Nazi Rule in Germany

1. Study document A in Chapter 3. Make a detailed list of the kinds of people who were likely to be arrested as "Enemies of the State" in Nazi Germany.

a. "the politicals," such as the Communist members of the Reichstag and other opponents of Hitler
b. any person who speaks out against Hitler, or has "spoken abusively" towards HItler
c. the "work-shy" group is the largest, and they were people such as "a business employee [who] lost his position and applied for unemployment releif" and he turned down an offer working "as a navvy on the new motor roads." Basically, the "work-shy" group consisted of people who asked for jobs but didn't want to do the jobs offered by the Nazis, which showed the Nazis that he or she weren't willing to work for them or Germany, and therefore wanted Germany to not make progress in the world.
d. "the 'Bibelforscher' was another group that were likely to be arrested because they "refused military service" and were banned by the Gestapo
e. Homosexuals would be arrested as "Enemies of teh State" in Nazi Germany because the secret police just didn't like homosexuals.
f. The "professional criminals" were most likely to be arrested as "Enemies of the State" in Nazi Germany because simply they were criminals and a threat to Germany and the want to be a world power.

2. Provide detailed notes on the following sub-topics in Chapter 4 (Jews in Nazi Germany)

A. Hitler's anti-Semitic ideas
1. Hitler believed that the Jews were responsible for Germany's defeat in World War I
2. He believed that they were contriving to take over the world
3. He also believed that the Jewish race was an inferior race and shouldn't be allowed to mix in with the "superior" Aryan Germans
B. The dismissal of Jews from jobs, 1933
1. The SA (the Storm Troopers) organized a boycott of Jewish shops, they were "sacked from important jobs in the civil service, the law, universities and schools, broadcasting and newspapers"
2. in 1934 all Jewish shops were marked with a yellow star or the word "Juden" to show everyone that it was a Jewish shop and to not shop there
3. Jewish people weren't allowed to sit together in parks, buses, and trains
4. children at school were also taught to "believe in anti-semetic ideas"
C. The Nuremberg Laws, 1935
1. the first took their German citizenship
2. forbid marriage between Jews and non-Jews
3. these laws caused a lot of suffereing for the Jews who stayed in Germany
a. it was difficult to get food, milk for their children, and shopping because grocers and in some stores forbade the admittance of Jews in their stores
b. doctors or chemists wouldn't give them medicine if he or she or someone in their family or knew was sick
c. hotels wouldn't allow Jews to sleep at their hotel
d. some went as far as to make signs saying "Jews Strictly Forbidden To Enter This Town" or "Jews Enter This Place At Their Own Risk"
D. The "Night of Broken Glass"
1. was the result of a Jewish person shooting a Nazi official dead and Hitler ordering Himmler to "begin a week of terror against the Jewish population"
2. November 10, 1938 was the first event (The Night of the Broken Glass)
3. thousands of Jewish shop keepers' shops had the windows destroyed and their merchandise stolen from their shops
4. Jewish homes and synagogues were burnt to the ground
5. dozens of Jewish people were killed and thousands were arrested
E. 1938 Violence against Jews
1. ordered to pay a fine of one billion marks
2. men and women forced to clean the streets with scrubbing brushes on their hands and knees
3. the number of concentration camps expanded


3. Why do you think Hitler and the Nazis put so much effort into organizing the lives of young people? (Chapter 5)

I think Hitler and the Nazis put so much effort into organizing the lives of young people because they can be easily influenced and are the future of Germany. As a child, you believe everything that a teacher tells you and teaches you, therefore the school books they used and the teachers who went through trainig during vacation to put Nazi ideas in their lessons were very influencial on the children. The children were constantly expose to Nazism as well, as a result they din't really see anything wrong with Nazism. Since the children were easily influenced and saw nothing wrong with Nazism, they became the future for Germany. This was very important to Hitler and the Nazis because if the children were the future and were learning to be Nazis they would carry on the pure Aryan German race and Nazi Germany would live on.

4. Study the photographs carefully in Chapter 5. Then, using the information and evidence you have read about young people, write a diary of one day in a Hitler Youth camp.

Dear Mother,

I'm no longer sore anymore because I cannot feel pain anymore. At The German Girls League I have become "swift, tough and very hard," just as Hitler wanted from us. Today we marched for fifty miles in the mud and rain, and at one point we had to walk through a three meter wide river where there were ice chunks flowing past us. We didn't feel a thing. I walked through the river with ease and didn't complain once, it was so easy that I was willing to go swimming in the river. I feel very prepared to serve my country, but unfortunately I can't join the army. But I will serve my country by marrying a pure Aryan and have pure Aryan children to make the pure race for Germany. I hope you are proud of me mother because I never felt so sure of myself until now. Long live Nazism, Heil Hitler!

