Victims or Perpetrators? - An analysis of the role of women in Nazi Germany
Extended Essay in History
"Victims or Perpetrators?" - An analysis of the role of women in Nazi Germany
Bita Pourmotamed 3848 words
Candidate code: MAY 2002 - 0511 038
Abstract
The main focus of this essay lies on the much-debated role of women as either "victims" or "perpetrators" in Nazi Germany between the years of 1933 to 1939. During the time Adolf Hitler and the NSDAP (National Sozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei) ruled the country, the Nazi party started and continued to consistently emphasize the primacy of motherhood and marriage for a woman, but also altered the role of females according to the needs of the party and the German state.
To be able to reach a final assumption to the research question, this essay firstly examines the situation of women in the Nazi state by primarily establishing an idea about their circumstances before Hitler's seizure of power in January 1933 and then continues with a brief description of the Nazi attitude towards the female population of Germany. This essay later proceeds to depicting the roles of women as mothers and views and as an important source of labour. Then by analysing the differences between male and female education and the Nazi organizations of women, the main body of the essay is completed with a historical debate.
The conclusion reached in this essay is that due to the fact that the majority of the German women experienced a highly complex and ambiguous relationship with the Nazi regime, they can both be classified as both "victims" and "perpetrators" at the same time.
229 words
Table of Contents
Introduction..........................................................................................4
Background..........................................................................................5
Nazi Women and their Roles in the 'Private Sphere' of Life..............................6
Women and the Nazi Population Policy........................................................6
Women in the Different Areas of Work........................................................8
Women and Education............................................................................11
The Nazi Organizations of Women.............................................................12
"Victims or Perpetrators?" A Historical Debate about the Role of Women in Nazi Germany.............................................................................................13
Conclusion...........................................................................................14
Bibliography........................................................................................15
Introduction
As Adolf Hitler and the NSDAP1 came into power in January 1933, a whole new era began in Germany where women formed a vital part of the Nazi state policy. "Nazi attitudes towards women were in most respects extremely reactionary"2 and female emancipation was strongly opposed in the country. Compared to the Weimar Republic and other European countries such as Sweden and Russia, where women had both been given the right to vote and been proclaimed equal to men after World War I, the Nazi ideology was extremely anti-feministic.3
Although Nazis insisted on the fact that women were not inferior to men, they clearly believed that men and women had different roles in life due to their natural differences, and that it thus could be said that "the world of the woman ?was? a smaller world" compared to that of a man, "for her world ?was? her husband, her family, her children and her home."4
This essay is mainly constructed around the treatment of the role of women in Nazi Germany during the period of 1933 to 1939 and will hence analyse her various roles in the different areas of life such as the family domain, work and the social sphere, until the upcoming crisis of war. The aim of this extended essay will be to reach a conclusion to the much historically debated role of women as either "victims or perpetrators" and argue that although many women both supported and praised Hitler and the NSDAP, "they remained only privates in the civilian army commanded by Nazi men."5
Background
At the same time as the Weimar Republic took form after the end of World War I, the situation of women changed drastically in former Imperial Germany. Women were suddenly given the right to vote, stand in elections and the Weimar Constitution recognised sexual equality as a basic right in the country. Although this was a great step towards female liberation, this constitution was never translated into legislation and the very few women that were elected into political bodies were well-kept from high politics.6
Although a woman's traditional domain had been and still was within her family, the many casualties of WWI left a surplus of approximately 2 million women aged over 20 throughout the inter-war years and thus made economic activeness7 both a necessity and a possibility for females. As wage-earners, "an independent income gave ?...? women a bargaining power needed for a greater participation in the decision making in the family and ?...? they also won some freedom from their husbands´ authority, where family law allowed."8
When it comes to education, girls were as before prepared for a future as housewives by learning household and motherhood skills by both family and schools while boys were expected to seek an occupation of their own choice to establish their roles as a future head of a family. 9
During the 14 years of the existence of the Weimar Republic, "more and more people were getting married and they were having fewer and fewer children."10 At the time of the 1933 census 62.8 per cent of all married women had fewer than three children, and the trend was seemingly growing. "Family law, which gave the husband almost exclusive rights over his wife's property and children, remained unchanged and German women were more deferential to their mensfolk than women in for example Britain."11
In summery, it can be said that even though women never experienced equality with men, and many traditional and oppressive rules and regulations still existed in the Weimar Republic, the female emancipation process had slowly but very confidently started after World War I.
