Third Reich as Racial State part 3-Antisemitic Policy & Society in Nazi Germany (1933-1939)

Demographic & Initial Context

• German Jewish population in $1933$: $(525\,000)$ ≈ <1\% of total German population.
• Early emigration already under way before Nazi seizure of power, yet prevailing Jewish attitude in $1933$: “wait-and-see.”
• Anti-Semitic state actions began “almost from the moment” of Nazi accession (Jan $30$, $1933$).

Failed Nationwide Boycott (April $1$ $1933$)

• SA organized a one-day boycott of Jewish shops, doctors & lawyers.
• Public response: largely apathetic or resistant ⟶ boycott collapses.
• Significance: shows limits of popular antisemitism in early months; contrast with later compliance.

First Wave of Discriminatory Legislation ($1933$)

• Core strategy: incremental legal exclusion from professional, economic, educational & agrarian life.
• Key laws (all $1933$):
  • Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service (April $7$)
  • Purged “non-Aryans” & politically ‘unreliable’ from state employment.
  • First official definition: “A person is non-Aryan if at least one parent or grandparent is non-Aryan, particularly Jewish.”
  • Law Concerning Admission to the Legal Profession
  • Extended civil-service exclusions to judges, lawyers, notaries.
  • Decree Regarding Physicians’ Services with the National Health Insurance
  • Restricted state reimbursement to Jewish doctors ⇒ discouraged Aryan patients, economically crippling Jewish medical practices.
  • Law Against Overcrowding of German Schools & Universities
  • Jewish student quota: $1.5\%$ of enrollment (up to $5\%$ in heavily Jewish cities).
  • Hereditary Farm Law (Reichserbhofgesetz)
  • Barred Jews from owning/inheriting agricultural land; dovetailed with blood-and-soil ideology.

Local & “Grass-Roots” Restrictions ($1933$ onward)

• “Nur für Arier” benches & signs in parks.
• Cologne (March $1933$): Jews banned from municipal sports facilities.
• Yiddish forbidden at cattle markets (April $1933$).
• Zweibrücken fairgrounds rental ban (May $1933$).
• German Gymnastics League (May $1933$): four Aryan grandparents prerequisite for membership.

Consolidating Racial Definitions (Prelude to Nuremberg Laws)

• Ongoing debates inside Reich bureaucracy over who is “Aryan.”
• Definitions would crystalize and tighten in $1935$ and again during the war.

Nuremberg Laws ($15$ Sept $1935$)

1. Reich Citizenship Law
   • Only those “of German or kindred blood” qualify as citizens.
   • Rights (vote, public office) reserved exclusively to citizens; Jews downgraded to “state subjects.”
   • Formula:
     • $\text{Jew} \Rightarrow \text{no suffrage} + \text{no public office}$.
2. Law for the Protection of German Blood & Honor
   • Prohibited marriage & sexual relations between “Aryans” and Jews.
   • Banned German women <45 yrs as domestic servants in Jewish households (impurity/fear-of-seduction trope).
3. Supplementary Definitions (Nov $1935$)
   • “Jew” = ≥$3$ Jewish grandparents (regardless of personal practice).
   • Mischling categories:
     • 1st degree: $2$ Jewish grandparents (+ possible added criteria such as synagogue membership/marriage).
     • 2nd degree: $1$ Jewish grandparent.
   • Children born after $1935$ to any Jewish/“mixed” marriage automatically classified Jewish.

• Hitler’s boast: “The full significance of these laws will only be recognized $100$ years from now.”

Official Propaganda Spin

• German Information Agency: Laws merely create ‘clear relations’; Jews may live “for themselves” under state protection but are not members of the Volk.
• Rhetoric frames exclusion as benevolent self-segregation rather than persecution.

Societal Penetration of Antisemitism

• Boycott failure $1933$ vs. widespread acceptance by $1938$ shows ideological seepage.
• Child-level indoctrination: Hans Massaquoi anecdote—Afro-German boy absorbs Jew-hatred despite own non-Aryan status; separates idolized Hitler from “few bad Nazis.”

Emigration Patterns & Obstacles ( $1933–1939$ )

• Annual Jewish departures from Germany:
  • $1933$: $37\,000$
  • $1934$: $23\,000$
  • $1935$: $21\,000$
  • $1936$: $25\,000$
  • $1937$: $23\,000$
  • $1938$: $35\,960$ (post-Kristallnacht surge)
  • $1939$: $77\,000$
• By $1938$ ≈ $25\%$ of German Jews had emigrated; majority remained.
• Barriers:
  • Emotional & social roots; fear of total upheaval.
  • Financial:
  • Emigration tax on assets > $(50\,000)$ RM.
  • Punitive exchange rates at Reichsbank.
  • International resistance: few states eased quotas.
  • Evian Conference (July $1938$): $32$ nations label refugee crisis a “problem” yet accept almost none.
  • Nazi propaganda victory: world also views Jews as unwanted.
  • SS St Louis case (May $1939$): >900 refugees denied Cuba & U.S. entry; forced back to Europe.
  • Canadian dictum: “None is too many.”
• Mandatory Palestine: ≈$60\,000$ German Jews via controversial Ha-avara (Transfer) Agreement—sale of German assets → purchase of German goods shipped to Palestine; ideological clash yet pragmatic overlap (Nazis want Jews out; Zionists seek immigration).

