The Question of Governance in the Third Reich

29 Fuehrerstaat or Fuehrerei? The Question of Governance in the Third Reich M. Gregory Kendricks I swear by God this sacred oath, that I will yield unconditional obedience to the fuehrer of the German Reich and Vollc, Adolf Hitler, the Supreme Commander of the Wehrmacht, and as a brave soldier, will be ready at any time to lay down my life for this oath. -German Armed Services Declaration August 2, 1934 The men about me are four-square and upstanding men, each of them a powerful personality, each of them a man of will and ambition, if they had not ambition they would not be where they are today. I welcome ambition. When you have a group of powerful personalities, it is inevitable that occasionally friction is produced. -Adolf Hitler Descrying the essential characteristics of government in the Third Reich is akin to Harry Haller’s journey through the maze of mirrors and rooms in the Magic Club of Hermann Hesse’s novel Steppenwotf: Nothing is as it seems. At first glance, the Nazi regime appears to be nothing more than another chapter in the history of German authoritarian government. Monocled barons and bemedaled generals goosestep to the bombast of a would-be Kaiser. The Armed Forces declaration of unconditional loyalty, cited above, is a case in point. For many in the military, this oath was no more than a resurrection of the personal tie that had characterized the traditional relationship between monarch and soldier in both Brandenburg-Prussia and the Kaiserreich.1 While this may have been a naive assumption in 1934, it was not an altogether unreasonable one. From the moment he assumed the Chancellorship in January 1933, Adolf Hitler fostered the idea that National Socialism was no more than a restatement of German nationalism. By associating himself with Hohenzollem princes, staging nationalist celebrations at Potsdam and restoring the black, red and white flag of the Empire, Hitler established himself in the public mind as the saviour and protector of the German Rechtstaat.2 Nevertheless, behind the smoke and mirrors of “national revival,” a much more radical process of “national reconstruction” was taking place. 1For a thorough account of both the background of the military declaration of August 2, 1934, and its tragic outcome see Gordon A. Craig, The Politics of the Prussian Army 1640-1945 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1964), 479-481. 2 Hajo Holbom, A History of Modern Germany 1840-1945 (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1969), 726-727. 30 The Prussian Rechtstaat and the German Kaiserreich may have been characterized by authoritarian political systems, but their governance was, nevertheless, an affair that involved the interplay of traditional elites, powerful interest groups, and political parties. Developments in 1933 made it quite clear that the Third Reich would not be governed in the same manner. With the Enabling Act in March of that year, Hitler removed both Reich President and parliament from the legislative process. In April, the German Lander were placed under Reich control and the national civil service was “cleansed” of all undesirable elements, i.e., opponents of the regime and Jews. By May all trade unions had been abolished and in July the remaining political parties followed suit. At the end of this year of Gleichshattung (coordination), a law of “Guarantees for the Unity of Party and State” proclaimed an indissoluble link between the Nazi movement and the Reich government. With the amalgamation of the offices of Reich President and Chancellor following Hindenburg’s death, Hitler, in less than two years, had concentrated all political, legislative, and executive power in his hands and his hands alone.3 When the Armed Forces pledged themselves unequivocally to their new Führer on August 2, 1934, their oath was not to a state, a body of law or even to a monarchial figure (for even a monarch is bound by oaths, lawful obligations and traditions) but to a leader whose authority was extra-legal and unprecedented in German history. The only real link between the government of the Third Reich and its predecessors was the fact that they were German states. One thing, however, was certain; this new Reich was not, and would never be, the venerable Beamtenstaat of Frederick the Great. Like the rooms in the maze of the Magic Club, its nature remained something of a mystery. According to the popular perception, both in the 1930s and the present, Hitler had created a totalitarian machine state in which the policies of an omniscient Führer were carried out in an efficient, uniform manner by unquestioning, fanatically loyal lieutenants. Given Hitler’s extraordinary position of power as head of both party and state, the de jure centralization of the Reich government, and the slavish loyalty of many Germans to their new leader, this idea of a Führerstaat is not an outlandish one. Furthermore, the complexity of administering a modern state such as Germany, with its large population, vast transportation