Holocaust Denial, legitimate debate and racism. | 114 comments (114 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

I agree with everything you said except...

I´m just a tiny bit uncomfortable with the phrase "the democratically elected Governance of the country".

Note that the Nazi party "NSDAP" in free elections never got a majority. For an overview of the election results look here:
http://www.gonschior.de/weimar/Deutschland/Uebersicht_RTW.html

I consider "32 II" the last free elections just to be clear. Hitler came to power in January 1933 because the then German President Hindenburg made him Chancellor (The Weimar Republic constitution gave a lot of power to the President). In fact Hitler still needed the help of the (stupid) nationalist and conservative DNVP even in the last (April) 1933 elections just to get a majority. And that elections weren´t free anymore because:

then the Nazi SA could intimidate people without fear of police action and
soon after the elections the communist "KPD" party was forbidden.

Likewise in the last free Presidential elections 1932 Hitler lost to Hindenburg by a wide margin (53%-37%).
http://www.zum.de/psm/weimar/tab1.php

by Detlef (Detlef1961_at_yahoo_dot_de) on Thu Jan 19th, 2006 at 02:37:59 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Just a tiny nitpick (none / 0)

sorry, cannot find the discussion where I was discussing this with Marek some time back. Of course Hitler never got the majority seats in the German parliament under non-Ermaechtigungsgesetz conditions, as you rightly pointed out. But that's not what I said. On January 30th 1933 Hitler was democratically elected by the parliament to become Kanzler. My point was more, there was no revolution there or military putsch that swept him to power, but he stayed within the existing German election law, once in power he changed all the laws necessary to stay in power. But his government was accepted, and there has never (as far as I can tell) been any doubt over his legitimacy as a Kanzler on the 30th of January 1933.

Of course he exercised powers of suppression towards the social democrats and he excluded the communists and the DVNP, were willing grooms (in the Steigbuegelhalter meaning).

I was so careful in parsing the words, because I get equally annoyed about the statements, that go: All Germans voted for Hitler.

by PeWi on Thu Jan 19th, 2006 at 08:40:24 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Holocaust Denial, legitimate debate and racism. | 114 comments (114 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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