish their downfall. The preceding pages have demonstrated that the Nazis have contributed practically nothing that is original to German political thought. By the use of unscrupulous, deceitful, and uninhibited tactics, however, they have been able to realize many of the objectives which had previously existed only in theory.

The Weimar Constitution provided the Nazis with a convenient basis for the establishment of the totalitarian state. They made no effort to conceal their intention of taking advantage of the weaknesses of the Weimar Republic in order to attain power. On April 30, 1928 Dr. Goebbels wrote in his paper Der Angriff:

We enter Parliament in order to supply ourselves, in the arsenal of democracy, with its own weapons. We become members of the Reichstag in order to paralyze the Weimar sentiment with its own assistance. If democracy is so stupid as to give us free tickets and salaries for this bear's work, that is its affair ...[123]

And later in the same article:

We do not come as friends, nor even as neutrals. We come as enemies. As the wolf bursts into the flock, so we come.[124]

Hitler expressed the same idea on September 1, 1933, when, looking back upon the struggle for political power in Germany, he wrote:

This watchword of democratic freedom led only to insecurity, indiscipline, and at length to the downfall and destruction of all authority. Our opponents' objection that we, too, once made use of these rights, will not hold water; for we made use of an unreasonable right, which was part and parcel of an unreasonable system, in order to overthrow the unreason of this system.[125]

Discussing the rise to power of the Nazis, Huber (document 1, post p. 155) wrote in 1939:

The parliamentary battle of the NSDAP had the single purpose of destroying the parliamentary system from within through its own methods. It was necessary above all to make formal use of the possibilities of the party-state system but to refuse real cooperation and thereby to render the parliamentary system, which is by nature dependent upon the responsible cooperation of the opposition, incapable of action.[126]

As its parliamentary strength increased, the party was able to achieve these aims:

It was in a position to make the formation of any positive majority in the Reichstag impossible.... Thus the NSDAP was able through its strong position to make the Reichstag powerless as a lawgiving and government-forming body.[127]

The same principle was followed by Germany in weakening and undermining the governments of countries which it had chosen for its victims. While it was Hitler's policy to concentrate on only one objective at a time, German agents were busy throughout the world in ferreting out the natural political, social, and economic cleavages in various countries and in broadening them in order to create internal confusion and uncertainty. Foreign political leaders of Fascist or authoritarian persuasion were encouraged and often liberally subsidized from Nazi funds. Control was covertly obtained over influential newspapers and periodicals and their editorial policies shaped in such a way as to further Nazi ends. In the countries Germany sought to overpower, all the highly developed organs of Nazi propaganda were utilized to confuse and divide public opinion, to discredit national leaders and institutions, and to induce an unjustified feeling of confidence in the false assertions of Nazi leaders disclaiming any aggressive intentions.

One of the most important features introduced by the Nazis into German foreign policy was the appreciation of the value of Germans living abroad and their organization as implements of the Reich for the attainment of objectives in the field of foreign policy. This idea was applied by the Nazis to all the large colonies of Germans which are scattered throughout the world. The potential usefulness of these colonies was early recognized by the men in Hitler's immediate entourage, several of whom were so-called Auslandsdeutsche who had spent many years of their life abroad and were familiar with foreign conditions and with the position and influence of German groups in foreign countries. Of particular importance in this group were Rudolf Hess, the Fuehrer's Deputy, who was primarily responsible for elaborating the policy which utilized the services of Germans abroad, and Ernst Wilhelm Bohle, the leader of the Foreign Organization, who was responsible for winning over these Germans to Naziism and for their organization in groups which would serve the purposes of the Third Reich.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 94: Feder, op. cit., p. 18.]

[Footnote 95: Gauweiler, op. cit., pp. 149-151.]

[Footnote 96: Mein Kampf, pp. 727-728.]

[Footnote 97: Ibid., pp. 735-736.]

[Footnote 98: Scurla, op. cit., p. 21.]

[Footnote 99: Ibid., pp. 21-22.]

[Footnote 100: Ibid., p. 23.]

[Footnote 101: Der Parteitag der Freiheit (official record of the 1935 party congress at Nuremberg: Munich, 1935), p. 27.]

