Hamburg Senate under National Socialism

Coat of arms of Hamburg during National Socialism

On March 8, 1933, a new Senate was elected under National Socialist leadership in Hamburg . Since September 1931, the Senate had been in office without a majority in the citizenry in order to continue business. The National Socialists consolidated their power in Hamburg in the first years of their rule and rebuilt the Hamburg state according to the Führer principle . As a collegial body, the Senate increasingly lost power, which was transferred to the Reich and, above all, to the Reich Governor. The end point in this development was the abolition of the Hamburg constitution and the dissolution of Hamburg as an independent state in the German Reich on April 1, 1938. This also dissolved and abolished the Senate as a body.

Seizure of power

With the appointment of Alfred Richter ( NSDAP ) as Reich Commissioner , Police Lord and thus de facto Hamburg Interior Senator by Reich Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick , the National Socialists began to take power in Hamburg on the evening of March 5, 1933. The Reichstag election took place on the same day and after it closed of polling stations occupied SA units the City Hall . Police officer Paul de Chapeaurouge ( DVP ), who had been in office since March 3, 1933, resigned from office on March 6, 1933. Under these circumstances, the bourgeois parties agreed state party , DVP and DNVP or their electoral lists to enter into with the NSDAP a coalition (intraparty disputes there was in any case in the dstp, where u next to supporters of a coalition. A. Heinrich Landahl or chef Christian also Opponents, such as Carl Wilhelm Petersen and Friedrich Ablass , who mainly protested against the fact that the state party with Matthaei participated in the new Senate).

The new coalition had a wafer-thin majority of 1 vote in the 7th citizenship (elected on April 24, 1932). The coalition had 81 out of 160 MPs, 51 from the NSDAP, 18 from the State Party, 5 from the DVP and 7 from the DNVP. The coalition decided to fill the senatorial posts according to the balance of power in the newly elected Reichstag. This benefited the DNVP, which performed poorly in Hamburg, and the steel helmet closely related to it , which were united in the black-white-red battle front .

Senate election

On March 8, 1933, a new Senate was elected by the Hamburg City Council under the First Mayor Carl Vincent Krogmann . The MPs of the KPD could not attend the citizenship meeting, their 26 seats remained empty. The Reichstag fire ordinance of the Reich President of February 28, 1933 enabled the National Socialists to take legal action against the Communists. Arrest warrants were available for the communist MPs, most of them were on the run or were already in custody at the time, such as Etkar André , a communist member of parliament who was arrested on March 5, 1933 .

The lack of 26 MPs changed the situation, because according to Article 34 of the Hamburg Constitution “the members of the Senate were elected by the citizens with a majority of the votes cast”. In the corresponding senatorial elections, only the second mayor (Burchard-Motz) and the finance senator (Matthaei) received 84 votes, three more votes than the coalition had. The remaining senators received only 79 votes, with at least two MPs from the coalition parties voting against them.

The merchant and shipowner's son Carl Vincent Krogmann , who at the time was still independent but in SA uniform, was elected as first mayor, Wilhelm Amsinck Burchard-Motz (DVP) (DVP) (department: Economy) as second mayor and Walter Matthaei (DStP). Matthaei had been a senator since 1921 and Burchard-Motz since 1925, the election of these experienced senators and the non-party First Mayor from Hamburg families concealed the radical change that this election represented.

The newly elected National Socialist Senators Wilhelm von Allwörden (welfare), Alfred Richter (police), Friedrich Ofterdinger (university) and Curt Rothenberger (justice) decisively determined politics in Hamburg in the following years; Diedrich Engelken (trade and shipping) was less important . The leaders of the DNVP parliamentary group Max Stavenhagen (building) and Carl Julius Witt (school ) moved into the Senate for the DNVP, Hans-Henning von Pressentin (work) and Philipp Klepp ( land lordship ) for the steel helmet .

The following are the members of the Hamburg Senate:

The National Socialists did not tolerate any other parties in the government, so Burchard-Motz switched to the NSDAP on April 1, 1933, Witt on May 1, 1933, Klepp and von Pressentin on June 24, 1933.

The old state councilors were gradually dismissed or retired in the course of 1933. On March 8, 1933, Georg Ahrens , who had already led the coalition negotiations as the representative of Gauleiter Karl Kaufmann , was officially appointed to the new Senate Council. In the same month, on March 26, 1933, he rose to the Council of State.

