The Enabling Act (Ermächtigungsgesetz in German) was passed by Germany's parliament (the Reichstag) on March 23, 1933. It was the second major step after the Reichstag Fire Decree through which the democratically-elected Nazis obtained dictatorial powers using largely legal means. The Act enabled Chancellor Adolf Hitler and his cabinet to enact laws without the participation of the Reichstag. The Reichstag (German for Imperial Diet) was the parliament of the Holy Roman Empire, the North German Confederation, and of Germany until 1945. ... March 23 is the 82nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (83rd in leap years). ... 1933 (MCMXXXIII) was a common year starting on Sunday. ... A German newspapers final issue, announcing its own prohibition (Verbot) by the police authorities on the basis of the Reichstag fire decree The Reichstag Fire Decree (Reichstagsbrandverordnung in German) is the common name of the decree issued by German president Paul von Hindenburg in direct response to the Reichstag... National Socialism redirects here. ... Forms of government Part of the Politics series Politics Portal This box:      A dictatorship is an autocratic form of government in which the government is ruled by a dictator. ... Hitler redirects here. ...

The formal name of the Enabling Act was Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich ("Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Nation"). Volk is a German (and Dutch) word meaning people or folk. It is commonly used as prefix in words such as Volksentscheid (plebiscite) or Völkerbund (League of Nations), or the car manufacturer Volkswagen (literally, peoples car). A number of völkisch movements were set up in Germany after...   (IPA: ; German: IPA: ), is the German word for realm or empire, cognate with Scandinavian rike/rige, Dutch rijk and English ric as found in bishopric. ...

Enabling Act text

As with most of the laws passed in the process of Gleichschaltung, the Enabling Act is quite short, considering its consequences. It is therefore reproduced in full in German and English: The German word Gleichschaltung â’½ â’¾ (literally synchronising, synchronization) is used in a political sense to describe the process by which the Nazi regime successively established a system of totalitarian control over the individual, and tight coordination over all aspects of society and commerce. ...

Volk is a German (and Dutch) word meaning people or folk. It is commonly used as prefix in words such as Volksentscheid (plebiscite) or Völkerbund (League of Nations), or the car manufacturer Volkswagen (literally, peoples car). A number of völkisch movements were set up in Germany after...   (IPA: ; German: IPA: ), is the German word for realm or empire, cognate with Scandinavian rike/rige, Dutch rijk and English ric as found in bishopric. ... The Reichstag (German for Imperial Diet) was the parliament of the Holy Roman Empire, the North German Confederation, and of Germany until 1945. ... The Reichsrat was one of the two legislative bodies in Germany under the Weimar constitution, the other one being the Reichstag. ... It has been suggested that April Fools Day be merged into this article or section. ... 1937 (MCMXXXVII) was a common year starting on Friday (link will take you to calendar). ...

Notes

The Enabling Act was passed by the Reichstag on March 23 and proclaimed by the government the following day. Following constitutional procedure for legislation, the law was countersigned by President von Hindenburg, Chancellor Hitler, Minister of Interior Frick, Foreign Minister von Neurath, and Minister of Finance von Krosigk. Paul Ludwig Hans Anton von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg, known universally as Paul von Hindenburg (2 October 1847 – 2 August 1934) was a German field marshal and statesman. ... Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (April 20, 1889 – April 30, 1945, standard German pronunciation in the IPA) was the Führer (leader) of the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi Party) and of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. ... Dr. Wilhelm Frick (March 12, 1877 â€“ October 16, 1946) was a prominent Nazi official. ... Konstantin von Neurath Konstantin Freiherr von Neurath (February 2, 1873 – August 14, 1956) was a German diplomat, Foreign Minister of Germany (1932-1938) and Reichsprotektor (nazi representative in the Czech puppet state) of Bohemia and Moravia (1939-1943). ... Count Johann Ludwig (Lutz) Schwerin von Krosigk, EK, (August 22, 1887–March 4, 1977) was a German politician. ...

Political support

March 1933 election

Within 24 hours of being appointed chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933, Hitler withdrew from the coalition of centrist parties and asked President von Hindenberg to dissolve the Reichstag. A general election was scheduled for March 5, 1933. This campaign was one of the first times the mass media was a major force in an election and was skillfully used to influence the outcome by propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, who wrote: The head of government of Germany is called Chancellor (German: Kanzler or Bundeskanzler meaning federal chancellor). ... January 30 is the 30th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1933 (MCMXXXIII) was a common year starting on Sunday. ... A general election is an election in which all or most members of a given political body are up for election. ... March 5 is the 64th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (65th in leap years). ... 1933 (MCMXXXIII) was a common year starting on Sunday. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Paul Joseph Goebbels (29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945) was a German politician and Minister for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda during the National Socialist regime from 1933 to 1945. ...

