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Disabled people in Nazi ideiology
Disabled people were considered to be ‘biological outsiders’ from the Volksgemeinschaft because their hereditary conditions made them a threat to the future of the Aryan race
Nazi thinking on the issue of disability borrowed much from the ‘science’ of eugenics
Eugenics
The unscientific and racist idea that the mental and physical characteristics of the human race can be ‘improved’ by controlling who can have children - removing undesirable characteristics
Theory became more prominent in Germany after the First World War
Sterilisation
Even before the Nazis came to power, the State government of Prussia had drawn up a draft law to allow the voluntary sterilisation of those with hereditary conditions
1933 - Nazis took this further by introducing the Law for the Prevention of Hereditary Diseased Progeny (Sterilisation Law) - introduced compulsory sterilisation for certain categories of ‘inferiors’
Applied to schizophrenia, manic-depressive illness, epilepsy, chronic alcoholism, hereditary blindness and deafness, and severe physical malformation
Amendments to the 1933 Sterilisation Law
Later amendments included permitted sterilisation of children over 10 years, and the use of force to carry it out after 14 years, with no right to legal representation
1935 - law was amended to permit abortions in cases where those deemed suitable for sterilisation were already pregnant
1936 - sterilisation of women over 38 was introduced (due to higher risk of children being born with disabilities)
However there was also a ban on abortion and contraception for Aryan women and girls in attempt to increase the birth rate
Health courts
Decisions about sterilisation were made at the Hereditary Health Courts
Most judges were in favour of sterilisation - decision process often took 10 minutes
60% of those sterilised were ‘feeble-minded’ , and either suffering from idiocy, (had an IQ of 0-19), or imbecility (IQ of 20-49)
During the Third Reich, 400,000 people were sterilised
‘Euthanasia’
October 1939, the regime had authorised ‘euthanasia’ for people with mental health conditions, learning disabilities and physical disabilities - regarded by Nazis as an ‘unproductive burden’ on German resources
Nazi propaganda had a recurring theme of the ‘solution’ to the ‘burden’ of these people was the legalisation of putting mentally and physically disabled children to be ‘mercifully’ put to death and so ‘relieve the burden on the national community’
Beginning of ‘euthanasia programmes’
The first ‘euthanasia programme’ for disabled children originated from one specific case of a badly disabled child in 1939 - the father wrote to Hitler asking for his child to be put to sleep
Hitler then approved the report and SS doctor Karl Brandt euthanised the child
Hitler issued a directive to protect the prosecution of doctors who carried out ‘mercy killings’
The catalyst of the euthanasia programme
Children were either starved or given lethal injections
More than 5,000 innocent children - deemed ‘incurable’ by the Nazis, were killed this way
Program was then authorised to extend to adults
The T4 programme
From October 1939 - the euthanasia programme was rapidly expanding and moved to a headquarters in Berlin (Tiergarten 4)
The end of the T4 programme
By 1941, rumours about the ‘euthanasia’ policy and aroused opposition
One public official filed a complaint with the Reich Justice Ministry and an accusation of murder - however these got nowhere
From July 1940 there were a series of protests against this programme by the Churches
Pastor Braune who was involved was arrested in August by the Gestapo
2 December 1940 - official statement from Rome stated the direct killing of people with hereditary conditions was against ‘the natural and positive law of God’
Catholic Archbishop Galen of Munster preached a sermon - that was printed and widely distributed
This sparked further protests - which alarmed the Nazi regime
24 August 1941 - Hilter halted the programme
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