Preservation of power and terror

In the days after March 5, 1933, Alfred Richter began to purge the Hamburg State Police (the Hamburg Political Police , see Hamburg State Police Headquarters ) of members of the Reich Banner or the SPD and other officials who were not loyal to the Nazi regime. Then the state police began with open terror and the persecution of opponents of National Socialism. In order to serve this goal, on the initiative of Gauleiter Karl Kaufmann, on March 24, 1933, the special use command (K. z. B. V.) of the Hamburg State Police was formed from SS and SA members under Lieutenant Franz Kosa . (Police lieutenant Kosa was convicted of abuse of prisoners after the Hamburg uprising . During the Altona Bloody Sunday , he led the police unit "Kosa Commando", which was responsible for the killing of 16 civilians. The KzbV had the particular task of tracking down opponents of the regime through raids and house searches " Protective custody " (unlimited detention without a court order). In March and April 1933, over 1,200 people in Hamburg - some for a short time - were detained by the KzbV. The remand prison was used for this purpose and its capacity was no longer sufficient, as even the attics were overcrowded, the Wittmoor concentration camp was built and the vacant buildings of the Fuhlsbüttel prison were used. This accommodation of "protective prisoners" in the Fuhlsbüttel prison later resulted in the Kola-Fu (concentration camp) . Abuses occurred during interrogations at the state police Agenda tion. First Mayor Krogmann publicly praised the brutal actions of the KzbV on May 10, 1933

Effects of the harmonization laws

The Senate became independent of the citizenry when the Reichstag passed the first law of alignment on March 31, 1933 . The Senate acquired the right to pass laws and the budget itself ; Membership in the Senate was no longer dependent on the approval of the citizens. The citizenship was thus de facto superfluous. On May 16, 1933, Gauleiter Karl Kaufmann was appointed Reichsstatthalter for Hamburg on the basis of the second synchronization law . Although this meant that he was not directly authorized to issue instructions to the Senate, as a direct representative of the Führer ( Adolf Hitler ) he could appoint and dismiss members of the state government, in this case the Senate. The Reich governor also drew up the laws and was thus able to exert influence.

Kaufmann used his newly acquired powers immediately and dismissed Max Stavenhagen and Walter Matthaei “at the request of the Reich Government” on May 18, 1933; for the latter, Hans Nieland was appointed the new finance senator. On this occasion, the division of responsibilities of the Senate was changed: Friedrich Ofterdinger handed over the university department to Carl Witt and took over the health department, which was spun off from the welfare division under Wilhelm von Allwörden. The construction department of the resigned Senator Stavenhagen was taken over by the second mayor.

At the same time, First Mayor Krogmann received the title “Governing Mayor” from Kaufmann: This was a further disguise of the true balance of power.

Senate reshuffle in October 1933

On September 14, 1933, the state administration law laid the foundation for the reorganization of Hamburg's Senate affairs. The corresponding executive order was issued on September 29, 1933 and the Senate was then reorganized. The governing mayor was authorized to issue instructions to the senators. The Senate was reduced to six people, five senators and State Secretary Georg Ahrens . The resigned senators were allowed to continue to use the title Senator, but were no longer members of the Senate. The health authority with its head Friedrich Ofterdinger and the rulership under Philipp Klepp were subordinated in October 1933 to the Senate Department "Internal Administration" under the direction of Senator Alfred Richter. The areas of school and university were combined to form the state education authority under Carl Witt and this was subordinated to Wilhelm von Allwörden. In addition, the “Administration for Economy, Technology and Labor” was set up under Wilhelm Amsinck Burchard-Motz. He was responsible for the economics department, since May 1933 also for the construction department and since July 1933 also for trade and shipping. In October, Hans-Henning von Pressentin was subordinated to him with the work department.

Loss of responsibility

In the police area

On November 24, 1933, the Hamburg State Police (the Hamburg Political Police ) were subordinated by the Senate to the Bavarian Police Chief and SS Reich Leader Heinrich Himmler . The latter confirmed his confidante, who had been appointed on October 20, 1933, to be the head of the company, Bruno Linienbach . In April 1936 the Hamburg State Police were finally merged with the originally Prussian Gestapo . With the " Decree of the Führer and Reich Chancellor of June 17, 1936 ", the remaining Hamburg police units were also subordinated to the Reich and the Senate lost its responsibility for the police.

In the area of ​​justice

From April 1935, the judicial apparatus was withdrawn from Hamburg's jurisdiction and subordinated to the Reich Ministry of Justice under Franz Gürtner . The previous Senator Rothenberger resigned from his Senate office and became President of the Hanseatic Higher Regional Court while retaining the title of “Senator” . From May 16, 1935, he was also appointed President of the Hamburg Higher Administrative Court. Rothenberger thus remained responsible for the justice sector in Hamburg.

