Reichstag elections

© AdsD Hitler and Hindenburg on „Potsdam Day“

Not even their ruthless persecution of political opponents and heavy restrictions on the left-wing parties’ election campaign  – including a ban on the left-wing press – can prevent the fact that an overwhelming National Socialist victory which Adolf Hitler expected in the Reichstag elections on 5 March 1933 did not materialise: The Nazis clearly fall short of an absolute majority with only 43.9 per cent of votes cast.

In spite of that, they portray the election results as a major victory: Hitler uses the convening of the newly elected Reichstag on 21 March 1933 in Potsdam’s Garrison Church to lay claim for himself and his party to Prussian traditions which are to supplant the „spirit of Weimar“ and manifest a „nation on the move“. The staging and choreography for this „Potsdam Day“ are overpowering machinations of National Socialist propaganda in which the aged Reich President von Hindenburg is also involved.

© AdsD Otto Wels delivering a speech in 1932

Just two days later the Reichstag votes on the „Enabling Act“. Only the Social Democrats, twelve of whose representatives are already under arrest, dare to vote against it shortly after their fraction leader Otto Wels delivers a courageous opposition speech („We are defenceless; defenceless but not without honour!“). The „Enabling Act“ – adopted with a crushing majority of 441 yes-votes to 94 no-votes – makes the Reichstag superfluous and places legislative and executive powers in the government’s hands. The Weimar Constitution’s separation of powers is effectively eliminated. Eight days later, on 31 March, the state assemblies are compelled by dint of this law to dissolve and re-constitute themselves according to the results of the latest Reichstag elections. They are „brought into line“, and their parliamentary prime ministers are replaced by „Reich Governors“ beholden to the „Führer“. With that, Germany’s federal structure is abolished and replaced by a centralised state.