Rudolf Jung

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Translator’s Introduction
In the summer of 1919 a new book began publication in the city of Troppau (today Opava),
Czechoslovakia, written by Sudeten-German political activist Rudolf Jung. Originally titled Der
nationale Sozialismus: Eine Erläuterung seiner Grundlagen und Ziele * (National Socialism: An
Introduction to its Foundations and its Goals), Jung’s book was the first serious attempt at
outlining and explaining völkisch National Socialism as an ideology, as a body of theory
constituting a general, all-encompassing worldview. Pamphlets and articles in the past had sought
to address this topic, but never before had it been the subject of an entire book. The scope of
Jung’s work made it something new.

Although Jung is something of an obscure figure today, the importance of his book to the
development of National Socialism cannot be overstated. It exercised an enormous impact over
the early National Socialist movement by helping to provide it with a more solid intellectual
foundation, and every major National Socialist party in the period – of which, at that time, there
were several – was indebted to it. Other works by other writers may have now overshadowed it,
but Jung’s book came first, and was the wellspring from which the others drew. Jung’s Der
nationale Sozialismus preceded Gottfried Feder’s Der deutsche Staat auf nationaler und sozialer
Grundlage (The German State on a National and Social Foundation) by four years, Hitler’s Mein
Kampf by six, and Alfred Rosenberg’s Der Mythus des zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts (The Myth of
the Twentieth Century) by over a decade, and it was advertised alongside them in National
Socialist publications right through to the 1933 ‘seizure of power’ and beyond. In essence Jung
was, as Social-Democratic writer and historian Konrad Heiden described him, the “intellectual
patron saint of National Socialism.” His political allies and associates in the early 1920s would
have agreed with this assessment. He was viewed by them as “the programmaticist of the
movement,” and they greeted his appearances at their events with wild, thunderous applause.

Reading Jung’s book, or most any of his original writings, makes it apparent that the strand of
National Socialist thought which he represented was somewhat different from that championed
by Hitler. This would have to be the case, since Jung’s interpretation of the ideology came first.
Jung first joined the National Socialist movement around 1909, when Hitler was still a struggling
and unemployed arts student painting postcards in Vienna, and National Socialism at that time
was developing in a disparate environment to that which would later shape the movement in the
years following the devastation of the Great War. Yet it is undeniable that Hitler’s own ideology
would itself have looked different without Jung’s influence. Regardless of how ‘Hitlerism’ may
have eventually evolved, it owed much to the theoretical formulations first laid out by Jung, as
noted by historian Werner Maser:

“The writings produced by the Munich National Socialists before 1924 were unsuitable
for establishing a political model which could be appealed to as a compelling and secure
political ‘Weltanschauung’. The Austrian Rudolf Jung, on the other hand, who knew how
to formulate methods of political struggle and how to dress them with useful agitational
formulas from his experience with the nationalities conflict within the former borders of
the Habsburg monarchy, played a remarkable role in the movement’s early days. The
Bavarian National Socialists imported some of his ‘teachings’, expanded certain aspects
of them in accordance with their own experiences and ideas, applied this knowledge and
these ‘fundamental’ insights to the political situation in Germany, and amalgamated these

*
The 2nd edition and 3rd editions of Jung’s book, published in 1922 and 1923 respectively, were retitled Der nationale
Sozialismus: Seine Grundlagen, sein Werdegang, und seine Ziele (National Socialism: Its Foundations, its
Development, and its Goals). This English translation is a translation of the 2nd edition.
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aggressive ideas with the German Freikorps ideology of the trenches and with certain
völkisch perspectives. Taken together, this synthesis resulted on the one hand in the
Weltanschauung of ‘Hitlerism’, which was shaped in a pioneering and authoritative
manner before 1924.” *

These differences are in part what make Jung’s book so valuable. In the public conception today,
‘Hitler’ and ‘National Socialism’ have largely become interrelated and inseparable. They are
regarded as being one and the same thing, and it seems to be generally assumed (when it is talked
about at all) that National Socialism started with Hitler, that he was its progenitor – or near
enough so. This was, admittedly, the perspective which Hitler would later encourage within the
National Socialist movement and in Germany. It is not, however, particularly accurate. Völkisch
National Socialism had been extant in Austria and the Sudetenland since the early 1900s, and in
Germany it had existed in organized form since 1918. Hitler, when he first joined the Munich-
based Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (German Workers’ Party, DAP) in October 1919, was merely
joining one very small branch of a much larger, pre-existing movement. The first edition of Jung’s
book was published before Hitler had even joined the DAP. The second, expanded edition (of
which this book is a translation) appeared in 1922, a period when Hitler was merely one leader
among many within the National Socialist movement, and one whom the others still regarded as
something of an intransigent yet talented troublemaker, not as their infallible Führer. These early
editions of Jung’s book thus provide a window into National Socialist ideology before Hitler, a
fresh look at the today still-obscure intellectual roots of an otherwise notorious political
movement.

Jung’s book deserves to be regarded as a central work of völkisch National Socialism, because
that is what it is. Not only is it at the center, along with Mein Kampf and the writings of Feder
and Rosenberg and Reventlow and Strasser and Darré, but it also bears the distinction of having
come first. The purpose of this translation is to amend an unfortunate and long-standing gap in
our understanding of National Socialist ideology by introducing Jung’s work to a wider, English-
speaking audience.

The Author: Who was Jung?

Rudolf Jung was born on 16th April, 1882, in Plass (today Plasy, Czechia), a small town on
the Střela River in the heart of Bohemia. Jung’s childhood was spent in Iglau (today Jihlava), a
city in the neighbouring region of Moravia. As well as being a garrison for the local military, Iglau
was a ‘speech island’, an enclave for ethnic Germans in the Czech lands of the Austro-Hungarian
empire. The significant number of Sudeten-Germans in the area engendered an atmosphere of
racial tension; since the 1880s there had been competition and conflict between Czech and
German workers in the town, an atmosphere which would shape Jung’s perceptions as a child
and have a significant impact on the development of his views as an adult.

As an adolescent Jung was sent to Vienna to study at its Technical High School. His natural
intelligence ensured him a place at university, and in 1906 he was awarded a doctorate in
mechanical engineering which opened further doors to employment as a railway engineer with
the Austrian Nordwestbahn. It was around this same period that Jung’s political activism began.
The state railways within the Empire were heavily unionized, with the unions divided along racial
lines – Czech and German workers not only competed for jobs, but also over which languages
should be used in signage and paperwork, which provincial administrations would manage which
sections of track, how many Czechs could be employed on German-majority territory (and vice

*
Translated from Werner Maser’s (1965) Die Frühgeschichte der NSDAP: Hitlers Weg bis 1924. Frankfurt am
Main, Germany: Athenäum Verlag.
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versa), and so on. There were a number of nationalist trade unions for each of Austria-Hungary’s
various ethnic groups, and as a consequence of these disputes the largest and strongest nationalist
unions were those of the railwaymen. Jung was thrown right into the middle of this ferment.

The conditions in the railways did nothing but reinforce the views Jung had been forming since
his childhood in Iglau: that Czech immigration was being used to undercut German labor with
cheap wages, deliberately forcing Germans to emigrate from their native lands in search of better
working conditions. It is likely also that Jung’s social views were further shaped by the
‘proletarian’ culture of this heavily unionized environment and the many working-class railway
employees whom he encountered. In any event, Jung soon became involved in union politics to
such an extent that it impacted on his employment, with his activism on behalf of the railway
workers earning him a punitive transfer by his employer from Vienna back to Bohemia.

Ironically, this punishment just moved Jung out of one hotbed of social-nationalist agitation and
right into another. In Bohemia, Jung came into contact with the Deutschen Arbeiterpartei in
Österreich (German Workers’ Party in Austria, DAPÖ), a minor political party founded in
Trautenau in 1904 by disgruntled nationalist workers who had become disillusioned with the
internationalist, ‘pro-Czech’ stance of Social-Democracy and the Marxist unions. The DAPÖ
was tailor-made for Jung’s worldview, with its programme presenting a synthesis
of völkisch nationalism and reformist socialism which agitated as much against the Czechs as it
did for “the liberation of the working classes of the German people.” Jung became a member of
the party sometime around 1909, * and after his continued radical activism resulted in his being
fired from his position as a state locomotive engineer, he devoted himself full-time to the DAPÖ
as a paid organizer.

Jung was a talented activist, and he and a number of other ‘white-collar’ workers who joined the
DAPÖ in this period did much to help provide the party with a more solid intellectual-ideological
foundation. † Jung made a name for himself as a writer in party publications, and in 1912 he was
elected to the Moravian Landtag as a representative for the DAPÖ, holding his seat there until
the end of the War. In 1913 he and another relatively new member, Dr. Walter Riehl (a former
Social-Democrat), were also responsible for drafting a new party programme, which incorporated
some of the more radical völkisch-socialist perspectives brought into the party by recent newer
recruits. During the difficult years of the Great War, Jung was exempted from military service
because of his technical expertise as an engineer, and as one of the few senior members not at
the front he was faced with the heavy responsibility of trying to keep the remnants of the party’s
organization afloat – not an easy task when the bulk of its members and leadership were off
fighting (and dying) on the battlefield.