Nazi Women and their Roles in the 'Private Sphere' of Life
In the patriarchal society of Nazi Germany, "the ideal Nazi man was a fighter; the ideal Nazi woman, his mother."12 Women were restricted from entering the masculine 'public sphere' which included the worlds of politics, government, industry and the military, and were to instead accept their natural roles as mothers and wives working within their homes. The female domain existed within the 'private sphere' and had a purpose of creating a safe and secure home so the big world, that was the world of a man, could survive.13
Women and the Nazi Population Policy
While Hitler took over the power in the German Reichstag in 1933, one of the major concerns of the Nazis was the declining birth-rate in the country due to the fact that the German birth-rate had declined from over 2 million in the beginning of the twentieth century, to approximately 971 000 in 1933. Since the Nazis feared that the nation was dying out, an urgent promotion about motherhood in 'valuable families' was started and the utmost role of the German woman became the role of a mother. "Essentially, marriage between the 'hereditary valuable' was to be facilitated while marriages were one or both parents were considered 'unfit' to reproduce, according to the regime's 'race and hereditary' criteria, were to be prevented."14
The major campaign that was launched to encourage couples to have children took many various forms. Firstly, §218 of the Civil Code that prohibited abortion was enforced greatly15, and birth control centres were closed down together with attempts to restrict access to contraceptive information and devices.16
When it comes to economical aid, "financial incentives were given to parents to produce children, previous loans were annulled, maternity benefits were improved and income tax allowances for dependent children were virtually doubled in October 1934 at the expense of single people and childless couples."17 However the most novel financial aid ...
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The major campaign that was launched to encourage couples to have children took many various forms. Firstly, §218 of the Civil Code that prohibited abortion was enforced greatly15, and birth control centres were closed down together with attempts to restrict access to contraceptive information and devices.16
When it comes to economical aid, "financial incentives were given to parents to produce children, previous loans were annulled, maternity benefits were improved and income tax allowances for dependent children were virtually doubled in October 1934 at the expense of single people and childless couples."17 However the most novel financial aid given by the state, are the marriage loans which had the purpose of increasing the number of marriages and thus children, as well as reducing unemployment for the male part of the German society. These interest free marriage loans of 1000 Reich Mark that were introduced in June 1933, were only given to couples of 'Aryan' descent if the future wife agreed to give up her job and any type of employment as long as her future husband received an income. This resulted in an increasing number of married couples, yet it did not produce a large increase in the number of children per family due to that most couples preferred to have only one or to children at the most.
Another measure to increase the number of children born every year in the country, was to improve the facilities of expectant mothers and offering them training courses such as household, skills of motherhood, management and ideological indoctrination of their future children at Mothers' school. 18
The final propaganda attempt made by Nazis to encourage childbirth was the campaign to raise women's status as mothers and wives within the society. Examples of these encouragements were the pompous celebrations of Mother's day and the Mother's Cross in bronze, silver and gold, given to females depending on how many healthy children they had produced.19
During the years of the Nazi regime, "National Socialism ?reiterated with crushing conviction that the task of the family ?was? reproduction"20 and marriage no longer was a private matter, but a concern of the state. According to contemporary sources the definition of, marriage, sex, motherhood and parenthood all contained reproduction of healthy children.21 However as the almost obsessive campaign to increase the birth rate in the country was taking place, five months after Hitler came to power, his minister of the Interior, Wilhelm Frick started to prepare the people of Germany for a mass sterilization by eugenic propaganda for the purpose of racial hygiene. He concluded in one of speeches that "in order to increase the number of hereditary healthy progeny, there is a duty to prevent the procreation of the hereditary unfit."22 In July 1933, sterilization became a law, and those who had any physical or psychological defects, or simply were not of 'Aryan' descendant were sterilized.23
Even though both men and women were included in the compulsory sterilization process, women were the sex protesting to the sterilization courts by letters of the resulting childlessness and started to get pregnant as a protest to these heinous acts. These 'protest pregnancies' were soon so many that the sterilization law was extended in 1935 to an abortion law. From that year, even abortions could be performed for the sake of racial hygiene.24
