Today Hitler is uniformly regarded as a dictator while his followers are seen as perpetrating great harm on German and other societies, especially by causing the deaths of tens of millions of people. In the 1930s, however, there was a division of opinion about Nazism and Hitler even before the coming of the Third Reich and its deadly programs.

1. An Author Opposes Nazism

Journalist, playwright, and novelist Lion Feuchtwanger was an early critic of Nazism, tagging it as a movement operating against the goals of democracy and clear thinking. Luckily, when the Nazis came to power in early 1933, Feuchtwanger was on a tour of the United States. The Nazis ransacked his house and burned his writings. On his return to Europe, Feuchtwanger went into exile but was temporarily imprisoned in France when the Nazis invaded. He eventually escaped to the United States, where he continued to write. This critique of Nazism dates from early 1931.

The war [World War I] liberated the barbarian instincts of the individual and society to a degree that was previously unimaginable. National Socialism has skillfully organized the barbarity. Among the intellectuals it is called OBG: Organized Barbarity of Germany.

Anti-logical and anti-intellectual in its being and ideology, National Socialism strives to depose reason and install in its place emotion and drive—to be precise, barbarity. Just because intellect and art are transnational, National Socialism distrusts and hates them to the extreme. . . .

Source: Lion Feuchtwanger, “How Do We Struggle against a Third Reich,” January 21, 1931, in Anton Kaes et al., eds., Weimar Republic Sourcebook (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), 167.

2. Hitler Defends National Socialist Street Activism

Before and after the Nazis took power, storm troopers took to the streets at night, engaging in brawls, beating up Communists (who fought as well), and generally making their noisy presence felt. Their activism reassured some people that something was being done to protect Germany, while others believed that the Nazis were a menace. In this speech to the Industry Club in January 1932, Hitler explained the paramilitary activity and praised the storm troopers.

I know quite well, gentlemen, that when National Socialists march through the streets and suddenly in the evening a tumult and commotion arises, then the bourgeois draws back the window-curtain, looks out, and says: Once more my night’s rest disturbed: no more sleep for me. Why must the Nazis always be so provocative and run about the place at night? Gentlemen, if everyone thought like that, then no one’s sleep at night would be disturbed, it is true. But then the bourgeois today could not venture out into the street. If everyone thought in that way, if these young folk had no ideal to move them and drive them forward, then certainly they would gladly be rid of these nocturnal fights. But remember that it means sacrifice when today many hundreds of thousands of SA and SS men of the National Socialist movement every day have to mount their trucks, protect meetings, undertake marches, sacrifice themselves night after night, and then come back in the gray dawn either to workshop and factory or as unemployed to take the pittance of the dole. . . . Believe me, there is already in all this the force of an ideal—a great ideal! And if the whole German nation today had the same faith in its vocation as these hundreds of thousands, if the whole nation possessed this idealism, Germany would stand in the eyes of the world otherwise than she stands now!

Source: Adolf Hitler, “Address to the Industry Club,” January 27, 1932, in Anton Kaes et al., eds., The Weimar Republic Sourcebook (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), 141.

3. A Professor against Hitler

Victor Klemperer was a professor of literature and a Protestant, though his father had been a Jewish rabbi. Once Hitler came to power, Klemperer, a veteran of World War I who was married to an “Aryan” woman, found himself unable to publish his writings and dismissed from his teaching position. During the Third Reich, he kept a journal tracking not only his own mounting difficulties but also the emigration, dismissals, poverty, and suicides of his family and friends. He had clear opinions about Hitler, whom he listened to on the radio, and firm beliefs about the Nazis and Communists.

November 11, 1933 . . . more than forty minutes of Hitler. A mostly hoarse, strained, agitated voice, long passages in the whining tone of the sectarian preachers. . . . “Jews!” want to set nations of millions at one another’s throat. I want only peace, I have risen from the common people. I want nothing for myself. . . . etc. in no proper order, impassioned; every sentence mendacious, but I almost believe unconsciously mendacious. The man is a blinkered fanatic.

November 14, 1933 . . . All Germany prefers Hitler to the Communists. And I see no difference between either of the two movements; both are materialistic and lead to slavery.

Source: Victor Klemperer, I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years, 1933–1941, trans. Martin Chalmers (New York: Random House, 1998), 41–42.

4. Praise for Nazis

A year after Hitler came to power, Paula Müller-Otfried, a former deputy to the Reichstag who had opposed both communism and liberalism, sent out this New Year’s card.

When I wrote a year ago and saw only a glimmer of hope, I could not possibly have believed . . . my plea would be so richly fulfilled. . . . The vast majority of the Volk joyfully summoned the national regime, with its drive to purify public life, to combat unemployment, hunger, and need. . . . We prayed and the answer arrived. May God grant our rulers wisdom. May the “steel-hardened man” for whom we cried out a year ago . . . retain his power.

Source: Quoted in Claudia Koonz, Mothers in the Fatherland: Women, the Family, and Nazi Politics (New York: St. Martin’s, 1987), 234.

5. Hitler in Prayers

Children in Germany recited the following bedtime prayer, addressed not to God but to Hitler. It expressed a clear view of who Hitler was and what he meant to Germany.

Führer, my Führer, sent to me from God, protect and maintain me throughout my life. Thou who has saved Germany from Deepest need, I thank thee today for my daily bread. Remain at my side and never leave me, Führer, my Führer. My Faith. My light. Heil, mein Führer!

Source: Quoted in Claudia Koonz, Mothers in the Fatherland: Women, the Family, and Nazi Politics (New York: St. Martin’s, 1987), 287.

Questions to Consider