*
The exact year in which Jung joined the DAPÖ seems unclear – usually historians claim that he joined either in
1908, 1909, or 1910. Hans Knirsch, one of the co-founders of the DAPÖ and a man who worked closely with Jung
in the interwar years, stated in his own 1932 history of Austro-Sudeten National Socialism (Aus der Geschichte der
deutschen nationalsozialistischen Arbeiterbewegung) that Jung joined the party in 1909, so it is safe to assume that
this date is probably most accurate.
†
During the 1908-1910 period the DAPÖ began experiencing an influx of more ‘middle-class’ members; previously
party membership had been comprised almost exclusively of skilled artisans and proletarians. It was in this same
period that the term ‘National Socialism’ became increasingly widespread within the party and in the broader
nationalist workers’ movement, used to describe the ideology underpinning their policies and activism. This
terminology had existed since the beginning (potential names debated for the DAPÖ during its founding in 1903-
04 had included ‘National Social Party’ and ‘German Social Party’), but it was not truly solidified until the movement
began attracting more intellectuals in the years just prior to the War.
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Following the end of the War and the collapse of Austria-Hungary, the returning members of
the DAPÖ decided to reconstitute the party in recognition of the changing circumstances brought
about by the Empire’s defeat and dissolution. On 5th May, 1918, the party met in Vienna to vote
on a new name, eventually deciding on the ‘German National Socialist Workers’ Party’
(Deutsche Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei, DNSAP). A new party programme was also
drafted, of which Jung was the sole author. This new ‘Vienna Programme’ called for, among
other things, an expansion of the cooperative system, the nationalization of large-scale
enterprises, a democratically-administered “People’s Bank,” and the “consolidation of the entire
area of German settlement in Europe into a democratic, social German Reich.” Many of the
programme’s proposals would be expanded upon the following year in the first edition of Jung’s
book on National Socialist ideology, Der nationale Sozialismus. It was this work, in combination
with the Vienna Programme and the body of published theoretical documents which he already
had to his name, which helped cement Jung’s reputation within the movement as National
Socialism’s chief ideologist, something of which he was quite proud – Jung’s stated ambition,
according to those who knew him, was to be the ‘Karl Marx’ of National Socialism.

The end of the War and the break-up of Austria-Hungary had additional far-reaching
consequences for the party and for Jung. As a consequence of the Treaty of Saint-Germain, most
of the Sudetenland was awarded to Czechoslovakia rather than to Austria or Germany, isolating
the Sudeten-Germans as a minority within another nation. This also caused a rupturing of the
DNSAP, whose strongest chapters were situated in the Sudetenland – suddenly the Sudeten
branches found themselves in a completely different nation to those of their associated branches
in Austria, forcing the party to re-found itself as multiple, separate national entities. By 1919 there
were thus three DNSAPs: one in Austria; one in the Sudetenland (Czechoslovakia); and one in
Poland (the territory of Upper Silesia had been given by the Entente to the new Polish Republic,
forcing the small DNSAP branch located there to also re-establish itself as an independent party).
Jung, after some wrangling with the Czech state over citizenship issues, ended up settling in
Troppau, Moravia. There he assumed a major leadership position within the Czechoslovakian
DNSAP, serving as the party’s Second Chairman from 1919 to 1926 and its First Chairman from
1926 to 1933. Between 1920 and 1933 Jung also represented the DNSAP as a member of the
Czechoslovakian National Assembly, acting as parliamentary leader for the party’s elected
members in the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate.

As one of the troika of leaders of the Czech/Sudeten DNSAP, alongside trade-unionist Hans
Knirsch and parliamentarian and newspaper editor Hans Krebs, Jung in the following years
directed the DNSAP down the path of reformism, leading the party as a law-abiding entity which
sought to achieve its goals via parliamentary methods and within the boundaries of the Czech
constitutional order. Although this was in accordance with the DNSAP’s historical culture and
ideology, and was arguably necessary in light of the difficulties a radical course would have
fostered vis-à-vis the Czech-majority state structure, the adopted strategy did create tensions
within the party organization as time went on.

Immediately after the War, a number of new National Socialist organizations had emerged in
the neighbouring German Republic, the most significant of which were the German Socialist
Party (Deutschsozialistische Partei, DSP) and the National Socialist German Workers’ Party
(Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP). By 1923 the NSDAP had not only
completely absorbed the DSP, but under the leadership of its chairman Adolf Hitler had also
grown to be the largest and most dynamic National Socialist party in all German-speaking
territories, outshining the far older and far more experienced DNSAP organizations in Austria,
Poland, and Czechoslovakia. As the NSDAP grew in popularity and influence within Germany
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in the late 1920s and early 1930s, so also did its influence intrude upon Jung’s DNSAP, creating
tensions within the Sudeten party between the older, reform-oriented party leaders and the
younger, more radical members, who had been attracted to National Socialism largely by the pull
of Hitler and by the mounting successes of the German ‘brother-party’. The younger members’
radical inclinations helped provide the Czech state with an excuse for persecution, resulting in
heightened censorship and crackdowns against the DNSAP until, in the face of an imminent ban
in late September 1933, the Sudeten party ended up dissolving itself completely. *

Following the dissolution of the Sudeten DNSAP, many party leaders sought to escape arrest by
fleeing Czechoslovakia for safe-haven in Germany, where Hitler had become Chancellor. Jung
too went into exile in Germany, although only after first serving a seven-month prison sentence
for his alleged crimes against Czech public order. Jung spent much of his time in the Reich
attempting to attain the recognition and prominence which he felt was his due, in light of his
intellectual contributions to National Socialism and the multiple decades of his life which he had
committed to advancing the movement’s cause. In November 1935 he was granted membership
in the NSDAP and received official recognition from the state as an Alter Kämpfer, † and in 1936
he entered the German Reichstag (against vigorous protests from the Czechoslovakian
government) as the representative for Westphalia-South. In 1938, as public acknowledgement
for his 30 years of activism, a small ceremony was held in which Jung was also appointed both
an honorary Gauleiter and an honorary member of the SS, receiving the rank of SS-
Gruppenführer.

Despite these official signs of recognition, Jung during this period of his life was not a particularly
satisfied man, according to those who knew him. He was never able to attain a genuine position
of importance within the ‘New Germany’, instead working various mid-ranking roles in academia
and the public service which entitled him to respect and to a comfortable living, but which were
without any real political influence. For a man who had been with the National Socialist
movement almost since its founding, who had been associated with National Socialism even
before the Führer and who had played an invaluable role in the development of the movement’s
ideology, this must have been particularly frustrating. Jung’s craving for the recognition and status
which he felt were commensurate with his prior achievements was noticed by his contemporaries,
one of whom observed that:

“He has an almost mimosa-like sensitivity with regards to his position and his rank and
his name. His addiction to titles, and his addiction to recognition of his personality, seem
downright pathological.” ‡

*
Younger members in particular had been behind the creation of the Volkssport, ostensibly a party sporting
association but in reality the DNSAP’s equivalent of the Brownshirts, an organization which drew suspicion and
hostility from the authorities. In February 1932 the Volkssport was banned and the government initiated legal action
against its leaders, alleging that they were engaged in subversive, anti-state activities. Throughout the rest of 1932-33,
governmental emergency decrees were also used to revoke the parliamentary immunity of the DNSAP’s elected
representatives, as well as to issue prohibitions against the party’s uniforms, publications, public events, and symbols
(including the swastika). The DNSAP was dissolved by members on 28 September, 1933, out of recognition that a
national ban on the party was imminent. They were correct – the official ban came a week later, on 7 October.
†
An “Old Fighter,” i.e. someone who joined the National Socialist movement before 1930. Alter Kämpfer like Jung
were entitled to wear the prestigious Golden Party Badge. Jung was also granted the artificially lowered NSDAP
membership number of 86. A low membership number was a status symbol, since it demonstrated that the bearer
had joined the National Socialist movement very early on, in the first years of the Kampfzeit (‘time of struggle’).
‡
Translated from the diary of Josef Pfitzner, 1944. Pfitzner was Deputy Mayor of Prague from 1939 to 1945.
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It was partly because of Jung’s desire for political influence that he and his family finally returned
to the Czech lands in 1943, now occupied and administered by the German military as a
Reichsprotektorat. After the annexation of Czechoslovakia in 1939, Jung had apparently hoped
to be made Gauleiter of the region, and although this had not come to pass he was still looking
to attain a position of influence there, perhaps as mayor of Prague or as the rector of Prague
University. Instead Jung ended up working as the Protectorate’s ‘Reich Inspector for Labor
Management’, a fairly inconsequential public service role in the Arbeitseinsatz, a Labor Ministry
organization overseeing government intervention in the local labor market. This was,
unbeknownst to Jung, also to be the last position he would ever hold. In early March, 1945, in
the face of obvious German military defeat and the inevitable advance of the Soviet Army, Jung
buried documents and weapons in the yard of his Prague villa, then packed up his family’s
belongings and furniture and sent them away, back to Germany and back, hopefully, to safety.
He himself stayed behind to maintain his post, and was arrested in his offices less than two
months later on May 5th, the day of the Prague Uprising by Czech citizens against the remnants
of German military administration. For a time Jung, as a minor official, was kept only under
police surveillance, and he was allowed to move around relatively freely. His long history of anti-
Czech political activism in the region meant that he had many enemies among the local populace,
however, and eventually his reputation caught up with him – in the end Jung was locked away in
Pankratz Prison.

On December 11, 1945, in a dank Czech prison cell, Rudolf Jung passed away – some accounts
say by suicide, others say by malnutrition and mistreatment. Whatever the cause, it was a sad end
for a man who had once been regarded among his peers as the ‘Karl Marx’ of National Socialism,
as the ideological leader and ‘patron saint’ of an entirely new political worldview. Unlike so many
other Alter Kämpfer in the German Reich, in the last years of Jung’s life there was no real public
recognition of his accomplishments – his name graced no street or square or building, and there
were no plaques or monuments or ceremonies in his honour. Today he is virtually forgotten. Yet
the role Jung played in the development of National Socialist ideology deserves recognition, as
does the book he wrote about that ideology – a book which exercised considerable influence
over the theory and practice of a political worldview which has had an indelible impact upon
history, and which is today still infamous the world over, although likely not for reasons which
Jung would have been comfortable with.