Women in the Different Areas of Work
Between the years of 1933 to 1939, women's employment policies were controlled by the state of the labour market, considerations of the public morale and the Nazi ideology. Even though the first and utmost role of women during Hitler's reign in Germany was that of a mother and a wife, the Nazis were forced to accept female labour due to the fact that many women in the state did not have children or husbands, and were thus dependent on a personal income to be able to survive. However since the great Wall Street Crash in 1929 had contributed to mass unemployment in the country, the illusion that women's presence in the labour market threatened men's livelihood resulted in that " from 1933 to 1939 women were pushed out of jobs in the public and private sectors"25 to provide men with work. In fact one of NSDAP's "propagandalistically skilful campaigns, was that jobs first for the fathers of families"26 and a reduction of the employment of women.27 The discrimination of the working woman continued to expand after the Wall Street Crash and in June 1933 the dismissal of a married woman in the employment market, lower pay rates for females compared to males and the Marriage Loan became written legislations intending to lower the male unemployment in the country.28 Yet as the historian Tim Mason states, "the campaign against married women who worked was a largely ineffectual and deeply irrelevant exercise in paternalistic and male chauvinist demagoguery"29 and 1935, when a sudden and fast economical revival brought shortages of labour indicating that male workers would not suffice for the Nazi regime's ambitions, women were encouraged to take up employment even in occupational areas that had before only belonged to men. By 1939, four years after Hitler's rearmament plan had taken shape, Germany did not only experienced virtually full-employment, but the "available and willing reserves of female labour had patently been exhausted."30
i) Women as Industrial Workers
The female industrial workers that formed approximately half of the workforce in consumer good industries were particularly increasing in textile production in the beginning of the Nazi regime. Yet, as Germany started to recover from the shared worldwide depression and the rearmament plan meant both the manufacturing of steel and building the motorways,31 the number of women employed in the industry, increased from 1.21 million in 1933 to 1.85 million in 1938. In factories, most women worked out of need and were restricted to unskilled or semi-skilled jobs, with usually a salary half of that of as mans. The German Labour Front, a union that had been given the task to assess the factory environment, ensured through the 'Law for Protection of Mothers in Gainful Employment', that pregnant 'Aryan' women's health was safeguarded due to the fact that their primary task was to produce healthy progeny.
During wartime, the government tried like never before to attract women into war-related industry and although employment of women rose slightly in this sector, female labour was finally worn out.32
ii) Women in White-collar and Clerical Work
From 1933 and throughout the Nazi regime, clerical work was one of the most modern and sought-after occupations a German woman desired for. However women remained in the lower levels of clerical work, believing that high-level expertise would be wasted when they got married. Working in the private sector, the banks, insurance companies or industrial concerns such as Krupp or Seimens, female office workers increased from 1.6 million to 1.9 million between the years of 1933 to 1939. As Hitler started to attack Germany's neighbouring countries for the purpose of increasing the German 'Lebensraum', the male part of the population were needed at the war front, and thus the females took over most of the clerical and white-collar jobs in the country.33
iii) Women as Professionals
Being "dominated by men with conservative prejudices, the professions- especially law and medicine- were often unwelcoming to women."34 Even though the teachers was the largest women's professional group, females in the high-level posts in this job sector were dismissed in January 1933 and were replaced by men even in girls' senior schools. But as the war came, also the professional workingwomen was reinstated in the absence of the men.35
iv) Women in Domestic Service
Domestic service was according to the Nazi view, a most appropriate work for women since it involved housekeeping and childcare and hence prepared women for marriage. In 1933, a tax relief law was introduced for employers of domestic servants to encourage an increase in the domestic service sector, and "in 1939, there were 1.5 million domestic servants, of whom 99 per cent were female"36 which meant a 300 000 increase and a success of the Nazi tax relief law.
v) Women in Small-Scale Farming
There was also an increase in the number of female workers in the agricultural sector between the years of 1933 to 1939, when female labour increased by 230 000 and male labour fell by 640 000.37 To a farmer, his entire family was essential when running his farm and daughters usually worked as free family assistants until they got married and started to work on their husband's farm.