systems, centralized industries, extensive agricultural sector, and varied The limitations of this paper necessitate the rather terse treatment of the Nazi Gleichschattung outlined above. Hitler’s ‘legal revolution’ during 1933-1934 touched every aspect of German life from agriculture to education. For an excellent overview of this period the reader is directed to Holbom,Modern Germany, 724-750. Detailed, exhaustive accounts of the Nazi reorganization of the German state can be found in Martin Broszat, The Hitter State: The foundation and Development of the Internal Structure of the Third Reich (London and New York: Longman Group, 1981), 57-133 and Karl Diethch Bracher, The German Dictatorship: The Origins, Structure, and Effects of National Socialism (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1970), 199-247. 31 business interests, seems to necessitate a well-organized, competent government with clearly delineated areas ofjurisdiction and authority. These considerations coupled with the stunning economic and military successes of the 1930s, as well as Germany’s ability to fight a world war on three fronts in the 1940s, has led many to conclude that the Third Reich was a centralized state govehied by a unified competent leadership. We know, however, from the memoirs of both Albert Speer and Joseph Goebbels that the government of this machine state was more aldn to the fractious courts of the absolutist monarchies than the bureaucratic regimes of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Within the quarrelsome circle of the Führer, intrigue, favoritism and corruption, usually for the purpose of personal aggrandizement, played a major role in the formulation and execution of government policies. On more than one occasion, as a result of the egoism and corruption of this circle, policies were formulated, which not only conflicted with Hitler’s aims, but contributed markedly to the final collapse of his state.4 Furthermore, the authority and jurisdiction of state and party offices and bureaucracies was never clearly defined, resulting in endless disputes, conflicting directives, and a loss of efficiency on all levels of government. This massive confusion was compounded by Hitler’s propensity for creating special agencies whose authority cut across, and overlapped with, the jurisdiction of other state entities.5 The resulting institutional “social Darwinism” has led many historians to liken the Third Reich not to a machine but to a morass. Whether one sees the Third Reich as a monolithic Führerstaat or as a hydra-like Führerrej at war with itself, the question of its nature, i.e., the essential characteristics of the dictatorship, as well as how that nature manifested itself through the administration of the state, continues to intrigue historians. Three of the theories that have been advanced to explain the nature and practice of the German dictatorship deserve further examination: the theory that the Third Reich was governed by a unified leadership, which shared common social, political and economic goals; the idea of a unified, powerful dictatorship, which, nonetheless, had to share power with a pre-existing collection of governing elites; and, finally, an offshoot of this “dual state” idea, which suggests that the Third Reich was a polycratic or “weak” dictatorship in which authority was exercised by a plethora of individuals and groups, sometimes in unison, other times in conflict. By analyzing the The backbiting, quarrels and vicious infighting that characterized the daily routine of the Nazi leadership throughout its twelve years in power is extensively treated in Albert Spear, Inside the Third Reich (New York: Avon Books, 1970), 176-180, 275-280, 288-291, 332-349. See specifically 275-280 and 288-29 1 for examples of how the egoism and selfishness of Hitler’s colleagues adversely affected the German war effort. Goebbels wrote on March 16, 1943: “We live in a state where areas of authority have been unclearly divided.. .the consequence is a complete lack of direction.” Joseph Goebbels, The Goebbels Diaries 1942- 1943 (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1948), 301. 32 essential features, rationales, and weaknesses of these theories, and by paying special attention to those elements that are common to all of these explanations, a clearer idea of the nature and practice of government in the Third Reich will emerge. I In Fritz Lang’s film classic, Metropolis, we are presented with a vision of a rigidly hierarchical, oppressive machine state. It is a world in which the commands of an all powerful elite are instantly obeyed by a populace that is more automaton than human. Of the many characters who inhabit this futuristic nightmare, perhaps the most intriguing is the demented nihilistic scientist, Dr. Rotwang. At first glance, it appears that he is the classic villain of the piece. After all, it is his boundless hatred, coupled with the wizardry of science, that almost destroys the hapless workers.

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