On Jung’s Book
Jung’s Der nationale Sozialismus was published in three separate editions, each of which bears
discernible differences to the others: the first in 1919, the second in 1922, and the third and final
edition in 1923. Jung’s original decision to write the book was born from his desire to provide
the National Socialist movement with an intellectual “armamentarium” of the kind which Das
Kapital and The Communist Manifesto had afforded Marxism, as well as to expand upon the
points made in the DNSAP’s Vienna Programme and to cement his credentials within the
movement as the ‘Karl Marx’ of National Socialism. Much of the first edition was written in exile,
a consequence of the Sudetenland being awarded to Czechoslovakia rather than Austria via the
Treaty of Saint-Germain. Following this decision, Jung had apparently faced legal problems
surrounding his citizenship status, either because he refused to take Czech citizenship or because
he equivocated over whether to become a citizen of Austria or Czechoslovakia, and eventually
the Czech government decided to make the decision for him by expelling him from the country.
For the next few months Jung settled in Salzburg, location of one of Austria’s most active DNSAP
chapters, and there worked on the draft of his book. As he later acknowledged, due to the
constraints imposed by these circumstances most of the first edition had to come from his “own
mind, without any assistance” (i.e. without any extensive supporting research). The finished book
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was published in the summer of 1919, after Jung had returned to Czechoslovakia (citizenship
issues apparently resolved) and settled in Troppau. Its full title was Der nationale Sozialismus:
Eine Erläuterung seiner Grundlagen und Ziele (National Socialism: An Introduction to its
Foundations and its Goals).

In 1921 Jung elected to revise the book, and at the end of that year a new, expanded version of
the text was produced which was first published early in 1922. The second edition also bore a
slightly modified title: Der nationale Sozialismus: Seine Grundlagen, sein Werdegang, und seine
Ziele (National Socialism: Its Foundations, its Development, and its Goals). Unfortunately,
copies of the original 1919 first edition are extremely difficult to find, so being able to properly
compare the content of the first and second editions is difficult. The small number of first edition
quotations which I have seen excerpted in other sources do appear to be almost identical to
portions of text in the second edition, although according to Jung the overall content of the
second edition was revised and expanded considerably:

“The first edition had various inherent shortcomings... Despite my lack of time, the first
section [of the second edition] has been extensively reworked and the second section
reshaped from the ground up.”

The only definitive difference in content between the first and second editions of which I am
aware concerns a piece of minutiae. Apparently within the first edition Jung makes reference to
“black-red-gold storm-banners” being the symbols of National Socialism – obviously this was
before the black-white-red swastika flag was universally adopted within the movement. In Austria
and the Sudetenland the colors black-red-gold were traditionally associated with the Pan-German
movement, a by-product of their origin in the liberal-nationalist revolutions of 1848.
Consequently, this political symbolism was inherited and utilized by the early National Socialists, *
until they eventually abandoned the black-red-gold tricolor following that flag’s adoption by the
Weimar Republic. All references to “black-red-gold storm-banners” have thus been excised from
the later second and third editions. This is a minor point of difference between the different
texts, but an intriguing one, particularly in light of how harshly modern Germany treats any
former “symbols of Nazism.”

The circumstances which motivated the drafting of the second edition are much clearer. When
the first edition was published in 1919 the National Socialist movement really only consisted of
the three national organizations of the DNSAP in Austria, Czechoslovakia (the Sudetenland),
and Poland (Upper Silesia). A new National Socialist party was being set up in Germany, the
German Socialist Party (DSP), but it was still small and inconsequential and lacked a proper
national party structure. There was also the Munich-based German Workers’ Party (DAP) of
Anton Drexler and Karl Harrer, founded in February 1919, but that was an even tinier grouplet
and was still barely-known to the members of the DNSAP.

By the following year, however, circumstances had changed. On 24 February, 1920, the DAP
had renamed itself the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP) and had begun
making waves in Munich under the direction of its new propaganda chief, Adolf Hitler. Over 24-
26 April the DSP had also held its first party conference, and had established for itself a proper
national party organization. And on 7-8 August, all the National Socialist parties – DSP, NSDAP,

*
Historian Andrew Whiteside, in his Austrian National Socialism Before 1918 (1962), recounts a story of National
Socialist leader Dr. Walter Riehl in the pre-WWI era “leading a gang of twenty young workers, waving the black-
red-gold flag of German unity and democracy, to a Czech union meeting and breaking it up by singing Die Wacht
am Rhein and fighting with the Czech audience until the police arrived and closed the meeting.”
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and the three DNSAPs – had attended an Inter-State Representatives’ Congress together in
Salzburg, acknowledging that they were all different wings of the same political movement and
attempting to forge common consensus on certain ideological and tactical issues. Despite some
of the links fostered at this event (Hitler conducted a speaking tour of DNSAP branches in
Austria shortly afterwards), certain differences had emerged in the discussions, particularly
between delegates from the reformist DSP and those from the more revolutionary NSDAP. The
National Socialist movement was thus growing in size, and thus naturally also growing more
intellectually diverse and complex. There was clearly a need for greater unity of thought and
purpose, which Jung – who had played a key role at the Salzburg congress – would certainly have
recognized.

This issue was clarified in particular the following year, when tensions between the NSDAP and
the other parties reached their boiling point. Over 26-28 March, 1921, at the 3rd Reich Party
Congress of the DSP in Zeitz, an attempt was made at negotiating a merger between all the
parties, effectively uniting them under one cross-border political structure. Despite express
support from the leadership of the NSDAP (represented at the congress by Drexler, still First
Chairman of the party), Hitler and his allies subsequently scuppered the deal at a follow-up
meeting chaired by Jung, held in Munich on 14 April, 1921. Hitler put further roadblocks in the
way of unification in July, after another rising star within the movement – writer and educator Dr.
Otto Dickel – had attempted to negotiate renewed merger talks between all the parties and his
own group, the German Working-Community (Deutsche Werkgemeinschaft). Hitler viewed
both Dickel and an amalgamated party as threats to his own leadership position in the NSDAP,
and he reacted by resigning from his party, stating that he would only return if he was made First
Chairman with ‘dictatorial’ powers and if there would be no further merger negotiations of any
kind. Drexler and the other leaders blinked, giving in to Hitler’s demands, and as a consequence
of this squabble no formal representatives from the NSDAP attended the Inter-State
Representatives’ Congress that year in Linz, although Hermann Esser and Gottfried Feder did
still take part on an unofficial basis. At this congress, Jung took advantage of the NSDAP’s formal
absence to push through some resolutions which Hitler had helped block the previous year,
including a programmatic amendment which effectively defined National Socialism as a class-
based ideology (committing it to “the class standpoint of productive labor”).

1921 was thus a year of some considerable discord within the broader National Socialist
movement, with divisions over questions of ideology and tactics resulting in some very real threats
to unity between the movement’s parties. It is thus perhaps understandable that Jung felt that his
original book, which had been written under conditions of adversity, needed to be substantially
expanded, with certain theoretical issues spelled out more clearly in order that all the National
Socialist parties would have a more solid and consistent intellectual foundation on which to base
their practical political work. It should be kept in mind, however, that the second edition of Der
nationale Sozialismus, published at the beginning of 1922, is not an anti-Hitler polemic. Despite
their organizational and ideological differences, Hitler and Jung still shared the same basic
worldview and would have agreed on more issues than they disagreed, and Jung had undeniably
helped influence Hitler’s own political beliefs. Regardless of any internal bickering over mergers,
points of theory, or electoral participation (which Hitler at this time was resolutely against), the
two men remained colleagues, maintaining a correspondence and continuing to make joint
appearances together at various events. At this time, though, Hitler – despite his mounting
influence within the movement – was still just one National Socialist leader among many, and it
makes sense that Jung (who still had a higher profile among grass-roots supporters) felt the need
to reiterate the essentials of his own ideological interpretation of National Socialism in light of
the recent disruptions.
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By the following year, however, circumstances had shifted completely. The third and final edition
of Jung’s book was released in 1923, and some of the differences between this version and that
published in the previous year are remarkable. The third edition of Jung’s book is now dedicated
to Adolf Hitler and contains glowing references to “red banners with black swastikas in white
fields,” originally the symbol solely of the NSDAP. In the directory of National Socialist parties
at the end of the book the NSDAP is now afforded pride of place at the head of the listing,
usurping the position previously held by the Sudeten DNSAP. While most of the third edition’s
content is the same, organized around the same basic chapter structure, the book as a whole is
also noticeably shorter, with a number of chapters reduced in length and several extensively
rewritten (although only one has been completely retitled). The most notable change is to the
chapter “The Development of National Socialism.” Whereas in the second edition this chapter
serves largely as a history of the DNSAP, with the NSDAP only mentioned as an afterthought
(and not even referred to by name, instead simply described as “the Bavarian National
Socialists”), in the third edition the chapter recasts the entire history of National Socialism as a
natural progression from its meagre beginnings in the Sudetenland towards its ultimate
expression and end-point – the NSDAP, led by the great Adolf Hitler, “the hope of all those with
a consciousness for their Volk.”

What had happened in a year to create such a stark shift in content? The most significant event
had been the collapse of the DSP, which lacked the necessary support base and resources to be
able to compete with the far more dynamic NSDAP. As a result of its collapse, most of the DSP’s
membership and assets had been absorbed by the NSDAP, significantly expanding the latter
party’s scope and influence outside of its stronghold in Bavaria. The other major change had
been a general explosion in support for the NSDAP, whose highly effective propaganda
techniques had drawn in a considerable number of new recruits, resulting in membership
numbers far in excess of those of the older, more established parties in Austria, Poland, and
Czechoslovakia. In recognition of the NSDAP’s success, and of Hitler’s growing cult of
personality within the movement, the various DNSAPs had effectively bent the knee at the 1922
Inter-State Representatives’ Congress in Vienna, with Hitler being officially declared “our
Reichsdeutsche Führer!” by the attending delegates. Jung had been among them, deferring to
Hitler’s demonstrable skills as a leader; following the congress, he even used his seniority within
the movement to ensure that Hitler’s new position of supremacy was acknowledged by National
Socialists in Austria and the Sudetenland. The third edition of Jung’s book thus marks the shift
from pre-Hitlerian National Socialism to the dominance of Hitlerism, highlighting the second
edition’s importance to our understanding of the ideology’s original tenets and evolution.