However, as the demand for industrial labour started to grow during wartime, 61 000 female agricultural workers migrated to towns and started to work at factories since the salary was almost twice as those in agriculture. Moreover when the men were called to the front, women were left with the unthankful job as a head of a farm as an addition to their already demanding roles in the household. "The absence of men during the war greatly enhanced the women's role and influence as they now acted as household heads and did work which was reserved for men."38
Women and Education
Turning to the education of females it can be said that the 1930s meant a grounding literacy and numeracy for women, but with very little intellectual input. As Hitler came to power he "pronounced that in girls' education, as in boys', the chief emphasis must be on physical training, and only after that on the promotion of spiritual and, finally, intellectual values."39In addition because the future of girls was to be that of a mother, childcare training was a mandatory objective for girls' education and female students were also supported to agree to do six months or a year of service,40 before going on to employment or further education.
The German superiority was indoctrinated through the different subjects41 already at elementary school and this type of patriotic propaganda continued to be taught in the so-called Middle Schools42 to both girls and boys. But girls were also obligated to learn to write shorthand and typing when not choosing a second foreign language except English, and the preparation for their important futures as wives and mothers were the most important lessons to be learnt. Even though further education such as academic senior high school and universities was very rare among girls, the saying that "German women under the yoke of Hitlerism...may not study at universities was erroneous: 'Aryan' girls and women were not denied an academic education in Nazi Germany, but they were guided and sometimes forced into 'womanly' areas and out of disciplines regarded as men's domain, including the classics and some science subjects." 43 In fact due to the relatively high numbers of female students at universities and that high graduate unemployment had to be reduced, Nazi students started to work towards women's exclusion from universities. Nevertheless neither in this case can it be said that "the number of women students dropped in higher education, since it ignores the male decline in student numbers"44 as well.
In the new curriculum that was introduced in Nazi Germany in 1937, boys were to study Latin while girls had both needlework and music added as subjects while being taken away the opportunity to study mathematics or sciences for the purpose of being more 'feminine'. Instead female students were compensated with a choice between foreign languages and homecraft45, which did not qualify them for a university entrance and was a clever way to exclude females from universities. Yet as the war drew closer and the demand for men skilled work was risen, women were allowed to enter the university even with homecarft on their diploma. The result was that women were soon very well represented in subjects such as medicine and pharmacy, but at technical universities there were almost no female students to be found. 46 "Hitler's wish that intellectual values should have the lowest priority in female lives had been implemented"47 but not nearly as much as he or the NSDAP had wished for.
The Nazi Organizations of Women
The Nazi women's organizations started to take form already in early 1920s as the NSDAP was taking shape itself and reached its peak of popularity when Hitler became Chancellor in January 1933. "In its objective of indoctrinating women and training them for their roles as loyal housewives and mothers and supporting them in those occupations outside the home judged 'appropriate' to women, the regime mainly relied on the work of two women's organizations- the Deutsches Frauenwerk (DFW) and the NS Frauenschaft (NSF)."48 Soon also the Reich Mothers' Service (RMD), that was one of many organizations under the DFW, was established with the objective to prepare women for a future as housewives and mothers together with encouraging them to have large families. By March 1939, approximately 1.7 million women had attended about 100 000 RMD courses despite that they were voluntarily and a small fee was charged.49
Turning to the NSF that was an organization intending to reach out to the female elite in the country, it can be seen how also this organization had as its main task to indoctrinate the German woman according to the National Socialistic ideology. Even though the NSF by itself did not have much impact on the female population in Nazi Germany, it can be concluded that together with the DFW, this organization was highly successful in ´turning the ideals of many women to benefit the goals of the Nazi regime.50
"Victims or Perpetrators?"
