HOW AND WHY DID HITLER BECOME CHANCELLOR OF GERMANY IN 1933?

There was a great economic depression1929-1933. The agricultural slump happened much before the great depression and it was world wide too. Then there was the wall start crash, which caused the great depression, unemployment, banks closing, loan were being called in. The agricultural slump happened much before the great depression, this was because of new machinery and equipment that big and rich countries like USA have that cause the agricultural slump. These big farms would sell all their harvest for very cheap prices, so therefore it would be cheaper for poor countries like Germany to by the product they get from abroad then to buy them from the farmer in their country. So the Farmers would soon become bankrupted, because no one is buying their goods. However, some farmers would still try to compete with the big farms. Germany was just starting to settle after the crisis in 1923, when the Wall Street crash happened. The stock exchange collapsed in America, October 1929. This effect many countries in the world but it would hit Germany the most because its loans are from America. When America was going through the depression, it needed all the money it can get from different countries it had loaned out to, including Germany. Germany was in no state to give back all the money it had borrowed, Germany was just recovering from its last depression. When Germany was forced to give back all the money that they had borrowed, many businesses became bankrupted because it had no money to borrow to put in the businesses. Therefore, many people were left unemployed. By 1932, nearly 30 % of the labour force was unemployed, that is around 12 million people unemployed. And the Government is spending a lot of money from banks to pay them the unemployed benefits. Because money is being taken away from the banks, the five biggest banks in Germany had to close because it went bankrupt. When the main banks start to close down ten there are huge problems, it will affect nig business, all the people who have invested in the back, people who saved money in the bank. Yet again, the German economy failed the German people; people were just getting over the crisis in 1923 and the hyperinflation when they lost all their money again in the great depression. The economy crashing the first time was good source for Hitler to use against the Weimar Government. Now that it has happened the second time, this just show and proves how incompetent the Weimar government really is and he was right about them along. Hitler would of said that, the Weimar government have failed them once and now the second time, the who is to say they would not do it again. Hitler would made out that the Weimar Government is doing all of this on purpose because they are anti-patriotic people. This would help the Hitler to convince the people of Germany that what they need is a strong figure like him.

There were many failures from the Weimar democracy. They had a minority government, people started to lose faith in the Government, Article 48 and 25 gave the president too much power. There was a political crisis 1930-1933. It was very hard to have a stable government because, at times there could be up to four or five different parties in the coalition government, this made it very hard to run a government. All the different parties would have different ideas and they would not be able to agree on anything. The more parties there are in a coalition government the harder it is to solve problems, and the shorter time the government would run the country, before it collapses and another government is elected. In about 5 years, they could of when through around 5 to 7 different governments. This just shows who unstable the country is. This concept must be very hard for the more mature German citizens, because they were used to having strong leadership all their lives and now they have been through into a very unbalanced leadership. There was a political crisis 1930-1933, where the coalition government failed to work together and to make new laws. So Hindenburg used his power to dissolve the Reichstag and then to hold another election in July 1932. In this election, the NSDAP had 37% of the votes, which was the most individually, but they did not have enough voted to be a majority Government. Article 48 and 25 gave the president many powers; the president has more power then the Reichstag. The presidential election takes place every 7 years, and he has strong power against the Reichstag. Under Article 25, the president could dissolve the Reichstag in a state of emergency. He could also block any new laws by calling a referendum. Under article 48, he could suspend the Reichstag and rule by decree in the case of a national emergency. The president also chooses who will become the next chancellor. In 1925 when Hindenburg ran of president, he won just but 3%. But by then Hindenburg was very old, so he depended on his advisers a lot. His advisers took advantage of the fact he is very old and they told him what to do, basically if you were on the good side of Hindenburg then you can tell he to do almost anything with his powers. While Hindenburg was the president, there was a minority Government, so it was very hard to pass any new laws, because you need more the 50% of the Reichstag vote to pass laws. The first Presidential Chancellor was Heinrch Brüning; he was right-wing member of the centre party. Brüning was very tolerate towards the NSDAP, even when they NSDAP was thought to had grouped up with the army, which was very illegal, but Hitler and his party was let off. Then there was rumour that the NSDAP were plotting to take over the Reichstag again, but Brüning dismissed it too. The reason why he did it was, he thought that he could get the NSDAP on his side and have a majority vote to gat rid of the Reichstag, and then to bring back the monarchy. Brüning also thought that he could tame Hitler. Brüning’s chancellorship only lasted two years before he was forced to resign, because he could bring the unemployment to a halt. It was very clear that the Presidential Chancellors were not going to be very successful with a minority government. Because of the instability, the German people were starting to lose their faith and patients with the Government. The German people wanted huge improvements in their country and they that nothing hah been done about it. Many of the senior generations did not like the idea of a democratic Government in the first place and they had not been proved wrong with all the depressions, revolts, and crisis they had to go through. People have lost their hope in the Reichstag so Hitler could tell them that if he would get in to power then he would get rid of it and they would have a dictator. Hitler carried on playing with the people’s mind and emotions to get their support. Hitler could see that the Government was not I good shape and it would be very easy to manipulate them; he knew that Hindenburg and his advisers would want him help.