[Footnote 102: Mein Kampf, p. 743.]

[Footnote 103: Ibid., pp. 754-755.]

[Footnote 104: Ibid., pp. 437-438.]

[Footnote 105: Rosenberg, Wesen, Grundsaetze und Ziele der NSDAP, p. 48.]

[Footnote 106: London Times, Sept. 26, 1939, p. 9.]

[Footnote 107: Ibid.]

[Footnote 108: Ibid.]

[Footnote 109: My New Order, p. 592.]

[Footnote 110: Ibid., pp. 669-671.]

[Footnote 111: Ibid., p. 687.]

[Footnote 112: Goebbels, op. cit., p. 6.]

[Footnote 113: Mein Kampf, p. 252.]

[Footnote 114: Ibid., p. 197.]

[Footnote 115: Ibid., p. 198.]

[Footnote 116: Ibid., p. 200.]

[Footnote 117: Ibid., pp. 200-201.]

[Footnote 118: Ibid., p. 202.]

[Footnote 119: Ibid., p. 203.]

[Footnote 120: Ibid., p. 273.]

[Footnote 121: Ibid., p. 129.]

[Footnote 122: Banse, Germany Prepares for War (New York, 1934), pp. 348-349.]

[Footnote 123: Goebbels, Der Angriff: Aufsaetze aus der Kampfzeit (Munich, 1936), p. 71.]

[Footnote 124: Ibid., p. 73.]

[Footnote 125: My New Order, pp. 195-196.]

[Footnote 126: Huber, Verfassungsrecht des grossdeutschen Reiches (Hamburg, 1939), p. 31.]

[Footnote 127: Ibid., p. 32.]



NATIONAL-SOCIALISM AND MEDICINE Address by Dr. F. Hamburger to German Medical Profession. Translated (in part) from Wiener Klinische Wochenschrift, 1939, No. 6.

Medical men must beware of pride, a pride which is certainly wide-spread and which leads to the disparagement of the practical doctor and medical layman, and then further to the disparagement of the craft of nature healers. The practical doctor and the nature healer on the one hand tend towards an understandable disparagement of medical science and analysis and, on the other hand, tend towards superficiality. The superficiality of the opponents of science is, however, as unhappy an affair as the pride of the so-called scientists, but the one group should not demean the other. This would lead to successful cooperation to the advantage of the sick and health of the community.

Academic medicine and nature healers generally have one thing in common, that they underestimate the significance of automatism and suggestion. In this regard there is an absence in both camps of the necessary criticism and clarity. Successes are noted with specific methods without any confirmation as to whether or not suggestion and faith alone have not produced the improvement in the patient.

National-Socialism is the true instrument for the achievement of the health of our people. National-Socialism is concerned with the great significance of inherited traits and with the insight into the working of spiritual forces upon the body, with the study of the power of custom and, along with this, of the significance of education and nurture. (Hamburger here complains about the luxurious arrangement for dealing with the mentally ill in contradistinction to the neglect of Folk-health. This he attributes to the era of liberalism with its stress upon the single individual. He here also attacks the Socialism of Social Democracy and its conception of a Community of Equal Men. This is a false Socialism.)

So we scientists and doctors simply and soberly affirm the principle of strength of faith and the nationalist socialist principle of Positive Christianity which does not prevent us from the inspired consideration of natural and divinely willed phenomena. We doctors must never forget the fact that the soul rules the body.

Soul forces are the most important. The spirit builds the body. Strength springs from joy. Efficiency is achieved despite care, fear, and uncertainty—We speak here of thymogenetic automatism or the automatism of harmony ("thymogenetische automatismus oder stimmungsautomatismus"). The autonomous nervous system achieves, under the influence of joy, the expansion of the blood vessels in skin and muscle.... The muscular activity incited by joy means the use of calories and stimulation of appetite. Muscular contraction pulls and draws at the bones, ligaments are tensed, breathing deepend, appetite increased ... A child influenced by the daily exercise of joy develops physically strong and powerful. ... The Soul care (Seele Sorge) of the practical doctor is his most significant daily task alongside of prescriptions and manipulative dexterity.