Now it will be easy to carry on the fight, for we can call on all the resources of the State. Radio and press are at our disposal. We shall stage a masterpiece of propaganda.^[3]

In the days leading up to the elections, the Nazis organized street violence to intimidate the opposition and to promote fear of communism. The burning of the Reichstag six days before the election was the pivotal event of the campaign. A mentally disturbed one-time Dutch Communist was arrested in the building and, while the circumstances of the fire are disputed and will never be conclusively known, the fire was portrayed by the Nazis as the beginning of a communist revolution. With the threat of communism looming, Hitler's government persuaded President Paul von Hindenberg to authorize several emergency powers in the Reichstag Fire Decree, which (among other things) suspended civil liberties and habeas corpus rights. The Decree enabled Hitler to have the Communist Party's offices raided and its representatives arrested, effectively eliminating them as a political force. The Reichstag fire was a pivotal event in the establishment of Nazi Germany. ... Paul Ludwig Hans Anton von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg, known universally as Paul von Hindenburg (2 October 1847 – 2 August 1934) was a German Field Marshal and statesman. ... A German newspapers final issue, announcing its own prohibition (Verbot) by the police authorities on the basis of the Reichstag fire decree The Reichstag Fire Decree (Reichstagsbrandverordnung in German) is the common name of the decree issued by German president Paul von Hindenburg in direct response to the Reichstag... In common law, habeas corpus (/heɪbiəs kɔɹpəs/) is the name of a legal action or writ by means of which detainees can seek relief from unlawful imprisonment. ...

Although receiving five million more votes than in the previous election, and counting the 52 seats won by the National People's Party, Hitler had only a slim majority - not enough to gain absolute power. 1924 electoral poster, using the Admiral Tirpitz as a figurehead The German National Peoples Party (German: Deutschnationale Volkspartei) (DNVP) was a right wing national-conservative party in Germany during the time of the Weimar Republic. ...

Centre Party support

At Hitler's first post-election cabinet meeting on March 15, the cabinet began drawing up plans to obtain absolute power in a constitutional way. Hitler decided upon the proposal of an "enabling act" that would give the cabinet legislative power for four years. The Reichstag Fire Decree had already given the government the power to arrest opposition delegates. The Nazis devised the Enabling Act to gain complete political power without the need of the support of a majority in the Reichstag and without the need to bargain with their coalition partners. March 15 is the 74th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (75th in leap years). ... An enabling act is a piece of legislation by which a legislature grants an entity which depends on it for authorization or legitimacy to take a certain action(s). ... The Reichstag (German for Imperial Diet) was the parliament of the Holy Roman Empire, the North German Confederation, and of Germany until 1945. ...

The Act essentially allowed the chancellor and his cabinet to enact legislation without the Reichstag, including changes to the constitution. Both the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and the Communist Party (KPD) were expected to vote against such an act, but the Nazis knew that the parties representing the middle class, the Junker landowners and business interests had grown weary of the instability of the Weimar Republic and were therefore likely to vote for the measure. Hitler felt certain that he could convince the Catholic Centre Party to give their support to the act and provide the needed two-thirds majority.^{[citation needed]} SPD redirects here. ... The Communist Party of Germany (in German, Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands – KPD) was formed in December of 1918 from the Spartacist League, which originated as a small factional grouping within the Social Democratic Party (SPD) opposed to the First World War on the grounds that it was an imperialist war... Junkers (English pronunciation: ; German pronunciation: ) were the landed aristocracy of Prussia and Eastern Germany - often also called Eastelbia (Ostelbien in German - the land east of river Elbe). ... The German Centre Party (Deutsche Zentrumspartei or merely Zentrum), often called the Catholic Centre Party, was a Catholic political party in Germany during the Kaiserreich and the Weimar Republic. ...

Hitler negotiated with the Centre Party's chairman, Ludwig Kaas, a Catholic priest, finalizing an agreement by March 22. Kaas agreed to support the Act in exchange for the Nazi's promise to help them achieve civil recognition of Catholics and Catholicism, as well as instituting quotas and protections for Catholic civil servants and schools. The Centre Party also asked Hitler to maintain constitutional protections of civil liberties. Monsignor Ludwig Kaas (23 May 1881-15 April 1952) was a Roman Catholic priest, and a prominent German politician during the Weimar Republic. ... March 22 is the 81st day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (82nd in leap years). ...