On the Translation
This translation is of the second edition of Rudolf Jung’s Der nationale Sozialismus: Seine
Grundlagen, sein Werdegang, und seine Ziele. From the title page onwards until the Translator’s
Notes and Appendices, everything is, as far as is possible, a replica in terms of the content and
style of Jung’s original text. All the asterisked footnotes within the text are Jung’s, translated from
the original German. The various diagrams and tables which Jung included in his book have also
been translated; in most cases I have simply taken screenshots of the diagram or table from a
digitized copy of the book, pasted an English translation over the original German text in image
editing software, and then copied the image into the document, leaving any numbers in their
original Fraktur font.

There are only two changes which I have made to the general structure of the book. The first is
to make each new chapter begin on a new page. In the original text, new chapters begin
arplan.org x

immediately below where an old chapter ends, which is not ideal for legibility (I suspect this may
have been done originally to cut down on printing costs). The other change concerns the book’s
‘parts’. In the second edition the book is divided into three sections or ‘parts’, with three clearly
identifiable headings. The headings are:
• Part One: Foundations of National Socialism
• Part Two: Development and Goals of National Socialism
• Goals of National Socialism
There is obviously some repetition here – ‘Goals’ is listed twice, even though the movement’s
goals are only covered in the third section. The heading of the third section is also missing a ‘Part
Three’ designator, despite it clearly being the beginning of the third segment of the book.

Although Jung only references two sections in his introduction, I personally suspect that this was
a design error. As evidence for this, the issue seems to have been corrected in the third edition,
where the new section headings are:
• Part One: Foundations of National Socialism
• Part Two: Development and Documents of National Socialism
• Part Three: Goals of National Socialism
In the end I made the editorial decision to amend the section headings to match those of the
third edition, which seem far more accurate. My guess is that this was probably Jung’s original
intention with the second edition, but that it was overlooked during the editing process, which is
why the issue was corrected when the book was reissued in 1923. Ultimately this is only a minor,
cosmetic issue – it does not alter any of the text in any way, which has all been translated from
the second edition.

At the end of the book I have included two sections of my own: one for Translator’s Notes, and
one for Appendices. References within the main text for the Translator’s Notes are numbered
(i.e. 1 2 3 4 etc.) to set them apart from Jung’s asterisked footnotes. The Translator’s Notes have
been included either to explain choices of translation, or to provide additional historical context
on certain persons, organizations, or events referenced by Jung. I have tried to use these
references sparingly in order to avoid distracting the reader; my general rule has been that if an
English-speaking reader can easily find context on something mentioned by Jung via a simple
online search, then it probably does not require an explanatory note. As for the Appendices,
they have been included for documentary purposes. Appendix A is a collection of translations
of every major National Socialist political programme produced between 1903 (the year the
movement began) and 1923 (the year of Hitler’s putsch and of the publication of the third and
final edition of Jung’s book). This includes the three programmes of the DAPÖ/DNSAP, two of
which Jung was responsible for writing. Appendix B lists the German titles of the sources, books,
and writings cited by Jung, in case readers wish to locate copies of these for themselves.

Regarding the language in the translation: where a word in Jung’s original text has no direct
English equivalent, I have maintained the original German word in Italics and provided an
explanation of its meaning via the Translator’s Notes. German words which are used so
frequently in English that most readers will already be aware of their meaning (Volk, Führer,
völkisch, etc.) have not been italicized. The titles of books, newspapers, and other publications
are italicized. Most book titles and organization names referenced by Jung have been translated
from German into English; most newspaper titles have not.

Finally, it should be noted that in some chapters Jung quotes fairly extensively from the Bible,
particularly from Old Testament sources. In the course of translating Jung’s text I compared each
of his biblical quotations against equivalent passages from different Bible translations in both
arplan.org xi

English and German (including King James, the New Revised Standard Version, the Luther
Bible, and several others). Based on this exercise, I am fairly confident that Jung’s biblical
quotations were originally taken from an older edition of the Luther Bible, which is why their
wording in the translation may read slightly differently from the wording which some English-
speaking readers are used to. It is unclear whether Jung directly sourced these quotes from the
Bible himself, or whether he instead merely took them from another work. I suspect the latter
may have been the case, as most of his biblical quotations also appear in völkisch writer Theodor
Fritsch’s Handbuch der Judenfrage, which Jung cites as one of his sources. Fritsch’s Handbuch
is likely also the source for the various quotes from the Talmud which Jung includes within the
chapter “The Jewish Spirit: The Jewish Pursuit of World Supremacy.” I did attempt to compare
these against an online English version of the Talmud, but I am far less familiar with the Talmud
than I am with the Bible, so I am still uncertain how accurate some of these quotations may
actually be.

I hope that you enjoy this work. Please feel free to distribute copies where you like. If you wish
to produce your own version (print or otherwise) for sale or distribution, or if you have any
questions, criticisms, or suggestions about the translation, contact details are available on my blog.

- BOGUMIL
arplan.org
 𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑𝔑 𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖𝔖:
ℑ𝔱𝔱𝔱𝔱 𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉𝔉, 𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇, 𝔞𝔞𝔞𝔞𝔞𝔞
𝔊𝔊𝔊𝔊𝔊𝔊𝔊𝔊𝔊𝔊
By Ing. Rudolf Jung,
Representative, Member of the Prague Chamber of Deputies

Maxim: “Only socialism in some form can be

of true value within Germany.”
Oswald Spengler
‘Prussianism and Socialism’

Second, fully revised edition

𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇 𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙𝔙, 𝔇𝔇𝔇𝔇. 𝔈𝔈. 𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅𝔅, 𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐

 2

Dedicated
to the courageous, the driven,
the selfless
 3

Contents
Foreword to the Second Edition.............................................................................................................. 5
Part One: Foundations of National Socialism.......................................................................................... 7
German Volk and Reich. ..................................................................................................................... 7
Changes in Land Law. ....................................................................................................................... 11
Social Economy in the Middle Ages. ................................................................................................. 15
Handicrafts and Urban Culture ..................................................................................................... 15
Municipal Policy (Urban Land and Taxation Questions) .............................................................. 18
Trade and Commerce (On Money and Interest)........................................................................... 19
The Transition to a Pure Monetary-Economy and to Factory-Production Enterprises. .................... 22
Materialism and Mammonism........................................................................................................... 26
The Jewish Spirit. The Jewish Pursuit of World Supremacy. ............................................................ 30
Democracy, International, and Collapse. .......................................................................................... 39
At the Gates to the Future. ................................................................................................................ 46
Part Two: Development and Documents of National Socialism ........................................................... 54
Introduction....................................................................................................................................... 54
The Development of National Socialism........................................................................................... 55
Documents of National Socialism. .................................................................................................... 58
Part Three: Goals of National Socialism ............................................................................................... 63
Introduction....................................................................................................................................... 63
Our Commitment to Folkdom. ......................................................................................................... 65
The Concept of Freedom and Defensive Readiness. ........................................................................ 69
The Concept of Renewal in National Socialism. ............................................................................... 75
Labor and Unearned Income. ........................................................................................................... 79
The Full Proceeds of Labor .......................................................................................................... 80
Ground-Rent and Appreciation ..................................................................................................... 81
Interest .......................................................................................................................................... 84
Economic Reform or Revolution?..................................................................................................... 89
Abolition of Unearned Income through Land Law Reform and Monetary-Reform, and through the
Socialization of Private Monopolies................................................................................................... 94
A. Land Law Reform and Monetary Reform ................................................................................ 94
B. Socialization of Private Monopolies ........................................................................................ 114
Cooperatives and Profit-sharing. Works Councils. .......................................................................... 118
Parliament or Councils? .................................................................................................................. 122
German Law. ................................................................................................................................... 127
The German People’s State. ............................................................................................................ 130
 4

The Tasks of Municipal Policy. ....................................................................................................... 134

Conclusion. ..................................................................................................................................... 137
Sources. ........................................................................................................................................... 139
National Socialist Books and Writings. ........................................................................................... 139
The National Socialist Movement. .................................................................................................. 140
Völkisch Trade-Union Movement................................................................................................... 140
TRANSLATOR’S NOTES ................................................................................................................ 141
APPENDICES .................................................................................................................................... 165
APPENDIX A: PROGRAMMES OF GERMAN NATIONAL SOCIALISM, 1903 – 1923 ....... 166
I. The Trautenau Programme (1903/04) ..................................................................................... 167
II. The Iglau Programme (1913) ................................................................................................. 170
III. The Vienna Programme (1918) ............................................................................................ 174
IV. The Brunner Memorandum (1918) ...................................................................................... 178
V. The Guidelines of the DAP (1919) ......................................................................................... 184
VI. The 25-Point Programme of the NSDAP (1920) .................................................................. 186
VII. The Salzburg Programme (1920) ......................................................................................... 190
VIII. The Guidelines of the DSP (1920) ..................................................................................... 192
IX. The Programme of Salvation (1921) ..................................................................................... 200
X. Goals of the German Working-Community (1921) ................................................................ 204
APPENDIX B: JUNG’S SOURCES AND WRITINGS ............................................................... 206
I. Sources..................................................................................................................................... 206
II. National Socialist Books and Writings.................................................................................... 206
 5

Foreword to the Second Edition.