A Historical Debate about the Role of Women in Nazi Germany
The historical debate trying to identify women as either an innocent part of the Nazi society or accomplices to Hitler's regime is mainly concentrated within the contrasting works and ideas of two female historians. Gisela Bock illustrates women as sufferers of Nazi Germany because it can hardly be believed that females would have participated in a regime that oppressed them. Claudia Koonz, however, maintains convincingly that the female population of Nazi Germany contributed to the emotional work in the private sphere and thus created stability within in the Nazi system.51
Beginning with the many factors in the Nazi state that enables the classification of women as victims of Hitler and the NSDAP, it can be said that "the Nazi system oppressed women, reduced them to mere objects who were therefore not able actively to defend themselves from National Socialism."52 Arguments presenting women as sufferers by Bock includes their discrimination in politics, the society and the economy as well as the fact that when Hitler came to power, females were forced out of their jobs and those remaining in their positions were badly paid. The historian Gisela Bock argues additionally that compulsory sterilization affected women more severely then men due to fact that a woman's identity during that time, was more closely connected to that of a mother. However Adelheid von Saldern sees a problem arising in "Bock's attempts to generalize and to extend her conclusions to all women."53 She believes that Nazis did indeed believe that women were inferior to men, but that 'Aryan' women were still included in the 'superior race' and hence she cannot only be seen as innocent.
Similarly there are many facts identifying females as accomplices of the National Socialistic regime, one of them being that one third of the women in Germany in fact did vote for Hitler and the NSDAP. Other arguments that are provided by Claudia Koonz to establish women as co-perpetrators with men, are that there were many women that were Anti-Semites and racists and most importantly many mothers did in fact educate their children in the Nazi spirit. As a final argument she believes that the Nazi organizations of women, which was ruled by women themselves, contributed incredibly to the National Socialistic indoctrination and hence makes women in some areas accomplices to Nazi men.
In summery, it can be said that there are many different factors in the behaviour of women in Nazi Germany that enables the classification of both victims and perpetrators. Hence as Saldern suggests, "there are strong arguments in favour of abandoning 'pure types' (...) and instead understanding that in the everyday lives of the German population, ordinary women became complex and contradictory combinations of both victims and perpetrators."54
Conclusion
After the description of the different roles of women in the various areas of life in Nazi Germany, it now seems possible to formulate an answer to the research question of whether women were victims or perpetrators in the Nazi regime. Females are naturally seen as victims of the German patriarchal system between 1933 to 1939 firstly because it denied them political and employment rights, secondly since regulated them to the private sphere of home and children and finally since the sterilization process and the lack of a wide scope education had its psychological effects. Nevertheless there were women who collaborated in the crimes of Nazism through indoctrination of their families and the women's organizations. While men had the occasion to commit crimes against all humankind, given their greater role in the public sphere, women were confined to their homes and were perpetrators in the extent that they created stability in the country.
Hence it can be concluded that women were neither victims nor perpetrators in the National Socialistic regime of Hitler and the NSDAP but had a very ambiguous role that cannot allow any kind of generalization upon the whole German female gender. It will be left to the current and future historians to continue to debate the matter of female guilt during Hitler and the NSDAP's reign, yet however they argue, the clarification of the role of women will never be simple or uncomplicated.
Bibliography and Evaluation of Sources
Bock, Gisela (1984), Racism and Sexism in Nazi Germany: Motherhood, Compulsory Sterilization, and the State, in Bridenthal, Grossman and Kaplan (eds) (1984), When Biology Became Destiny. Women in Weimar and Nazi Germany. New York: Monthly Review Press
This source is an essay concerning the reproduction policy in Nazi Germany and gives a quite negative and thus bias view of the population policy of the Germans. It is a secondary source that was written 44 years after the time of the subject of its treatment.
Bock, Gisela (1994), Antinatalism, Maternity and Paternity and National Socialistic Racism, in D.F. Crew (ed.) (1994), Nazism and German Society, 1933-1945. London and New York: Routledge
Also this essay is a secondary bias source about the German population policy when Hitler and the NSDAP came into power. It describes the different actions taken for the purpose of racial hygiene and concludes these measures as female discrimination and racism.
