Fürstenwalder hateful message
The Fürstenwalder hatred message was a political proclamation directed against the political system of the Weimar Republic , which Elhard von Morozowicz (1893-1934) , the state chairman of the Stahlhelm Front Soldiers in Brandenburg , held at a steel helmet rally in Fürstenwalde , Brandenburg, in September 1928 . Historically, the political positioning of the Stahlhelm as one of the largest organizations in the camp of the political right of the Weimar Republic, expressed through the "hateful message", is considered an important milestone in the course of the decline of the democratic-republican system, which ultimately resulted in the establishment of the NS -Dictatorship culminated when the "hateful message" ushered in the transition from the steel helmet, which had been tolerably loyal to the republic in previous years, to an aggressive course hostile to the republic.
content
The relevant passage from Morozowicz's speech, from the content of which the name of the proclamation is derived, read:
“With all our hearts we hate the current state structure, its form and its content, its becoming and its essence [...] fight against the system that governs the state today. ... "
Morozowicz's speech received a lot of contemporary attention: It was followed by detailed comments in the daily press and, as a result, heated arguments. These were carried out on two levels: Once within the Stahlhelm, where there were conflicts between supporters of a moderate course and representatives of a radical anti-republican thrust. And secondly, between the steel helmet as a whole and forces loyal to the republic.
The then foreign minister and chairman of the German People's Party (DVP), Gustav Stresemann , accused the steel helmet of "that a very deliberate establishment of a kind of fascist party was taking place here." Stresemann also recommended all members of the Reichstag of the DVP, many of whom belonged to the Stahlhelm as former front-line fighters, to resign from the military association, which they also did together.
Also on the Reich President Paul von Hindenburg , who as a former field marshal of the First World War was an honorary member of the Stahlhelm, was exerted violent pressure to resign his membership of the Stahlhelm as a now openly negative attitude towards the state, of which he was the highest representative, for which Hindenburg however, significantly, saw no cause.
Wording of the speech
According to: Johannes Hohlfeld: Deutsche Reichsgeschichte in documents 1849–1934 , vol. 2 (The exit of the liberal epoch, 1926–1931), 1934, pp. 82–84 (in comparison to other prints, slight wording deviations can be found).
“We love our people and fatherland with all our hearts, because every German person and every grain of German soil is a piece of the German state. With all our hearts we hate the current state structure, its form and its content, its becoming and its essence. We hate this state structure because the best Germans do not lead in it, but because there is parliamentarianism in it, the system of which makes any responsible leadership impossible. We hate this state structure because in it class struggle and party struggle have become an end in themselves and a right. We hate this state structure because it hinders the German workers in their justified will to rise, despite all the high-sounding promises. We hate this state structure because it prevents us from liberating our enslaved fatherland and purifying the German people from the falsified war guilt, gaining the necessary German living space in the east, making the German people free again, agriculture, industry, trade and to protect crafts against the hostile economic war and make them viable again. We want a strong state in which the responsible leadership has the best and does not lead irresponsible bigwigs and mouthslingers. We demand from our Christian church communities that they do not enter into any kind of international ties that would prevent them from doing their part in the political and cultural renewal of the German people. We warn the church not to bypass a clear position. On the contrary, it should cultivate German spirit-fighting Christianity in order to pave the way for the freedom of the German people. We make this demand in the clear recognition that a struggle for freedom can only be waged successfully if a fighting church succeeds in bringing the bulk of the German people back to the deepest [in other transcripts: highest] foundations of God and Christianity. We know that the German people are still facing severe shocks in their struggle for a strong state. We do not fear these tremors; on the contrary, we steel ourselves and get ready to jump into the breach to see that these tremors do not lead to breakage but to the rise of the people. Just in these days we have seen how our pacifist policy of reconciliation and compliance has suffered miserably. Again it has been shown that our enemies use Germany only as an object of exploitation for their political and economic goals. And so we also know that our internal political opponents are determined to fight against us despite pacifist drivel. Our will to fight will be put to a severe test. Some forces that should stand by God and justice will betray us. We'll win anyway. Tried and tested in war, hardened in the storms of the revolution, immune to swamp and morass, we will oppose coming wars, coming revolutions and also the swamp of modern politics with our defiant life of its own. With this realization we want to wrestle and fight unreservedly: Fight against the system that governs the state of today, fight against those who support this system through compromises "
Imprints of the "hateful message"
- Elhard von Morozowicz (ed.): The “hatred” message from Fürstenwalde. Published in the name of the Landesführung des Stahlhelm Brandenburg , Freyhoff, Oranienburg [approx. 1928].
- Herbert Michaelis (Ed.) Causes and Consequences. From the German collapse in 1918 and 1945 to the state reorganization of Germany in the present , vol. 7 (= The Weimar Republic. From the Kellogg pact to the global economic crisis 1928-30), Berlin 1962, p. 423.
literature
- Wolfgang Ruge / Wolfgang Schumann / Dieter Fricke: Documents on German history. 1924-1929 , 1977, p. 94.
- Volker Berghahn : The steel helmet. Bund der Frontsoldaten 1918–1935 , 1966, p. 113.