Interlude of the $1936$ Berlin Olympics

• Regime temporarily toned down open antisemitism to court international favor; repression resumed—and intensified—after games.

Legal & Administrative Escalation $1938$

• Jews must register assets >$(5\,000)$ RM.
• Forced to adopt ‘Jewish’ forenames or add “Israel” / “Sara.”
• Polish-born Jews expelled (Oct $1938$) ⇒ family of Herschel Grynszpan; his shooting of German diplomat Ernst vom Rath in Paris (Nov $7$) used as pretext for nationwide pogrom.

Kristallnacht Pogrom (9–10 Nov $1938$)

Planning & Orders:

• Hitler orchestrates “spontaneous” popular outrage; party leaders instructed not to impede violence, secretly to organize it.
• Police telegram: “Actions against Jews & their synagogues will shortly take place… Do not interfere. Arrest $30\,000$ prosperous Jews.”
• Fire brigades: protect Aryan property only.

Destruction & Casualties:

• Synagogues destroyed: $\ge267$ (possibly $\sim1000$).
• Jewish businesses smashed/looted: $7\,500$.
• Jewish deaths: ≥$100$; plus ≥$300$ suicides thereafter.
• Arrests/deportations to camps (Dachau, Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen): $30\,000$ Jewish men.
• Economic loss: >$200\,000\,000$ RM damages; collective fine levied on Jewish community: $1\,000\,000\,000$ RM.
• Public humiliations: forced kneeling, water-hosing, schoolchildren spitting on captives.

Reactions:

• Some Germans joined riots; many watched silently; limited vocal opposition.
• Clergy: isolated protests, no institutional condemnation by Catholic hierarchy or Confessing Church.
• Quote (German woman): “The Jews are the enemy of the new Germany. Last night they had a taste of what that means.”

Consequences:

• Accelerated dispossession: obligatory sale of businesses, exclusion from state schools, bans from public spaces.
• Massive second emigration wave ($\approx100\,000$ within a year).
• Demonstrated regime’s readiness for public violence; psychological terror preceding later genocide.

Broader Ethical, Philosophical & Practical Implications

• Gradualism: legal steps normalize exclusion, enabling later physical annihilation.
• Othering of Jews conditions majority to view neighbors as foreign, dangerous, expendable.
• International indifference (Evian, St Louis) underscores ethical failure beyond Germany; complicity through inaction.
• Economic plunder (exchange controls, Kristallnacht fine) shows genocide intertwined with theft.
• Propaganda portrays persecution as self-defense & moral hygiene (racial-purity narrative).

Survivor Testimony: Susan Warsinger (née Heller)

• Night of Kristallnacht: hometown crowd smashes family windows; local policeman watches passively.
• Rabbi publicly shorn of beard by SS—ritual humiliation.
• Parents hide children in attic; father’s post-pogrom decision: desperate bid to smuggle kids to France via paid courier.
• Emotional toll: hindsight grief centers on mother’s anguish at parting, illustrating personal dimension behind statistics.
• Pedagogical uses: illustrates
  • Local participation & bystander effect.
  • Children’s experiences & family separation.
  • Intersection of gender (mother’s perspective) & trauma.
  • Transition from hope (“Nazism will blow over”) to realization of mortal danger.

Connections to Previous & Future Lectures

• Builds on earlier theme: Nazi racial state targets both “insiders” (discipline/conformity) & “outsiders” (exclusion/elimination).
• Kristallnacht marks hinge between legal-bureaucratic persecution and approaching wartime radicalization (ghettos, deportations, Final Solution).
• Demonstrates symbiosis between domestic policy & foreign-policy aggression (military buildup parallels antisemitic escalation).

Key Numbers, Dates & Formulae (Quick Reference)

• Jewish pop. $1933$: $(525\,000)$.
• Emigration tax threshold: $(50\,000)$ RM.
• Fine post-Kristallnacht: $1\,000\,000\,000$ RM.
• Synagogues destroyed: $267–1000$.
• Men arrested Kristallnacht: $30\,000$.
• Emigration cumulative by $1938$: $\approx25\%$ of German Jews.

Take-Away Concepts for Exam

• Incrementalism: understand step-by-step exclusion → why public resistance waned.
• Legal Definitions as Violence: classification precedes confiscation, deportation & murder.
• Propaganda & Education: shaping perceptions from childhood (Massaquoi example).
• International Context: refugee crises reveal global antisemitism & failure to aid.
• Kristallnacht as Turning Point: first state-backed mass violence on Reich soil; economic & psychological watershed.