More than two years ago, the first edition of this book was published under the title National
Socialism: Its Foundations and Goals. It owed its genesis to a desire to provide our movement
with an armamentarium similar to that which the Marxists possess and successfully employ. This
work was based on suggestions I received in a meeting, one which was meaningful to me for
several reasons. In this assembly – it was at Troppau – I spoke for the first time before a massed
audience about the goals and means of National Socialism, i.e., about that movement which
encompasses everything that can be called a German worldview.

There are plenty of movements dedicated to the implementation of specific innovations. Their
significance should by no means be diminished. And yet: National Socialism strives for more
than one or the other partial reform; it goes all out. Its goal is, purely and simply, the reform of
life itself; it fights against everything which arises out of foreign thinking, which binds our Volk in
the fetters of slavery.

Its slogan is: return to the German spirit, to the German essence! And because our Volk can only
recover and regain their strength – and therefore become free again – if they eradicate everything
foreign that proliferates within them, National Socialism therefore means Germany’s salvation,
because salvation can only come about from its own strength, from the German spirit, from
German will!

The first edition had various inherent shortcomings. These were understandable given the
adverse conditions under which it arose. Losing my position, expelled from the country, every
suitcase packed, I was deprived of the most essential resources. Most of it came from my own
mind, without any assistance. Nor was much time available to me, either. Even now my time is
still limited by politics, speaking, and organizing. So it happened that the work which was
commenced in Easter was not finished until the end of the year. With gratitude I recall the few,
yet for that all the more beautiful, days spent in magnificent Reihwiesen, which facilitated the
work tremendously.

Despite my delicate lack of time, the first section has been extensively reworked and the second
reshaped from the ground up. Consequently, I hope that I have fulfilled all expectations which
can reasonably be placed upon the work.

The format of individual, self-contained essays was carried over from the first edition. Although
it makes repetition inevitable, it also makes the book easier to read, and is suited for the book’s
primary task: providing the foundations for lectures.

The condition of our Volk is no more improved than when I wrote the first edition. In East and
West, in North and South, millions of Germans groan under the yoke of foreign domination,
and the bulk of our Volk sinks ever deeper into the quagmire under a cowardly leadership
animated by the Jewish spirit. The plebiscites in East and West Prussia, Schleswig, Upper Silesia,
Carinthia, Tyrol, and Salzburg must not hide these facts from us.1 But they are bright spots,
insofar as they demonstrate to us that our Volk are still healthy and are still pervaded with the
will to live.

Our confidence in the resurgence of our Volk is based upon this fact. We are ready with heart
and head and hand to help create the future works which should and will arise from the seething
 6

cauldron of the present! As a young movement we turn to the bustling, turbulent youth, who do
not deliberate in doubt and fear but who, with hope and faith, win because they dare!

Self-confidence, courage, drive, and also selflessness are our guiding stars! They were the pillars
of our Volk’s great past; they will also be the building blocks of our future. From their embrace
shall emerge,

our yearned-for goal,

our desired prize,
a free, social Pan-Germany!

Altstadt-Troppau, December 1921.

The Author.
 7

Part One:
Foundations of National Socialism
German Volk and Reich.
Charlemagne unified all the Germanic tribes in what is now France, Northern Italy, and Germany
into one state. Under his son Louis, however, this Reich had already begun to crumble, and it
was finally divided by his own sons Lothar, Louis, and Charles in the year 843 through the Treaty
of Verdun.

In addition to the bishoprics of Speyer, Worms, and Mainz, situated to the west of the Rhine,
Louis also received all the lands east of the Rhine.

This marked the beginning of our own German history, as well as that of France. The Carolingian
family had, however, exhausted its strength with Charlemagne. In 887 the last of his descendants
in the German lands was deposed. After an interlude a king was elected in the year 911, as had
formerly been customary among the Teutons. From this the Franconian Duke Conrad emerged
as king, who died 7 years later. Now selection fell upon the Saxon Duke he had recommended,
Henry, known as the Fowler or City-Founder.

It was only under him that the German Reich actually came into being, and the German Volk
along with it. This creation was subject to varied destinies. Henry’s son Otto I allowed himself to
be blinded by the Roman imperial dignity, and as a result the German Kingdom became the
“Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation.” This unnatural covenant with Rome was the first
link in an unending chain of trials and tribulations. German kingship should have become, like
that of the French or the English, a völkisch institution; this would have overcome the tribal
differences which were inherent within our Volk and so merged them into one. The un-German
imperial ideal, international in its essence, has however only brought evil upon us. It was the
cause of our fruitless pull towards Italy, which inhibited our natural drive towards the East and
thereby suppressed the nascent settlement activity occurring there. Courland, Livonia, Estonia,
Poland, and the Sudetenland would be German today if the rulers of the Saxon and Salian-
Franconian houses, and the splendid Hohenstaufen family, had remained German kings. Instead
they chased after an un-German imperial delusion, which ultimately only led, under the Salian
Henry IV (1056-1106), to the “Walk to Canossa” and the downfall of the German Reich of the
early Middle Ages.

The covenant with Rome soon became a struggle with and about Rome, a struggle which the
Hohenstaufens eventually lost. Their dynasty perished miserably. In the year 1256 the Roman-
German Kaiserreich was shattered. In 1273 it was restored through the election of Rudolph of
Habsburg. But under the Habsburg and Lützelburg (Luxembourg) rulers it was effectively only
a mere shadow of itself. These dynasties were seeking merely to establish the greatest possible
power bases for themselves, and the larger vassals imitated them in kind. In the Peace of
Westphalia (1648), which concluded the Thirty Years’ War, the ruling princes became truly
independent, and the disastrous Kleinstaaterei occurred.2 Until the year 1806, when Francis II
abdicated the German imperial dignity and assumed that of the Emperor of Austria, the Reich
led only a phantom existence. An Imperial Prince like the Prussian King Frederick II could, for
example, wage war against Maria Theresa, who ruled over the Habsburg hereditary lands, even
though her spouse was the German Emperor!
 8

The Saxon, Franconian, and Hohenstaufen rulers, although outstanding for the most part and
brilliantly gifted – yes, like the Saxons, Otto I (936-978) and Otto II (973-983); the Frank, Henry
III (1039-1056); and the Hohenstaufen, Henry VI (1190-1197) – lost their footing through their
thirst for world domination. They entirely misjudged their real task of creating a Reich in Central
Europe, comprised largely of Germans, which had to gather and to Germanize the scattered
West Slavic tribes. They neglected to do so, even with the help of the valiant German bishops
who would have been willing to establish a Christian-German church. These were their sins as
statesmen, which we their descendants must still suffer from today after centuries.

The second opportunity for state unity and for the consolidation of the Reich offered itself
centuries afterwards in the Reformation. It remained unutilized once again, and that is the
original sin of the Spanish-clerical Habsburgs. The only member of this dynasty who felt himself
a German and who desired to behave accordingly, at least within the range of his hereditary lands,
was Joseph II, who arrived too late and lived too briefly.

Since then ecclesiastical schism has been our misfortune, the eternal dichotomy between Roman
and Lutheran the deeper cause behind every inclination towards Kleinstaaterei, i.e., behind all
so-called particularism. We could never become completely German in the sense that the French
are French and the Czechs are Czech, because we have always been primarily either Catholic or
Protestant. Neither of the two is German in the depths of its heart. One, however, could never
even become so, inasmuch as it has always taken its orders from Rome. Rome, however, has
many offspring, and prefers to ignore its disobedient children for the sake of focusing on the
already well-behaved German. How the Pope campaigned for a negotiated peace – when we
were victorious; but when a shameful peace was imposed upon us he kept silent, and the German
Catholics did not draw any conclusions from this!

We have already demonstrated that the German Reich of the Middle Ages was in its essence a
supranational state. However, one should not in general compare it with the state of modernity.
The state at that time had only a few responsibilities; it was nothing but a loose association for
mutual defence. Everything else fell outside of its immediate sphere of duties. The economy, for
instance, was still very simple: initially its basis was purely that of agricultural commodity supply,
then, with the emergence of cities, barter. It was not until the later Middle Ages that economic
life in the modern sense flourished; trade and industry arose and enabled the cities to blossom
and to grow powerful; they became small states with their own jurisdictions, with their own
coinage, their own customs systems, and with their own armed forces rooted in mercenary
recruits and those citizens fit for military service.

In the early days of the German Reich, however, this was not at all the state of affairs, and it was
not so in the country even in the heyday of the cities. Rather the state was based primarily on the
feudal system, whose representatives were the nobles. In the rarest of cases these representatives
were in fact the folk-nobility,3 who had grown out of the free peasantry. The lower nobility of the
Middle Ages, on which the feudal system was based, were at any rate something else entirely.
They constituted their own warrior-caste, whose members often emerged out of the estate of the
unfree (the serfs). With their vassals they provided the armed forces, the “Heerbann.” At the
same time they were civil servants, to use a contemporary expression. They maintained, for
example, the judiciary in the name of the King. The knight, count, margrave, prince-elector, and
duke were state officials in peace and military officials in war. Their remuneration came through
being leased land and soil which the unfree peasants had to cultivate for them. They were thus
the beneficiaries of unearned income, the so-called “ground-rent,” but had a legal title for it: their
 9

services for the state, for the general public. They were not initially awarded the land as their
permanent possession, but as a “fiefdom”, i.e., as a loan.

The situation of the bonded peasants was not overly onerous at first. However, when the fiefs
became hereditary, contrary to their original purpose, the condition of the peasants went from
bad to worse. The inheritability of fiefs was the first step along the path towards today’s erroneous
land laws, the saleability of land the second. As we shall see later, this development constitutes
the deeper cause behind all social movements of the modern era, the first of which was the
Peasants’ War (1525).

The discovery of America ushered in the age of capitalism, characterized by the transition from
a needs- and barter-based economy to the monetary-economy. The landed nobility, with the
exception of the great landowners, became impoverished, but the citizens of the cities became
rich through trade. So began the rule of money and interest. The Fuggers and Welsers were the
equivalents of today’s Rothschilds – though with a number of significant differences, which we
probably need not discuss in greater detail.

The Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) – which arose out of religious conflict and the selfishness of
the ruling princes – made Germany a playground for every possible nation [Völker] and plunged
it into nameless misery. The Peace of Westphalia rendered it powerless. Whoever wanted to
tear a piece from Germania’s body could do so with impunity, and could certainly locate German
princes who would assist him. Thus did Louis XIV of France rob Alsace. The German imperial
territory of Lorraine was later traded by the Habsburgs to France in order for Maria Theresa to
help her husband, Franz Stefan. When Bismarck reclaimed Alsace and Lorraine in 1871 it was
not a conquest or “annexation,” as such a thing is called today; conversely, it probably did count
as such a thing when both territories (provinces) – as occurred at Versailles on 28th June 1919 –
were cold-bloodedly handed over to France without a referendum.

After the appalling catastrophe of the Thirty Years’ War a gradual resurgence of our Volk
occurred in the areas of economics, art, and science. The state, however, remained powerless.
Even the Napoleonic War did not bring it its long-awaited unification. That remained reserved
for Bismarck, and through him Prussia, which had gradually grown under the Great Elector and
his successors (especially Frederick the Great) into the second great German power alongside
that of the Habsburgs – and which in 1866 risked a necessary armed encounter with Austria,
then with France in 1870, and so founded the new German Reich, the profound fall of which
every nationally-conscious German presently mourns.

What every other nation was given generously, we were denied: the freedom to determine our
national affiliation. We have been treated like livestock; they dealt with us in 1919 the same
 10

way they did with our forefathers in 1648. We are intended to be the servant-nation of the
Earth! *

We will deal with Germany’s current and at the same time deepest fall and its causes in a separate
chapter. Let us once again briefly consider the primary features of our history: We have always
– apart from a brief period – been nationally divided and powerless, and further appear to remain
so, because we have eternally pursued internationalist delusions rather than face reality. This
internationalism also tore us apart ecclesiastically, something which did not occur with other
peoples. Further, today’s unsound land distribution has historical foundations and has already
made its impact. Finally, the overestimation of money also does not derive solely from today’s
conditions. These issues have been singled out because they will keep us occupied a few more
times. In particular, we now turn to land law.
 11

Changes in Land Law.

In the previous chapter we mentioned that the formerly free peasantry, who constituted the bulk
of the German Volk, had become unfree or held in bondage. Under the pressure of
circumstances they gradually gained the right of disposal over their possessions, and later also
over their own persons and over their kinsmen (serfdom). How did this come to pass? Originally
all land was common property. It belonged to the “Markgenossenschaft,” that is, to the village
settlement.4 Germanic law was explicitly a cooperative law. Only the house, family farm, and
garden were regarded as “fully or genuinely one’s own,” as “inheritance,” in other words, as hard-
earned. Even when farmland passed over into private ownership, the meadowland, pastures,
forests, and water all remained common property.

These conditions are still sporadically preserved today in certain regions of Germany, in the
“commons.” In addition to the small landowners, the yeomanry, who owned Hufe of 30 to 40
morgen (7½ to 10 ha.), 5 there were also already large landowners. These were the kinsmen of
those individual clans who had unfailingly distinguished themselves during the migrations of the
Germanic tribes and in battle with the Romans, who had provided the military leadership and
were viewed as aristocracy. They were called “Edelinge,” and made up the old Germanic folk-
nobility.6 Their property was too large for them to be able to cultivate it alone with just their kin
(family-members); that task instead went to prisoners-of-war, servants, and slaves.

Rights of citizenship were associated only with ownership of land and property. However,
ownership also imposed duties, particularly that of military service – the most prestigious duty,
but also the toughest. Conscription alone granted citizenship! Perpetual military service, however,
became too onerous for the peasant. He therefore renounced his freedom and placed himself
under the aegis of the largest landowners, becoming a serf. As a serf he performed no military
service, which was taken over by his master, who resided in the castle with his men, the horsemen,
squires, or servants. In return he assumed the responsibility of cultivating his master’s fields for
several days a week, of performing “corvée” or “labor service,” and moreover of paying over to
his master a tenth of the harvest from his own property, the tithe or “tenthpart”. Those subject
to compulsory servitude constituted the cooperative of the demesne and had their own court, the
Grundhold-court.7 The cooperative concept thus lived on undiminished even among the unfree.

The peasants’ serfdom, on the other hand, triggered the emergence of their own warrior-caste,
the knights, so-called because they performed their military service on horseback.8 This caste was
also comprised of those who had originally been unfree. It was supported by the farmers, so did
not live by its own labor, instead receiving “ground-rent.” The knights were the lowest nobility.
Alongside the counts, margraves, princes, and dukes, they represented the civil servants and
officer-class of the medieval state, the primary characteristic of which was vassalage. To a certain
extent the bonded peasant was the vassal of the knight, who in turn was vassal either directly to
the Kaiser (the Imperial Knights) or to the higher nobility. Essentially, the feudal system still
reflected the old Germanic outlook that land and property are not independently owned but
rather the property of the community, and that the individual is only to be enfeoffed them, i.e.,
to be loaned them. As such he is the recipient of ground-rent. In exchange, however, he is
responsible for providing services to the community, whether military protection or suchlike.
Besides the aristocracy, it was predominantly the Church which held property, such as
monasteries and dioceses. The peasants came under their protection, too, and preferred it to
that of the secular nobility. “You can live well under the crosier,” it was said at the time. Even the
richly endowed Church, however, by no means pocketed its ground-rent without providing
services in return. Monks cleared the forest, cultivated arts and science, held lessons; bishops
 12

and abbots were statesmen, or fought in battles as military commanders; yes, most preferred
swinging swords to reading mass. Some of these bishops were splendid characters, and were
invariably more loyal to the Reich and to the Kaiser himself than they were to the Pope and the
secular princes!

Until around 1400 the lot of the serfs was tolerable. As there was enough unutilized land they
could free themselves from any pressures which were too onerous. Whoever wanted to be free
could acquire a “King’s-Hufe” (160 to 180 morgen, i.e., 40 to 45ha.) by making woodland or
uncultivated land arable, or he could move to the steadily-emerging and rapidly-flourishing cities
(“Urban air makes one free”)9 or to the East, where the largest settlement effort of the German
Volk in the Middle Ages had begun.

The settlement of the eastern lands began with the expansion of Germandom across the Elbe
under the first two German kings, Henry and Otto I. Yet Otto II gave this up in order to chase
after the delusion of emperorship. Fortunately, the margraves Conrad of Wettin and Albert the
Bear, among others, were men of sterling quality who further expanded the borders of the
territories under their control. No assistance came from the German Kaisers, however, and so
the work which had begun would have perished if the Teutonic Order had not taken it up
themselves in the year 1230. Due to the lack of necessary assistance from the Reich they were
also regrettably unsuccessful in settling Courland and Livonia with peasants. Yet the eastward
expansion still accomplished a great deal; a large part of today’s Prussia is former Slavic land,
and on its soil the incontestably toughest, most capable, and most sober German tribe has grown
out of the mixture of different tribes through the harshest of struggles with nature and with sundry
enemies. (Of course, Berliners should not be viewed as their representatives any more than the
Viennese are representative of the Southern Germans. At least two thirds of the population of
the big cities consists of racial riffraff!)

With the heritability of the fiefs, the sealing off of the cities against further immigration from the
country, and the cessation of settlement in the eastern lands following the Battle of Tannenberg
(1410), in which the Teutonic Order was defeated by the Poles, the situation of the bonded
peasantry became unbearable. The nobility, no longer held in check by stronger powers, now
appropriated more and more rights for itself. That they had previously had no other burdens to
bear was justified by the fact that military service was the most difficult duty; with the dissolution
of the Teutonic Order and their replacement by mercenary forces (the “Landsknecht”), however,
their exemption from taxes and duties became a right to privilege, and therefore unjust. Ground-
rent, initially justifiable because it was tied to services, was now obtained illegitimately as unearned
income. Through marriage, endowment, and naked robbery, the property of the affluent, well-
to-do noble families and the Church increased immeasurably, while the small knight became a
beggar and a bandit, the peasant a servant in bondage. Today’s largest great estates (latifundia)
stem from such sources.

Towards the end of the Middle Ages radical upheavals occurred in all areas. Thus the invention
of gunpowder eliminated the knightly forces; the strengthening of the power of the princes
reduced imperial dignity to a mere illusion, and made the Reich into an impotent federation of
statelets [Kleinstaaten]. Around the year 1500 there probably numbered 1,786 of these, with all
possible constitutions and laws.10 No wonder that under such conditions Roman Law, which
invaded from Italy11 along with humanism, prevailed with relative ease. The ordinary man was all
but defenceless before the learned judge which it required; he did not understand the new
language (Latin) and the new ways, and jurisprudence had also become very costly. It thus
became simply a means of oppressing the poor, who sought for justice in vain. In his Table Talk
 13

Luther judged the circumstances of the legal system at that time as follows: “Is that what a jurist
is, he who with his haggling and evasion works to make the people so exhausted that they must
abandon the law? It would be no wonder if God were to destroy the world on account of the
villainous lawyers; those proud fools and pettifoggers ought to have their tongues torn out of their
throats! Thereby also ensuring that no poor man of the law might console himself.”