Hitler’s action skills and leadership helped him a lot to get in to power the way he planned a new image for his party and to target different areas and classes in Germany, he was always one-step ahead of the other parties. He was stubborn and stood his ground, he knew when he was right and when was needed. In1924 Hitler promised that he would not start any putsch, other wise the ban on the NSDAP would be lifted. Hitler realised, if wanted power then he has to follow the democratic method. Even though he hated democracy, and it would take much longer then a revolution, he knows he had no other choice; this method was called the path of Legality. The path of Legality is not the path that he wanted to go down but he knew that if he tried to start a putsch again then he would be sent to prison for life, this time around. Moreover, he could not take that risk; Hitler would make the same mistake two times in a row. Now Hitler was beginning to see himself as a leader too, because he had a lot of time to think through all the mistakes he has made and to improve the party further, while he was in prison. The Nazi party was not a small local party any more; it was going to become a national party, so they had to have members of their party all across the country. Hitler made network of parties, each party was in their own Gaue, and it was led by a Gauleriter, then the Gaue was sub-divided further into Kreis, which were lead, by Kreislriter. Germany was divided into 35 Gaue and its boards were very clear and organised. Before, it was very difficult to separate each region because it was so unorganised. Each of the regions main aim were to, focus on propaganda, speeches, giving out leaflets; they also raised funds for the party to run, nd they were supporting their candidate standing in for election. The Nazi members would try to get very important people in a community to join their party, so that people who admire these people would become members of the party too. They got a lot of member in that way. Hitler also realised that a lot of the party are trying to attract the working classes vote, so it would be very difficult to gain all much support from them. So they have to look at different classes like the mittlestand, they are usually the worst hit when anything goes wrong and there is not that many parties for them too chose from. Therefore, the mittlestand became one of the Nazi’s targets and potential voters. The Nazi has also targeted the Farmers because they were going through a rough time and they want support from the government. The party would say one thing to the Mittlestand and another to the farmers, it did not really mater what is said as long as the Nazi’s get in to power, they are only saying all of this to get the votes, they have no intention of for filling any of the polices that they have told these people. However, the downfall of the party is, Hitler have given each region a lot of independence. Therefore, they can do what ever they want in their region as long as they are campaigning for the party. So different regions seemed to have slightly different policies to another, or have diverse strategise of campaigning to another. It also brought a lot of rivalry in to the party, various regions started to compete with each other to get the attention of their leader, Hitler. Hitler encourage this practice, this could be because he believe in Darwin’s theory, the survival of the fittest. Hitler believed that through this process he could see who is a natural leader or the strongest leader of all the Gaue. During this period, the Nazi’s were getting a lot of support from the younger generation, teenagers, young voter. Their main interest was Hitler and to have him as a leader, as well as the excitement of getting involved in an extreme, radical party. Hitler’s confidence of becoming the führer has been boosted by the support and respect he is getting from his party members as well as supports. Gerg Stressa, 1927, “we have the outstanding leader who holds not only supreme power but also the love of his followers, a much stronger binding force.” This shows that his followers too believe that he is the “supreme” leader, and he is the on to lead Germany to stability and power. The only thing that he really had not changed was the SA. Hitler had to remodel them so they would not be as threatening as they looked. Hitler had to change them from a military look to more of a peace loving march banned. The leader of the SA, Röhm said that he would resign if Hitler went ahead with his plan to tone down the SA. Hitler did not care what Röhm said, so he carried on with his plans, and Röhm was soon replaced by von Pfeffer (an ex-Freikorps leader). Hitler did not want to lose too much of the military style so they kept their uniforms and training but made it seem like they were not a private army. On Sundays the SA would go out on to the streets and marching, playing the drums and give out leaflets, it looked like a marching band. It was illegal to have a private army so this was the perfect way of hiding the SA. After all those dramatic changes the Nazi’s had a very disappointing result at the election on 1928, this could be because, the German economy at the time was very stable and many a lot of the people were very happy with the way every thing was going. Therefore, they did not see the point in voting for an extreme party. But that did not stop Hitler from trying again, it was the golden years 1924-1929, but after that many things happened, they had the great economic depression, and people were ready to listen and vote more extreme parties. So the NSDAP vote in creased from 18% to 37%. Then when thing were starting to get bad for Hitler, he lost 4% in the next election, and he was running out of money. Hitler was asked to become the Chancellor. Hitler had been asked to be the Chancellor before but they did not give him all that he wanted so he refused to take the place, but the Reichstag were desperate to have a popular politician, so they soon gave in to some of his demands. Hitler had proved himself, to the people and politicians, strong, tactical, stubborn, and determined when needed to be. Even though his ideas seemed outrageous to some people, but to other it was a dream to have a one-man leader. This was because the German people had been through a lot and they just want it to be just as it used to be before the war. Hitler seemed to know what the people want to hear. I believe that if one of the main event events had not have happened then I do not believe that Hitler would have been the leader of Germany. All the points link into each other making them equally important. In the Army Hitler was not seen as a leader. So it was by chance and circumstance that Hitler had become leader. And all the circumstance and skills helped him to be the führer.