Historians, notably Klaus Scholder, have maintained that a key reason for the leadership of the Centre Party agreeing to support the Enabling Act was a promise from Hitler to negotiate the Reichskonkordat with the Vatican, a treaty that formalised the position of the Catholic church in Germany. Kaas was a close associate of Cardinal Pacelli, then Vatican Secretary of State (and later Pope Pius XII), who had been pursuing a German concordat as a key policy for some years. Klaus Scholder (1930-1985) was a German ecclesiastical historian, professor of history at the Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen university. ... The Reichskonkordat is the concordat between the Holy See and the German Reich, signed in 1933. ... Pope Pius XII (Latin: ), born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli (March 2, 1876 – October 9, 1958), reigned as the 260th pope, the head of the Roman Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City State, from March 2, 1939 until his death. ...

According to Klaus Scholder, a Reichskonkordat was in fact impossible under the Weimar Republic: "as long as this democratic republic existed in Germany a Reich concordat was inconceivable." Catholic parties would never have sufficient strength to get a treaty past Protestant and socialist opposition. It was thus the establishment of Hitler's dictatorship with the Enabling Act that allowed the concordat to become a real possibility, following the model of the Lateran treaties with fascist Italy where the Church had agreed to abstain from political activity in return for recognition in a concordat.^[4] Anthem Das Lied der Deutschen Germany during the Weimar Republic, with the Free State of Prussia (Freistaat Preußen) as the largest Capital Berlin Language(s) German Government Republic President  - 1919-1925 Friedrich Ebert  - 1925-1933 Paul von Hindenburg Chancellor  - 1919 Philipp Scheidemann Historical era Interwar period  - Established August 11...

Scholder argues that Kaas "probably acted as the key go-between" between Hitler and the Vatican. ^[5]. The day after the Enabling Act vote Kaas went to Rome in order to, in his own words, "investigate the possibilities for a comprehensive understanding between church and state,"^[6] and the first official mention of the concordat was made when Kaas returned ten days later, on April 2. April 2 is the 92nd day of the year (93rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar, with 273 days remaining. ...

Passage of the Enabling Act

Debate within the Centre Party continued until March 23, when ex-chancellor Heinrich Brüning denounced the Enabling Act as treachery of the worst order, calling for the Reichstag's assembly to be postponed. Kaas nevertheless claimed a written guarantee would come from Hitler. Brüning's experiences with Hitler led him to warn Kaas to ensure he received the written promise before the vote, but agreed to maintain party discipline by voting for the Act. March 23 is the 82nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (83rd in leap years). ... Heinrich Brüning on a Centre Party election poster (German Resistance Museum, Berlin) Dr.   (November 26, 1885 – March 30, 1970) was a German politician and Chancellor of Germany. ...

Later that day, the Reichstag assembled under intimidating circumstances, with SA men swarming inside and outside the chamber. Hitler's speech, which emphasised the importance of Christianity in German culture, was aimed particularly at appeasing the Centre Party's sensibilities and almost incorporated Kaas' requested guarantees. Kaas gave a speech, voicing the Centre's support for the bill amid "concerns put aside", while Brüning notably remained silent. Only Otto Wels of the SPD spoke against the Act. Kaas had still not received the written constitutional guarantees he had negotiated, but with the assurance it was being "typed up", voting began. Kaas never received the letter. The Reichstag (German for Imperial Diet) was the parliament of the Holy Roman Empire, the North German Confederation, and of Germany until 1945. ... The seal of SA The   or SA (German for Storm division, usually translated as stormtroop(er)s ), functioned as a paramilitary organization of the NSDAP — the German Nazi party. ... Otto Wels (September 15, 1873 - September 16, 1939) was the chairman of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) from 1919 and a member of parliament from 1920 to 1930. ... SPD redirects here. ...

All parties except the SPD voted in favour of the Enabling Act. With the Communist delegates removed and 26 SPD deputies arrested or in hiding, the final vote was 441 supporting the Enabling Act to 94 (all Social Democrats) opposed. With 83% of the delegates voting in favour of the Enabling Act it became law. With the passage of the Act, the Reichstag was effectively eliminated from active participation in German politics thus giving Hitler's cabinet the power to rule by decree.