The commons had been stolen from the villages. This injustice was accompanied by the
introduction of one of the most oppressive privileges, the hunting rights of the lords; in 1494, for
example, a Lord von Eppstein had a peasant executed because he had “trapped crabs,” and
Duke Ulrich von Württemberg had the eyes of every poacher put out. These circumstances
practically forced a violent reaction. In 1493 the first peasants’ association was formed, the
“Bundschuh.” It was violently suppressed. In 1514 it was followed by the second, called “Poor
Conrad.” In 1525 – encouraged by the religious movement which had started at the same time
– the storm broke loose with the “Great Peasants’ War”. Weaned on war and incapable of
subordinating themselves to a structured leadership, the unruly peasant forces burned,
murdered, and looted. Their gifted leaders, the knights Florian Geyer and Wendelin Hipler,
who had converted to their just cause, were unable to keep them in check. So ultimately
everything turned against them, and the uprising was drowned in a sea of blood!

Indicative of the peasantry’s social situation were their demands, the most important of which
were as follows:

1. The abolition of serfdom;

2. The regulation of compulsory labor, tithes, and death duties. Judicial penalties and
fines should not be arbitrarily increased;
3. The freedom to hunt game and fowl, and fish in flowing water, insofar as these are not
then sold;
4. Woodland, meadows, and fields which used to be communal property should once
again belong to the community.

As one can see, these are perfectly modest proposals. The peasants would have gotten them
through, too, if they had acted sensibly; broad circles of the population were sympathetic towards
them. But they felt the same way that Marxist polemicists of the class struggle do today: Once
one has begun with radical slogans, then even more radical ones inevitably have to follow, and
these will soon become the decidedly more popular demands which the masses will rally behind.
The inevitable result of this is defeat. Then with the peasantry, today with the unconditional
laying down of arms before western capitalism which we have recently witnessed.

Serfdom was abolished in the Habsburg hereditary lands by Joseph II; in Prussia only in 1807;
and corvée labor was not eliminated until the middle of the 19th century, once Kudlich had
submitted his famous proposal to the Kremsier Reichstag. However, as this required laws to be
replaced, the peasants thereby only exchanged the aristocratic landowner for the Jewish
moneylender!

The old German land law had made indebtedness impossible to the extent that it exists today.
In contrast to today, it distinguished strictly between those works which were of human hands
and those which were gifts from the heavens. Moveable property, i.e., chattel property, was for
example considered everything “that burns like a torch,” which thus included the house (which
is today counted as immovable property). On 23rd July, 1759, the lay jurists of the Breidenbracher
Grund still maintained “that, in accordance with local land custom, stone and brick houses are
also considered moveable property.”12 These land rights guaranteed undiminished free access to
 14

nature at least up to around the year 1400, thus also guaranteeing the possibility of earning a
living relatively easily. Around 1300, for example, a day laborer in the Aachen region earned
daily the purchase price of two geese; in the Lower Rhine around 1480 he was able to purchase
each day 2¼ litres of rye, 2lb of veal, and a large pitcher of milk, in addition to free board, and
there was so much left over that in four weeks he could buy 1 pair of shoes, 6 cubits of canvas,
and a work jacket; in Saxony during the same period a day laborer earned 6-8 Groschen a week.
By comparison, a sheep cost 4 Groschen, a pair of shoes 2 Groschen.

In addition to the decline of the feudal system, Roman Law and the monetary-economy
produced today’s unhealthy distribution of land, that property-monopoly among several families
which soon became the source of so much misery. For example, in old Austria as of June 3,
1902, there were in total 2,856,348 properties with a combined area of 28,140,000ha. Of these,
2.3% were without fields and meadows, 48.9% were under 2ha., 27.3% possessed 2-5ha., and
12.2% were up to 10ha. Non-marketable property thus accounted for 90.7%. 6.7% had 10-20ha.,
2.2.% had 50-100ha., and 0.4% had over 100ha. at their disposal. Among these last-mentioned
were to be found the 721 (=0.0252%) largest estates (latifundia) of over 2000ha., with a collective
total of 3,734,000ha., i.e., 13.2% of the combined area overall. Although a significant part of
these properties consisted of forests, it is clear that these 721 large landowners displaced many
thousands of peasant clans.

The greatest of these latifundia were, among others: The Princes Liechtenstein, 247,000ha.; the
Princes Schwarzenberg, 232,000ha.; the Cieszyn Cameral Administration, 71,000ha.; the
Benedictine Order, 68,000ha.; the Counts Czernin, 62,000ha.; the Princes Colloredo-Mansfeld,
61,000ha.; the Princes and Counts Kinsky, 58,000ha.; Counts Thun-Hohenstein and Thun-
Salm, 54,000ha., etc.

These largest of the estates harmed the masses of our Volk both economically and physically,
for agricultural policy was adjusted to meet their demands. The Volk had to live more expensive
and poorer lives, because the estates wanted it so. They also cut off broad segments of the
population from access to the soil. Furthermore, the wages which they paid encouraged the rural
exodus, which resulted in a rush of people into the cities and, along with it, the miserable housing
situation and its accompanying symptoms: epidemic diseases; infant and child mortality; the
physical, mental, and moral decay of the broad masses of our Volk. As a result they harmed us
indirectly, in a racial [völkisch] sense. But they also did so directly, particularly in the
Sudetenland, where they were primarily situated; there they made any planned internal
settlement (i.e., the promotion of smallholdings) impossible, blocking the path to the soil for us
Germans, subsequently condemning us to the lot of the minority – and were thereby to blame
for our present misfortune. Moreover, it is well known that this spiritually and morally degenerate
caste was arm in arm with Slavdom politically. It is an irony of fate that it is now precisely those
Czechs whom they so supported who have been the first to go for their throats. Certainly, Czech
“land reform” is quite a strange beast. Its transparent objective is by no means the promotion of
internal settlement in and of itself, but instead the planned dismemberment and enforcement of
enclosed German settlement areas. We proponents of a reform in land law (land reform) have
nothing in common with this. It is unadulterated Hussitism,13 like everything in the Czech state.
A true internal settlement, which denotes no robbery of German vested rights, is only possible
here in this territory after the attainment of self-government. In German countries, however, the
return to German land rights marks the beginning of the resurgence of our Volk. This is the only
way for each family to possess their own home, and thus to have a share in the most beautiful
thing there is in their homeland. A Volk who live freely upon free land are unconquerable!
 15

Social Economy in the Middle Ages.

Handicrafts and Urban Culture
If we compare today’s times with the past, then a massive turnaround can be identified not only
in land law, but in many other areas. The comparison, let us admit upfront, does not reflect
favorably on the present era. Just as there was originally no private monopoly over land and
property, a monopoly over natural resources was also impossible. On the contrary, mining rights,
like the right to collect customs, the right to mint coinage, and the right to hold markets, were
afforded only to the King as the representative of the community. In the Sachsenspiegel it says:
“All wealth which is buried beneath the soil deeper than a plough goes belongs to the royal
power.”14 The extraction of mineral resources was awarded as feudal tenure. Since the right to
feudal tenure constituted only right-of-use rather than right-of-ownership, he who did not
properly maintain the enterprise lost all entitlement to it. Thus the mining law of the Bohemian
King Wenceslaus II (1283-1305) specifies:

Ҥ5. If, however, a number of mineworkers are not working their silver-mines РРРso
should our workers take them over themselves (confiscating them). It behoves us that no
one should leave their mine unworked and unused.”

Until the middle of the 15th century, the daily shift of the hewer and the smelter amounted to 6
hours, their weekly wage to 10 Groschen. There was no overtime. It was only later that working
hours rose to seven hours, gradually increasing to eight by the 16th century. It was understood,
however, that these hours were always inclusive of ingress and egress.

Handicrafts developed only in the cities; in the countryside each was his own artisan. Their
origins can be found in the economy of the demesne, where the division of labor first began.

The old Germanic concept of the cooperative lived on within urban artisanry. It found its
expression in the guilds, who occupied themselves not only with the purchase and sale of goods,
with the setting of prices and the like, but in intervening in the life of the individual. Only those
born in wedlock and of German origin, whose badge of honor was pure, could become a
member of a guild, i.e., be admitted to a trade. As it said in the Guild Law of the City of Libau,
1649:

“In the birth certificate (of the guild master), however, it should be attested to that the selfsame
possesses nothing but an honest, and not un-Germanic, German ancestry. – – He should also be
free of un-German bastard children or louche associates, or else be disengaged from his offices.”
– – Whoever wanted to be accepted as an apprentice also had to prove “all of his honest German
heritage.”

The guilds became virtually all-powerful; no Pope, no Kaiser had need to intrude into their
affairs. Apprentices were not accepted by an individual master craftsman, but by the guild; their
number was limited. A master who treated an apprentice so badly that he ran away was only then
allowed to raise a claim for a new one once the runaway’s apprenticeship was over.

Journeymen likewise had their own associations. Like the guilds, they had evolved out of the
Germanic ideal of the cooperative. The unemployed journeyman was supported, the sick cared
for, the itinerant in every city accepted by his guild and provided with work.
 16

The journeymen’s associations were also so powerful and so well-respected that they were able
to protect the honor and lifestyles of their members. In the year 1471, for example, Leipzig’s
shoemakers, feeling insulted by members of the university, issued a formal letter of feud which
began as follows: “We, the undersigned, make it known to all and sundry students of the
University of Leipzig, whichever kind they might be – doctorates, licentiates, masters or
baccalaureates, young or old, small or large – that we have become, and will remain, your
enemies.” They also initiated industrial actions, and not only on account of wages. The
journeyman-bakers of Colmar once began a decade-long strike in 1445 because they were denied
their usual place in the Corpus Christi procession. All over the Rhineland, journeyman-craftsmen
rallied for the bakers in their fight for their honor, and they ultimately emerged victorious.