Bridenthal, Renate (1977), Something Old, Something New: Women between the Two World Wars, in R. Bridenthal and C. Koonz (eds) (1977), Becoming Visible. Women in European History. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company
This secondary source gives in excellent overview of the situation of women in the Weimar Republic with many examples and is used in this extended essay to establish a background. The tone is quite informative and as non-bias as an author can manage to be.
Frevert, Ute (1989), Women in German History. From Bourgeois Emancipation to Sexual Liberation. Oxford/Hamburg/New York: Berg
Even Ute Frevert's book about women in German history provides with a good overview of the role of women in the Weimar Republic as well as it analyses the same role in Nazi Germany. This source is secondary and was written in a non-bias manner.
Hitler, Adolf (1936), Mein Kampf (My Struggle), translated by Ralph Mannheim (1999). Boston: Mariner Book
This book is the most bias source used in this essay, but provides as excellent material to use since it is a primary source written by the Nazi leader himself during the time of the existence of the Nazi state.
Kirkpatrick, Clifford (1939), Woman in Nazi Germany. London: Jarrolds
This publication is also a contemporary source, which makes the information in it quite valuable. However, it is a secondary source, which has a minor bias tone due to the British author.
Koonz, Claudia (1977), Mothers in the Fatherland: Women in Nazi Germany, in R. Bridenthal and C. Koonz (eds) (1977), Becoming Visible. Women in European History. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company
Claudia Koonz's essay discusses the role of women in Nazi Germany in a very informative manner, giving a more close-up observation of the actual view of Nazi women. It is a secondary source that has been used in many parts of the essay.
Koonz, Claudia (1987), Mothers in the Fatherland. Women, the Family and Nazi Politics. New York: St. Martin's Press
In this impressive book, which is a secondary source, the author tries to prove that women were to some extent accomplices to the Nazi regime and has therefore a very bias tone although it presents many counter arguments. It was primarily used as a background in the historical debate of this essay.
Lode, M. (1938), Women under Hitler's Yoke, The Communist International, volume XIV, no 10
This publication is the only literary work representing the view of the Soviet historians concerning the role of women in Nazi Germany. By being one of the many written essays in the Communist International it is clearly a bias a secondary source, however is increasingly interesting due to the fact that it is contemporary.
Mason, Tim (1976), Women in Germany, 1925-1940. Family Welfare and Work, History Workshop Journal, nos I and II. Reprinted as chapter 5 in Jane Caplan (ed.) (1995), Nazism Fascism and the Working Class. Essays by Tim Mason. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press
Tim Mason's essay about women in Germany between 1925 and 1940 was one of the most useful secondary sources used in this essay. It clearly and directly went through women's role in the family and as a source of labour in a very non-bias manner and could therefore be used throughout the whole extended essay.
Noakes, Jeremy and Pridham, Geoffrey (eds) (1986), Nazism 1919-1945. A Documentary Reader. Exeter: University of Exeter Press, volume 2, State, Economy and Society.
Noakes and Pridham's Documentary Reader also provided the essay with some general information, which could be used. The tone was very non-bias in this secondary source and therefore it was often used in the different parts of the text.
Nolan, Mary (1997), Work, Gender and Everyday Life in Twentieth Century Germany, in I. Kershaw and M. Lewin (eds) (1997), Stalinism and Nazism. Dictatorship in Comparison. Cambridge: Cambridge University press
This essay that is a secondary source was primarily used in the part of the essay analysing women as a source of labour. It is a good and informative text with a largely wide scope and as non-bias as a text can be.
Pauwels, Jacques R. (1984), Women, Nazis and Universities. Female University Students in the Third Reich, 1933-1945. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press
This publication was naturally only used in the part describing women and education in the extended essay due to its narrow scope. It provides good explanation to the sudden change in Nazi attitudes towards female education and is a good secondary, non-bias source to use when writing about female education throughout the Nazi regime.
Saldern, Adelheid von (1994), Victims or Perpetrators? Controversies about the Role of Women in the Nazi State, in D.F. Crew (ed.) (1994), Nazism and German Society, 1933-1945. London and New York: Routledge
This is an excellent essay treating the theses question of the extended essay in a very professional manner, both examining women as "victims and perpetrators". It is a tertiary source based on the ideas of the other historians concerning this topic.