Eroding power

Not the First Mayor, but Georg Ahrens rose to become the most influential person in the Hamburg Senate. Ahrens was a close confidante of Reichsstatthalter Kaufmann and had the most powerful position within the Senate. From July 6, 1933, he was head of the newly created Hamburg State Office, responsible for general administration, official staff and the external representation of Hamburg. Even in this position he had a decisive influence. When the Second Mayor Burchard-Motz was dismissed from the Senate in November 1934 because Kaufmann mistrusted him and he was no longer needed, Ahrens was given the vacant senatorial post. Ahrens was appointed businessman's deputy and in 1937 he negotiated the Greater Hamburg Act .

Dissolution of the Senate

On July 29, 1936, Adolf Hitler commissioned Reichsstatthalter Karl Kaufmann to lead the state government. The new ruling structure was implemented with the decree of September 24, 1936 on the Hamburg administration. Kaufmann was thus the head of all administrative branches. The Senate only acted as an advisory body, Senate meetings no longer took place. Kaufmann as the state government commissioned the individual senators to manage individual authorities and administrations under his authority. The formerly independent senators were demoted to political officials. In this context, the governing mayor Krogmann was appointed head of the Hamburg municipal administration.

With the implementation of the Greater Hamburg Act , the previous administrative structure was also significantly changed. With the "Reich Law on the Constitution and Administration of the Hanseatic City of Hamburg" of December 9, 1937, the old Hamburg constitution was repealed on April 1, 1938. With that the Senate ceased to exist without replacement. The previous senate members were allowed to keep their senatorial title and became full-time councilors in the municipal administration of the Hanseatic City of Hamburg or members of the state administration.

literature

• Research Center for Contemporary History in Hamburg (Ed.): Hamburg in the Third Reich, Göttingen 2005, ISBN 3-892-44903-1 .

Web links

• First Meeting of the Harmonized Hamburg Citizenship under SA Saalschutz (May 10, 1933)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Brauers: The FDP in Hamburg 1945 to 1953. P. 82–88.
2. ↑ http://www.gonschior.de/weimar/Hamburg/LT7.html or Ursula Büttner : Establishment and destruction of democracy in Hamburg . Hamburg 1998, p. 112.
3. ^ State Center for Political Education Hamburg (ed.): Hamburg in the Third Reich, seven articles. Hamburg 1998, p. 55.
4. ^ FZH (ed.): Hamburg in the Third Reich. P. 64.
5. ↑ Werner Johe: The unfree city: Hamburg 1933-1945. Hamburg 1991, p. 8.
6. ↑ Data from Pressentin and Klepp, see Hamburger Anzeiger No. 145 of June 25, 1933.
7. ^ State Center for Political Education Hamburg (ed.): Hamburg in the Third Reich, seven articles. Hamburg 1998, p. 131.
8. ^ FZH (ed.): Hamburg in the Third Reich. P. 519.
9. ^ District collective Rotes Winterhude: The Hamburg uprising - course - myth - teachings . Hamburg, 2003, 64 pages with photos and theses on the uprising and the current political situation from the left. Pages 1–32 (1.21 MB) The Hamburg Uprising 1923 Course - Myth - Teaching ( Memento from December 20, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) and pages 33–64 (1.8 MB) The Barricade. ( Memento of September 26, 2007 in the Internet Archive )).
10. ↑ Léon Schirmann: Justice manipulations The Altona Bloody Sunday and the Altona or Hamburg Justice 1932-1994 . Typographica Mitte, Berlin 1995. ISBN 3-929390-11-6 , p. 28.
11. ↑ State Center for Civic Education Hamburg (ed.): Hamburg ..., see above , p. 49.
12. ↑ State Center for Civic Education Hamburg (ed.): Hamburg ..., see above , p. 47.
13. ↑ Legal text see http://www.documentarchiv.de/ns/lndrgleich01.html
14. ↑ Legal text see http://www.documentarchiv.de/ns/lndrgleich02.html
15. ^ Research center for contemporary history in Hamburg (ed.): Hamburg in the Third Reich. P. 125.
16. ^ State Center for Political Education Hamburg (ed.): Hamburg in the Third Reich, seven articles. Hamburg 1998, p. 103.
17. ^ FZH (ed.): Hamburg in the Third Reich. P. 125.
18. ↑ Quoted from http://www.verfassungen.de/de/hh/hamburg37-1.htm
19. ^ Constitution from 1921 quoted from http://www.verfassungen.de/de/hh/hamburg21-index.htm