Consequences

While there had been previous enabling acts in the earliest years of the Weimar Republic, this one was more far reaching since Article 2 allowed for deviations from the constitution. The law therefore formally required a two-thirds majority in the Reichstag. Hitler had taken care of that: under the provisions of the Reichstag Fire Decree, the Communist Party deputies — and a few Social Democratic deputies as well — were already jailed, and the Communist mandates were declared "dormant" by the government shortly after the elections. The Social Democrats at first had planned to hinder the passing of the law by boycotting the Reichstag session, rendering the body short of the two-thirds quorum needed for the vote, but led by Reichstag president Hermann Goering, the body changed its rules of procedure to allow the Reichstag president to declare any deputy "absent without excuse" to be considered as present in order to forestall obstruction. Because of this procedural change, the Social Democrats were forced to participate in the session and their chairman Otto Wels delivered a speech against the Enabling Act. The remaining free members of parliament were intimidated by the SA surrounding the parliament hall. In the end, only the Social Democrats voted against the bill. Anthem Das Lied der Deutschen Germany during the Weimar Republic, with the Free State of Prussia (Freistaat Preußen) as the largest Capital Berlin Language(s) German Government Republic President  - 1919-1925 Friedrich Ebert  - 1925-1933 Paul von Hindenburg Chancellor  - 1919 Philipp Scheidemann Historical era Interwar period  - Established August 11... A German newspapers final issue, announcing its own prohibition (Verbot) by the police authorities on the basis of the Reichstag fire decree The Reichstag Fire Decree (Reichstagsbrandverordnung in German) is the common name of the decree issued by German president Paul von Hindenburg in direct response to the Reichstag... 1932 KPD poster, End This System The Communist Party of Germany (German Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands – KPD) was a major political party in Germany between 1918 and 1933, and a minor party in West Germany in the postwar period. ... SPD redirects here. ... SPD redirects here. ... The Reichstag (German for Imperial Diet) was the parliament of the Holy Roman Empire, the North German Confederation, and of Germany until 1945. ... Hermann Göring Hermann Wilhelm Göring (also spelled Hermann Goering in English) (January 12, 1893–October 15, 1946) was a prominent and early member of the Nazi party, founder of the Gestapo, and one of the main architects of Nazi Germany. ... Otto Wels (September 15, 1873 - September 16, 1939) was the chairman of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) from 1919 and a member of parliament from 1920 to 1930. ... The seal of SA The   or SA (German for Storm division, usually translated as stormtroop(er)s ), functioned as a paramilitary organization of the NSDAP — the German Nazi party. ... SPD redirects here. ...

The British tabloid Daily Express described the Jewish reactions of boycott against Germany as "Judea Declares War on Germany" (March 24, 1933). For other uses, see Daily Express (disambiguation). ... Frontpage of the Daily Express, March 24 Judea Declares War on Germany was a front-page headline on the March 24, 1933 edition of the British newspaper, the Daily Express. ...

During the negotiations between the government and the Centre Party, it was agreed that the government should inform the Reichstag parties of legislative measures passed under the Enabling Act. For this purpose, a second working committee was set up, chaired by Hitler and the Centre's chairman Kaas. However, this committee met only three times without any major impact. The German Centre Party (Deutsche Zentrumspartei or merely Zentrum), often called the Catholic Centre Party, was a Catholic political party in Germany during the Kaiserreich and the Weimar Republic. ... A committee is a (relatively) small group that can serve one of several functions: Governance: in organizations too large for all the members to participate in decisions affecting the organization as a whole, a committee (such as a Board of Directors) is given the power to make decisions. ... Hitler redirects here. ... Monsignor Ludwig Kaas (23 May 1881-15 April 1952) was a Roman Catholic priest, and a prominent German politician during the Weimar Republic. ...

President von Hindenburg seemed to be pleased with Hitler's firm hand. During the cabinet conference on the Enabling Act, von Hindenburg's representative stated that the aged president was withdrawing from day-to-day affairs of government and that presidential collaboration on the laws decreed as a result of the Enabling Act would not be required.

Though the Act had formally given legislative powers to the government as a whole, these powers were for all intents and purposes exercised by Hitler himself; as Joseph Goebbels wrote shortly after the passage of the Enabling Act:

The authority of the Führer has now been wholly established. Votes are no longer taken. The Führer decides. All this is going much faster than we had dared to hope.

Formal cabinet meetings were rare during the whole Third Reich and non-existent during World War II.

It is indicative of the care that Hitler took to give his dictatorship an appearance of legality that the Enabling Act was formally extended twice by the Reichstag (by then a puppet of Hitler) beyond its original 1937 expiration date.

The passage of the Enabling Act reduced the Reichstag to a mere stage for Hitler's speeches. The opposition parties were suppressed or banned, and eventually even the parties making up Hitler's coalition yielded to government pressure and dissolved themselves. On July 14, 1933 the government decreed a law eliminating political parties other than the Nazi Party. By this, Hitler had fulfilled what he had promised in earlier campaign speeches: "I set for myself one aim ... to sweep these thirty parties out of Germany!". July 14 is the 195th day (196th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar, with 170 days remaining. ... 1933 (MCMXXXIII) was a common year starting on Sunday. ... The Nazi Party (German: , or NSDAP, English: Workers Party), was a political party in Germany between 1920 and 1945. ...

See also

• Enabling act (General)

An enabling act is a piece of legislation by which a legislature grants an entity which depends on it for authorization or legitimacy to take a certain action(s). ...

References