5. What effect did "the three Ks" have upon women. (Chapter 6)

The effect "the three Ks" have upon women were basically enslavement, the women had really no rights and couldn't do much for themselves. The three Ks are Kinder, Kirche, and Kuche which mean Children, Church and Cooking. A woman's job was simply to bear children, stay at home, and cook. Women weren't allowed to express themselves in any way, they couldn't wear make-up, pants, or be slim. These were looked down upon and to be slim was seen as being less able to birth a child, it was thought that it made a woman weaker. Not only were women put down and treated as almost slaves just meant to be child-bearers, there were homes where single women could go to get pregnant with pure Aryan SS agents. The effect of the three Ks was that the women probable felt like slaves, that their only purpose in life was to produce pure Aryan children and women were inferior to men; like women were only good for birthing children and nothing less. However, from what's written in Chapter 6 there weren't any women who tried to stop from being shut down by the three Ks, which shows that all the women just took the pressure to bear children, attend the National Riech Church, and cook only.

6. Study the photograph in Chapter 6 (2nd page) and read the rules of the National Reich Church. Explain in your own words the kind of religion which the Nazis wanted Germans to follow.

The kind of religion the Nazis wanted Germans to follow was one led by Nazis only, where they expressed Nazism only and emphasized strength (represented by the sword) and the ideas Hitler wrote about in Mein Kampf. Since the National Reich Church was only led by "orators of the Reich" only Nazi ideas were mostly likely talked about, I doubt that there was any sort of God or gods involved at the meetings at the church. The Reich Orators probably just talked about Nazi ideas and emphasized how strong Germany was going and supposed to be and the ideas expressed in Mein Kampf. It's as if the author of Mein Kampf, Hitler, was the "God" for Germans because those are the only ideas and words the people would listen to at these meetings. Therefore, the Nazis wanted the Germans to follow a Nazi religion, full of Nazi ideas.

7. How did Hitler address the massive unemployment situation in Germany when he came to power? (Chapter 7)

Hitler addressed the massive unemployment situation in Germany when he came to power by first making the National Labor Service, which gave men jobs in public works such as digging drainage ditches on farms, planting new forests, building schools and hospitals. The advantage of the National Labor Service was free meals, but the men were only given pocket money, had to wear military uniforms, and lived in camps. So the men in the National Labor Service were under strict control of the Third Reich because they lived in camps, wore military uniforms, and were only given pocket money. Data shows that Hitler's National Labor Service program was working, but what he purposefully failed to include were the hundreds of thousands of Jews who were put in concentration camps and the million men who joined the army. Therefore, the decrease in unemployment can't be proven if Hitler's National Labor Service worked because there were so many other people that weren't included in the number of unemployed.

8. What is the significance of the German Labor Front? (Chapter 7)

The significance of the German Labor Front is that basically, yes, people were able to get jobs, but they lost all of their working rights. The people who had jobs were paid ten times of what they were in 1932 and actually had a job, but they could no longer ask for higher wages, boycott, and they were working for more than when the limitations on the number of hours a person coud be made to work was put into law. There weren't as many freedoms, and therefore it shows the tight control the Nazis put on the people living in Germany no matter where or who you were there was no escaping the control and ideas of the Nazis.

9. In your own words, discuss the significance of the Strength through Joy program. (Chapter 8)

The significance of the Strength through Joy program is that the Nazis knew that people worked better if they were happy, and as a result many leisure time activities were made to make people happy. However, Doctor Robert Ley, the leader of KDF (Strength through Joy program), calculated the amount of hours a person has per year for leisure time, which shows that their leisure time was strictly regulated. Another significance is even though German workers were given leisure time, it was controled by Doctor Robert Ley and the Nazis. The workers could only go to certain places, like Austria, and could only do certain activities. The activities were skiing in Bavaria and sport matches organized by the KDF, so there was no escaping the reigns from the Nazis that controled what the workers did. Therefore, the significance is that the people were meant to be happy to work better and harder, but it just showed how much control the Nazis kept over the people.

10. Describe Dr. Joseph Goebbels propaganda and censorship tactics. What effect did they have upon the German citizen? (Chapter 9).

Dr. Joseph Goebbels was the master at propaganda and censorship tactics. In propaganda he tried to make it so strong so people "in the end succumb to it utterly and can never escape from it." Goebbels used the newspapers, radios, and mass rallies as key ways in propaganda. For example, Goebbels controlled what was printed on the newspapers and sometimes he closed down newspapers because they printed stories that weren't approved. In censorship tactics Goebbels made sure that no information that could "badly" influence the people be accessible to them. For example, jazz music was considered a "bad" influence in the view of Goebbels and the Nazis because the origin of Jazz was from black people in America, which weren't a pure Aryan race. Jazz could give people ideas saying that it was okay to express yourself and to accept different cultures as equal, when they were actually inferior to the pure aryan German race. The effect of propaganda on a German citizen is extreme influence, they couldn't help themselves to become involved. If a German citizen walked into a mass rally, like the Nuremburg rallies, they would see the mass of people, the order and the passion and couldn't help him or herself to get hooked into the rally as well, to what was going on in the rally. The effect of censorship on a German citizen is he or she had less freedom on what he or she could do. A German citizen couldn't even say a joke about Hitler without getting the death penalty, and if there was ever a bad representation of a German or relating to Germany it was banned so he or she wouldn't be able to see certain movies or read some books that had this "bad representation." However, for the youth it was an exciting time because they were already influenced and hooked on Nazism they also saw the "bad reputations" as bad and should be destroyed, so there was no negative effect on the a German youth.