Stephenson, Jill (2001), Women in Nazi Germany. Harlow: Longman
This publication is the best and most useful secondary source when writing about the role of women in Nazi Germany. Many other literary sources used in my extended essay, have themselves utilized Jill Stephenson's excellent non-bias book as a reference. Women in Nazi Germany provides with a detailed view of the situation of females in Germany between 1933-1945.
Wilke, G. and Wagner K. (1981), Family and Household: Social Structures in a German Village Between the Two World Wars, in R.J. Evans and W.R. Lee (eds), The German Family. London and Totowa, NJ: Croom helm and Barns and Noble
This essay has only been used in a very limited part of this extended essay, but it is a good non-bias secondary source, which specialises in its own limited and narrow topic.
In January 9th, 1919 the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (German Workers' Party) was founded in Munich/Germany. The party name was changed in 1920 to NSDAP (National Sozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei) and Hitler was elected party leader. Although some historians may not agree, the assumption is made in this essay that the thoughts and the ideas of Hitler and the NSDAP are inter-changeable.
2 Noakes/Pridham, page 448
3 Bridenthal, page 424
4 This quotation comes from Hitler's speech to the National Socialist Women's organization at the Nuremberg Party Rally on September 8th, 1934, Mason, Tim, page 131
5 Koonz (1977), page 471
6 Frevert, page 169-171
7 "Economically active is a census category which comprehends all persons who performed, part-time or full-time, productive work of any kind", Mason, page 136
8Bridenthal, page 425
9 Frevert, page 179
0 Mason, page 145
1 Mason, page 143
2 Koonz (1977), page 447
3 Saldern, page 145-147
4 Stephenson (2001), page 27
5 Between the years 1934 to 1939 convictions against the crime of abortion rose by 50 per cent.
6 Stephenson (2001, page 37-40
7 In 1935 100 Reich Mark was given to large families and in March 1938, 560 000 families received grants of 330 Reich mark each. Noakes /Pridham, page 450
8 Mason, page 169
9 The golden cross was given to mothers of eight children, silver to the mother's of six and bronze to the mother's of four. Noakes /Pridham, page 452
20 Kirkpatrick, Clifford, page 94
21 Noakes /Pridham, page 454-455
22 Bock, Gisela (1994), 235
23Physical defects could include examples such as blindness and epilepsy. An example of a psychological defect was schizophrenia and Jews and Gypsies are examples of a non-'Aryan' people. Bock, Gisela (1984), page 273-277
24 Stephenson (2001), page 23-27 and 37-40
25 Nolan, page 331
26 Stephenson (2001), page 51
27 Noakes/Pridham, page 464
28 As mentioned in the previous part of this essay, Marriage Loans were introduced in Germany to encourage couples to marry and thus reproduce, but the primary function of the Marriage Loan legislation was to provide men with work since one of the conditions of the Marriage Loan was that the future wife was to leave her employment and promise to never seek an occupation again as long as her future husband received an income salary. The Marriage Loans were introduced in "The Law to Reduce Unemployment" in 1933. Stephenson (2001, page 52
29 Mason, page 93-94
30 Stephenson (2001), page 55
31 Autobahnen
32 Stephenson (2001), page 58-61
33 Stephenson (2001), page 61-63
Noakes/Pridham, page 465
34 Nolan, page 345
35 Noakes/Pridham, page 465-467
36 Stephenson (2001), page 66
37 Stephenson (1987), page 357
38 Wilke/Wagner, page 143
39 Stephenson (2001), page 70
40 In this case service means serving as cheap labour for domestic and farm work.
41 Subjects could include German geography, language and culture together with injustices of the Versaille Treaty.
42 Students between the ages of 10 to 16 attended the so-called Middle Schools.
43 Lode, page 46
44 Pauwels, page 147
45 Homecraft included nursing, household management and childcare.
46 Pauwels, page 95-107
47 Stephenson, page 75
48 Noakes/Pridham, page 459
49 Stephenson, page 83-88
50 Saldern, page 147-148
51 Saldern, page 141
52 Saldern, page 143
53 Saldern, page 144
54 Saldern, page 157
Candidate code: 0511 038
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