German National People's Party

The German National People's Party (, DNVP) was a national-conservative and monarchist political party in Germany during the Weimar Republic. Before the rise of the Nazi Party, it was the major nationalist party in Weimar Germany. It was an alliance of conservative, nationalist, monarchist, , and antisemitic elements supported by the Pan-German League. Ideologically, the party was described as subscribing to authoritarian conservatism,Seymour M. Lipset, "Social Stratification and 'Right-Wing Extremism'" British Journal of Sociology 10#4 (1959), pp. 346–382 on-line German nationalism, and monarchism."German National People's Party Program" pp. 348–352 from The Weimar Republic Sourcebook edited by Anton Kaes, Martin Jay and Edward Dimendberg, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1994 p. 349. Until 1931, the party also advocated for national liberal and protectionist economic policies,Dieter Gessner, 'Agrarian Protectionism in the Weimar Republic', Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 12, No. 4 (Oct. 1977), p. 765. embracing corporatist economic policies from 1931 onwards.Evans, Richard J. (2004). The Coming of the Third Reich. Penguin Books. p. 95. . Some members like the populist media mogul Alfred Hugenberg embraced economic nationalism and statism.Leopold, John. Alfred Hugenberg: Die radikalnationalistische Kampagne gegen die Weimarer Republik (englisch). – New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977. – 298 S. – . Leopold, 1977, S. 1, 91–92, 120–121, 146 It held anti-communist, anti-Catholic, and antisemitic views. On the left–right political spectrum, it belonged on the right wing. Specifically, it is classified as far-right in its early years and then again in the late 1920s when it moved back rightward. It has also been described as proto-fascist.

It was formed in late 1918 after Germany's defeat in World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919 that toppled the German Empire and the monarchy. It combined the bulk of the German Conservative Party, Free Conservative Party, and German Fatherland Party, with right-wing elements of the National Liberal Party. The party strongly rejected the republican Weimar Constitution of 1919 and the Treaty of Versailles, which it viewed as a national disgrace, signed by traitors. The party instead aimed at a restoration of monarchy, a repeal of the dictated peace treaty and reacquisition of all lost territories and colonies.

During the mid-1920s, the DNVP maintained a more moderate profile, accepting republican institutions in practice while still calling for a return to monarchy in its manifesto, and participating in centre-right coalition governments on federal and state levels. It broadened its voting base—winning as much as 20.5% in the December 1924 German federal election—and supported the election of Paul von Hindenburg as President of Germany () in 1925. Under the leadership of Alfred Hugenberg in 1928, the party moved to the far-right and reclaimed its reactionary nationalist and anti-republican rhetoric and changed its strategy to mass mobilization, plebiscites, and support of authoritarian rule by the president instead of working through parliamentary means. At the same time, it lost many votes to Adolf Hitler's rising Nazi Party. Several prominent Nazis began their careers in the DNVP.

After 1929, the DNVP co-operated with the Nazis, joining forces in the Harzburg Front of 1931, forming coalition governments in some states and finally supporting Hitler's appointment as Chancellor of Germany () in January 1933. Initially, the DNVP had a number of ministers in Hitler's government, but the party quickly lost influence and eventually dissolved itself in June 1933, giving way to the Nazis' single-party dictatorship with the majority of its former members joining the Nazi Party. The Nazis allowed the remaining former DNVP members in the Reichstag, the civil service, and the police to continue with their jobs and left the rest of the party membership generally in peace. During the Second World War, several prominent former DNVP members, such as Carl Friedrich Goerdeler, were involved in the German resistance to Nazism and took part in the 20 July plot to assassinate Hitler in 1944.

