The First Fire decree in 1933 suspended the
rights like freedom of
speech, press and assembly and thus controlled the German population
Answers
Answer:
The First Fire decree in 1933 suspended the
rights like freedom of
speech, press and assembly and thus controlled the German population
Explanation:
By the late 1920s, Adolf Hitler and his Nationalist Socialist German Workers (Nazi) Party were gaining strength due to growing popular dissatisfaction with the ruling Weimar Republic.
Germany’s economic woes in the early 1930s threw the government into further chaos, with President Paul von Hindenburg forced to replace several chancellors within a short time period. In late January 1933, hoping to make an alliance with the Nazis against more left-wing opponents, Hindenburg reluctantly asked Hitler to serve as chancellor.
With elections set for early March, the Nazis set about suppressing their political opposition. On February 4, Hitler’s cabinet issued the temporary Decree for the Protection of the German People, which restricted the German press and authorized the police to ban political meetings and marches.
Specifically targeting the Communists, Minister of the Interior Hermann Göring ordered a raid on that party’s headquarters in Berlin on February 24. Though the authorities found nothing of note, they claimed that they had uncovered seditious material, including leaflets encouraging an armed revolt.
NIGHT OF THE REICHSTAG FIRE
On the night of February 27, passers-by heard the sound of breaking glass from the Reichstag, and soon after that flames erupted from the building. The blaze would destroy the Reichstag’s gilded cupola, as well as a main chamber, causing some $1 million in damage before firefighters could extinguish it.
Police arrested Marinus van der Lubbe, an unemployed 24-year-old Dutch laborer with Communist sympathies, at the scene. Van der Lubbe reportedly confessed to setting the fire, saying he did it to encourage a worker’s uprising against the German state.
He was later tried in Leipzig, along with three Bulgarian members of the Communist International and a leading German Communist. Van der Lubbe was the only one convicted, and he was beheaded in January 1934.
IMMEDIATE IMPACT OF THE REICHSTAG FIRE
A few hours after the Reichstag Fire, as Nazi propaganda spread fears of a Communist revolt, Hitler convinced Hindenburg to invoke Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution, which gave the president dictatorial powers and allowed him to make laws for all of Germany’s territorial states.
Hitler and the cabinet quickly drew up a more permanent and expansive Decree for the Protection of the People and the State (known as the Reichstag Fire Decree), which suspended the right to assembly, freedom of the press, freedom of speech and other constitutional protections within Germany.
The decree also removed all restraints on police investigations, allowing the Nazis to arrest and jail their political opponents indiscriminately. That night, the stormtroopers of the Sturmabteilung (SA) rounded up some 4,000 people, many of whom were tortured as well as imprisoned.
The swift and brutal response to the Reichstag Fire bolstered Hitler’s image as Germany’s strong-willed savior from the dreaded “Bolshevism.”
On March 23, meeting at the Kroll Opera House in Berlin, the Reichstag passed the Enabling Act, giving full powers to Hitler. The meeting, which supposedly marked the union of National Socialism with Hindenburg and the German establishment, essentially turned the country over to the Nazis.