Soul-care in the medical sense is a concern for the wishes, hopes and fears of the patient, the considered participation in his fate. Such a relationship leads to the all-important and generally recognized trust in the doctor. This faith, in all cases, leads to the improvement, often even to the elimination of symptoms, of the disease. Here we have clearly before us the great significance of thymogenetic automatism.

Academic physicians should not dismiss this because we do not know its biochemical aspects. (We must beware of regarding something as unacceptable because it is not measurable in exact terms, he warns.) We see its practical results, and, therefore, thymogenetic automatism must stand in the first rank as of overwhelming significance. Thus, also, the principle, strength through joy (Kraft durch Freude) stands firmly as an inescapable natural law.

We see the practical country doctor spreading courage and confidence. For years too few doctors have seen clearly that gymnastic tourism and sport do more for health than all doctors taken together. And now we face the fact that a single man, a non-medical man (Hitler) through his great qualities, has opened up new avenues of health for the eighty million folk of Germany.

In the majority of cases things so happen that the doctor must act before making a diagnosis, since only the mis-educated patients, the one-sided intellectual patient, wishes in the very first place to know the diagnosis. But the unspoilt and properly ordered type of person wishes only to be relieved of his pain. For him the diagnosis is an interesting side issue but not the principle thing. We can thus also understand why we always meet the desire for a diagnosis placed first by the over-intellectualized Jewish patient. But that is not the case with most Aryan patients. They, from the first, come to meet the doctor with more trust. They do not entertain as many after-thoughts. And I cannot help but remark that after-thoughts are hardly conducive to right results.

(After a discussion of the sterilization of the unfit and of inheritable diseases he turns to the subject of child bearing.)

It has been estimated that every couple should have four children if the nation's population is to be maintained. But we meet already the facile and complacent expression of young married people, "Now we have our four children and so have fulfilled our obligations"—What superficiality! Today we must demand a much higher moral attitude from the wife than previously. Earlier it was taken for granted that a woman would bear a child every one or two years. But today in this time of manifold amenities of life, at a time when women is not denied access to these joys it is understandable that she is eager to participate in them. Add to this that the knowledge of birth control is general today. Despite all this women must be encouraged to give birth during twenty years of married life to eight or ten and even more children, and to renounce the above-mentioned joys of life. She must decide as a mother of children to lead a life full of sacrifices, devotion, and unselfishness. It is only when these ethical demands are fulfilled by a large number of worthy wives of good stock that the future of the German nation will be assured.

Doctors are leaders of the Folk more than they know ... They are now quite officially fuehrer of the people, called to the leadership of its health. To fulfill this task they must be free of the profit motive. They must be quite free from that attitude of spirit which is rightly designated as Jewish, the concern for business and self-provision.



SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Arendt, Hannah—The Origins of Totalitarianism, N.Y., 1951.

Pt. III is especially directed to a discussion of the principles and consequences of fascism. The author gives an effective account of what "total domination" signifies in a reign of terror. Detailed bibliography.

Bodrero, Emilio—"Fascism" in Dictatorship on Its Trial, ed. by Otto Forst de Battaglia, London, 1930.

A brief, but significant, statement by a former Rector of the University of Padua and a Secretary of State to Mussolini.

Borgese, G.A.—Goliath, The March of Fascism, N.Y., 1938.

Well written from the point of view of an Italian humanist.

Brady, Robert A.—The Spirit and Structure of German Fascism, London, 1937.

An extremely thorough and documented discussion of the economy of National Socialist Germany, its institutions and its business practices.

See also: Brady's Business as a System of Power; chapters on Germany, Italy and Japan. N.Y., 1943.

Childs, H.L. and Dodd, W.E.—The Nazi Primer, N.Y., 1938.

A translation of the "Official Handbook for Schooling the Hitler Youth." In simple form including illustrations, it is an excellent indication of the guiding principles of the German educational system.

Dennis, Lawrence—The Coming American Fascism, N.Y., 1936. The Dynamics of War and Revolution, N.Y., 1940.

Two books by the only fascist theorist in America.