History National Opposition, 1918–1924

The party was formed in December 1918 by a merger of the German Conservative Party and the Free Conservative Party of the old monarchic German Empire. It was joined soon afterward by the most right-wing section of the former National Liberal Party, and most supporters of the dissolved radically nationalist German Fatherland Party, the antisemitic Christian Social Party and . Thus, the party united most of the formerly fragmented conservative spectrum of the Empire. The process that led to the DNVP began on 22 November 1918 when an ad appeared in a number of Berlin newspapers calling for a new right-wing party for "which we suggest the name of German National People's Party". The founding of the DNVP was a response to the November Revolution of 1918 and the sense of extreme crisis it had engendered amongst the German right, where there were widespread fears that society was on the verge of destruction.Hertzman (1958), p. 24 As a result of the crisis atmosphere of late 1918, a very wide assortment of different parties came together to form the DNVP.Hertzman (1958), p. 25 This proved to be as much weakness as a strength as the DNVP had strong fissiparous tendencies throughout its existence, which was the product of the various different streams of conservatism that found themselves flowing uneasily together in one party.Hertzman (1958), pp. 26–28, 30 There was much disagreement about who was to lead the new party, and Oskar Hergt was chosen as leader on 19 December 1918 very much as the compromise candidate, being a little-known civil servant who was thereforth acceptable to all the factions.Hertzman (1958), p. 28 British historian Ian Kershaw wrote that ever since the late 19th century there had been tension on the German right between traditional conservatives and the more radical populist völkisch elements, saying: "Even the German National People's Party, itself with many fascistic characteristics, could only uneasily accommodate the new strength of the populist forces on the radical Right".Kershaw, Ian (1983) "Ideology, Propaganda, and the Rise of the Nazi Party" pp. 162–181 in Stachura, Peter ed. The Nazi Machtergreifung London: George Allen. p. 165

At the founding convention in December 1918, Siegfried von Kardorff gave the keynote speech, in which he stated "Our new party, in which friendly right-wing parties have united, has no past and rejects any responsibility for the past. We have a present, and God willing, a good future", to which the delegates shouted "But without the Jews!"Hertzman (1958), pp. 29–30 The task of writing out a common platform acceptable to all fell to a committee headed by Ulrich von Hassell.Hertzman (1958), p. 34 Reflecting a strong antisemitic orientation, right from the start Jews were banned from joining the DNVP.Hertzman (1963), p. 137 In the elections on 19 January 1919 for the National Assembly that was to write the new constitution, the DNVP produced a pamphlet entitled "The Jews—Germany's vampires!"Hertzman (1958), p. 31

Generally hostile towards the republican Weimar constitution, the DNVP spent most of the inter-war period in opposition. Of the 19 cabinets between 1919 and 1932, the DNVP took part in only two governments and their total period in office over this 13-year period was 27 months. The party was largely supported by landowners, especially from the agricultural, conservative and Protestant Prussian east (East Elbia), and wealthy industrialists, moreover by monarchist academics, pastors, high-ranking government officials, farmers, craftsmen, small traders, nationalist white-collar and blue-collar workers. Because most of the Protestant aristocracy, high civil servants, the Lutheran clergy, the Bildungsbürgertum (the upper middle class), university professors, and Gymnasium (high schools for these destined to go to university) teachers supported the DNVP until 1930, the party had a cultural influence on German life far beyond what its share of the vote would suggest.Beck (2009), pp. 19–20. Because so many university professors and Gymnasium teachers supported the DNVP, everyone who went to university in Germany under the Weimar republic was exposed in some way to Deutsch-National influence. More women than men voted for the DNVP, and despite the party's traditionalist values, women were very active in the DNVP.Scheck (October 2001), p. 547 The women in the DNVP came mostly from the evangelical Protestant church leagues, associations representing housewives who had become politically active during World War I and women who been active in groups like the Pan-German League, the Colonial League and the Navy League.Scheck (October 2001) p. 558 The women in the DNVP tended to be most concerned with wiping out "trash and dirt" which was their term for pornography and prostitution, and was seen as especially threatening to women.Scheck (October 2001), pp. 547–548 The Israeli historian Yehuda Bauer called the DNVP "the party of the traditional, often radical anti-Semitic elites."Bauer (2000), p. 101 The writer Kurt Tucholsky wrote in 1924 that "Even in Jewish circles (of which a portion would still vote German-National today, were the party not so stupid to trade in anti-Semitism) and even in merchant circles, this way of thinking prevails."Tucholsky, Kurt (1994) "The Spirit of 1914" pp. 20–22 in Kaes, Anton; Jay, Martin; and Dimendberg, Edward eds. The Weimar Republic Sourcebook. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 21 Extremely nationalistic and reactionary and originally favouring restoration of the Hohenzollern monarchy, it later supported the creation of an authoritarian state as a substitute. Its supporters came from dedicated nationalists, the aristocracy, parts of the middle class and big business. The DNVP had little appeal to Catholics and almost its entire support came from Protestant areas.Childers (1983), p. 40