Fraenkel, Ernest—The Dual State: A Contribution to the Theory of Dictatorship, N.Y., 1941.

By distinguishing between the "Prerogative State" and the "Normative State," the author gives an effective account of the attempt of the Nazis to acknowledge an indispensable, if minimal, legal order, which was, comparatively speaking, independent of the extra-legal realm of violence.

Hartshorne, E.Y.—The German Universities and National Socialism, Cambridge, 1937.

A carefully documented account of what happened in the various branches and departments of German universities under the Nazis.

Hitler, Adolph—My Battle, N.Y., 1939.

Hitler's own vitriolic account of his attempt to rise to power.

Lasswell, Harold D.—"The Garrison State," American Journal of Sociology, Chicago, Vol. XLVI, 1940-41, pp. 455-468.

A brief but incisive discussion of the structure of fascism.

Lilge, Frederic—The Abuse of Learning: The Failure of the German University, N.Y., 1948.

A philosophical history of higher education in Germany, concluding with its fascist evolution.

Matteotti, Giacomo—The Fascist Exposed: A Year of Fascist Domination, London, 1924.

A factual account by a liberal, who, until murdered, was a member of the Italian Senate.

Minio-Paluello, L.—Education in Fascist Italy, N.Y., 1946.

A detailed discussion of fascist education, including an historical introduction to pre-fascist education.

Neumann, Franz—Behemoth: The Structure and Practice of National Socialism, N.Y., 1942.

Probably the most comprehensive and definitive statement in English of the functioning of National Socialism. It concentrates especially on the political and economic aspects of Nazism.

Pinthus, Kurt—"Culture Under Nazi Germany," The American Scholar, Vol. IX, N.Y., 1940, pp. 483-498.

A valuable treatment of the inner character of the arts and letters and of what happened to their publics under the Nazis.

Sabine, G.H.—A History of Political Theory, N.Y., 1950.

A brief chapter on "Fascism" gives an excellent balanced account of its fundamentals.

Salvemini, Gaetano—The Fascist Dictatorship in Italy, N.Y., 1927. Under the Axe of Fascism, N.Y., 1936.

An eminent Italian historian writes vividly and perceptively on Italian Fascism.

Schneider, Herbert W.—Making the Fascist State, N.Y., 1928.

An early, but well considered, account of the rise of Italian fascism.

Silone, Ignazio—Fontamara, Verona, 1951.

The best novel on Italian fascism.

Spender, Stephen—European Witness, N.Y., 1946.

Note especially the analysis of Goebbel's novel, Michael.

Trevor-Roper, H.R.—The Last Days of Hitler, N.Y., 1946.

An intimate portrayal of Hitler and his entourage from the time of the beginning of the collapse of the Nazi armies. Especially good on the rift between the politicians and the military.



READINGS ON FASCISM AND NATIONAL SOCIALISM

The catastrophe and holocaust brought about by the two powerful movements of fascism and national socialism will mark human life always. Now, as we feel our hatred for them, we find it difficult to understand how they could have been so powerful, how they could have appealed so strongly to millions of people of a modern age.

And the documents whereby we could understand these philosophies have been lost—except as they are now gathered here in one convenient volume.

To understand our own times, it is necessary to understand these movements. And to understand them, we must read the basic philosophical and political documents which show the force of the ideas which moved a world to the brink of disaster.

THE FIRST SWALLOW PAPERBOOKS:

1. A FIELD OF BROKEN STONES by Lowell Naeve. A profound book written in a prison. $1.65.

2. THE WIFE OF MARTIN GUERRE by Janet Lewis. One of the fine short novels of all time. $1.25.

3. READINGS ON FASCISM AND NATIONAL SOCIALISM. A grouping together of authoritative readings. $1.35.

4. THE TEACHER OF ENGLISH by James E. Warren, Jr. The Materials and Opportunities of the teacher. $1.35.

5. MORNING RED by Frederick Manfred. The most ambitious novel by a powerful writer. $1.95.

ALAN SWALLOW 2679 So. York St., Denver 10, Colo.

Cover design by Lowell Naeve

THE END