On average people worked only four days a week. In addition to the numerous church holidays,
which permitted abundant leisure, there was also the “Blue Monday” (from the blue in Lent).15

Wages were high. Thus around 1550 in Lower Austria a journeyman-bricklayer or journeyman-
carpenter could purchase, out of his daily wages, 10 pounds of beef in the summer and 8 pounds
in winter. In Augsburg one could afford 5-6 pounds of meat, 1 measure of wine, 15 eggs, and 3
loaves of bread with his daily pay. In Meissen a bricklayer received 5 Groschen “bathing money”16
a week, while a bushel of grain only cost a little over 6 Groschen. Often a third or half the Pfennigs
would be worked for in place of the full wage, i.e., the journeyman would share earnings from
joint work with his master in a ratio of 1:2 or 1:1. Profit-sharing thus existed.

Diets were good. The “common folk” rarely had fewer than four dishes to a meal. The civil code
of the dukes Ernst and Albert of Saxony stipulated in regards to maximum wages:

“For a manual worker with board, 9 Groschen per week; without board, 16 Groschen.
Workers are to have only four dishes for their luncheon and supper: on meat days that
is soup, a dish of two meats, and a vegetable serving; on Fridays and any other days on
which meat is not eaten: soup, a dish of fresh and dried fish, and two servings of
vegetables. For those who have to fast, five dishes: soup, two kinds of fish, two vegetable
servings, and they receive 18 Groschen, while common workers (unskilled laborers) are
paid 14 Groschen per week. For those who are working for their own board, the foreman
should not be paid more than 27 Groschen and the common mason no more than 23
Groschen.”

Thus a full, bountiful meal cost, weekly – 9 Groschen!

The cities flourished not only through handicrafts, but also through trade. Trade arose wherever
an opportunity for markets – insofar as they didn’t already date back to the time of the Roman
settlements – presented itself. Merchants therefore enjoyed an exceptional position within the
law. They were able to call upon the so-called Guest Court,17 whose verdicts indeed only related
to debts and moveable property, and which were mostly passed on the same day on which a case
was raised, or within three days at the very latest. Merchants were also faced with staple duty, i.e.,
the obligation to halt transport of their wares and have them moved further by the local carrying
trade.18

All businesses in which goods were not available – i.e., any speculation and futures trading – were
prohibited!
 17

Prices for commodities were mostly fixed – without the maximum price inducing the
disappearance of goods – and their weight was double-checked. Highly exemplary punishments
were stipulated for swindlers and for forgers. Above all, each was sent to the pillory and had to
hawk his own wares there under a deluge of scorn and mockery, or – as happened with the
baker19 – he was “ducked”, i.e., placed inside a cage and submerged in a dirty pond. If a man
sold watered-down milk, as much of it was poured down his throat through a funnel as he could
endure without risk of death. If someone sold rotten eggs, he was placed in the stocks and pelted
with them, and so on and so forth.

Many women were also self-employed in commerce and the trades. The tax rolls of Frankfurt
am Main demonstrate this, for example:

Women were counted as self-employed and as workers in many different professions. In the
main they were involved in the weaving and tailoring trades, in baking, in furriery, in decorative
metalwork, in the bar trade, in shopkeeping, and in letting rooms. As workers one encountered
them partly in the workshop, and partly in home-based work [Heimarbeit]. They had to learn
their trade just as the men did. Women’s work had also arisen out of the old manorial system,
where they had been active in their own fields under their own master craftswomen.

Even the scientific professions were by no means closed to women in those days. Above all they
could be found in medicine. The Salerno College was home to a number of renowned female
doctors in the 11th and 12th centuries, and 15 could be found in Frankfurt am Main between 1389
- 1497.

Only with the decline of the guilds did resistance against female employment emerge, suppressing
it completely by the 18th century.

One thing should not be left unmentioned: personal hygiene. It is highly indicative of a peoples’
cultural level. The bathroom now played a major role in medieval life. The old Germanics had
always loved bathing – both cold and warm. Among the seven perfections of knightly education,
mention of it is made as follows: “The second which a perfect knight must love: he must know
how to swim and dive, how to turn from his belly to his back.”20

Journeymen received their own “bathing money,” what is today typically known as a “tip.” The
earlier closing times on Saturdays and before public holidays like the Blue Monday reserved time
for bathing. Bathhouses for schoolchildren were heated on Thursdays. In the 14th century, Basel
had 15 bathhouses, Vienna 29, etc. The poor generally had open-air pools at their disposal, for
which numerous endowments were established. If one considers that, when the German Reich
in 1905 was marching along at the peak of “culture and civilization,” there were 1,092 towns of
over 3,000 inhabitants without any public space for a warm bath, then one gets the right idea
about these dark and backward Middle Ages!
 18

Bathing only began to decline in the 16th century. The primary cause was that forests had been
wrested from local communities, causing timber prices to rise immeasurably. In this way the
bathroom became a luxury which only the rich could afford to indulge themselves in. Adding to
this was the fear of that venereal disease which was devastating Europe for the first time following
America’s discovery, and which the Germans called “French,” the French “Italian,” the Poles
“German,” the Russians “Polish,” and which the Turks named the “‘Christian disease.”21

If we now allow everything so far outlined to briefly pass through our minds for review once
more, then we can assess whether or not it seems appropriate to break out in jubilant hymns over
how wonderfully far we have come in our advanced modern times.

Municipal Policy (Urban Land and Taxation Questions)

An old regulation of the formerly German town of Kuttenberg, in Bohemia, sums up the social
attitude of the time in the following words: “Everyone must take pleasure in their work, and
nobody should appropriate through idleness what others have created with their diligence and
their labor.”

That this was the case was chiefly due to the settlement of the land question [Bodenfrage]. The
city, i.e., the community as a whole, was the master of the soil. The citizen was allotted land for
usage only, subject to payment of a modest land tax. The typical building site was on average 100
feet long and 50-60 feet wide, and was granted in “emphyteusis” (hereditary entail, Erbpacht).22
According to the Sachsenspiegel, construction height was restricted to three levels, hence building
into the air was prohibited. When a house was sold, the lending authority of the land enjoyed
the right of first refusal. Only home ownership conferred citizenship. The children of citizens
were not excluded from this. As urban land was limited, even ownership of part of a house was
sufficient; in Freiburg im Breisgau an eighth was enough.

The German citizen of the Middle Ages could rightly say of himself: “My home is my castle.”
Trespassing was punished severely. But even he who neglected his duties towards the community
out of his own general need faced a heavy penalty. In accordance with the provisions of Colmar
city law, his own house would be pulled down!

Every building site generally had to be built upon within a year, otherwise it was considered
forfeited (see the Salzburg town charter of 1287, among others). Thus land-usury was deprived
of its most effective means. Under many city charters, derelict houses were forfeited in the same
fashion as unutilized land; if they were not built up after a certain period of time, they became
city property without compensation. “One should not convert houses into gardens,” read the
1520 city charter of Freiburg im Breisgau. Nowadays, many houses are converted into gardens,
with the owners waiting for the most advantageous opportunity to sell them off as building sites.
In the year 1520 this would have cost them a 10 Pound fine, with their land expropriated without
compensation to become city property.

The German did not pay any poll tax; that was reserved for the half-frees23 and for the Jews. Aside
from duties for certain considerations (market protection,24 bridge construction, etc.), the only
tax he paid was his land tax. The maxim of H. George,25 the founder of land reform, that “the
single tax is the tax upon land values,” was thus a fact at that time. Furthermore, the German also
rendered his blood-tax; he was obligated to perform military service at any time.
 19

It was only when the abundance of precious metals began to accumulate more and more, and
the dreadful habit of stockpiling them set in, that taxation upon this most moveable of all goods
actually came into being. Household effects, clothing, bedding, provisions, domestic animals,
weapons, and work tools remained tax-free. Wherever assets were taxed, there also existed the
provision that they would be forfeited if their owner had made an underestimation of their value,
or that they could be taken over at the stated value at any time. As citizens became rich, however,
this excellent provision was admittedly debased through the institution of a lower value beyond
which self-assessment ceased, as happened in Frankfurt. Tax evasion by property-owners is
therefore quite old. Having said that, in most cities the good old law was preserved much longer,
as for example a legal judgement from Schwäbisch Hall demonstrated in 1662. The “Jewish
spirit,” by contrast, had swiftly settled in at Frankfurt am Main.

Building plots did not rise in price as a result of the growing accumulation of people within
limited space, even though it could be assumed that this would be the case with the cities being
encircled by walls. Instead, comprehensive expansions were carried out, such as in Strasbourg,
which was expanded four times from 1200-1440; Cologne was expanded in 1180 to such an
extent that it managed to get by with almost the same space until 1882. The total population in
Augsburg (1445) was 18,000; in Frankfurt am Maine (1387) 10,000; in Eger (1446) 7,300; in
Dresden (1474) 3,200. Only Ulm, Nuremburg, and Strasbourg had 20,000 or more residents in
the middle of the 15th century; Lübeck (1390) had 22,300.

What this small number of people created under the rule of a land law which did not turn them
into thralls of usury-capital is demonstrated by the architecture and artworks of that period! Land
reform, i.e., land law reform, fundamentally strives for a return to the original, sadly suppressed
land law. Only land reform allows housing reform and homesteads to be implemented on a
much larger scale; only land reform makes building cooperatives work successfully. Alongside
this, however, the regulation of the monetary system must also be undertaken.

Trade and Commerce (On Money and Interest)

Metal currency is an old institution. It mediated the exchange of goods as far back as Babylon,
Athens, Rome, Carthage, etc. It is virtually the only state institution which has survived unaltered
over untold centuries. As old as it is, its true nature has not yet been deeply illuminated. What
the Babylonians said about it is still being ruminated over by the supposedly infinitely wiser
peoples of the 20th century: “Toward gold throng all, to gold cling all, yes all!”26 Germanic legend
professed that gold is laden with a curse; murder and violent acts of all kind are bound to it;
streams of blood have flowed on its account across every age, from antiquity to the present day,
and yet – we have not illuminated its nature any more deeply than did our ancestors, and today
we are still as wise as we ever were.

Two things are interlinked with metal currency in such a way that they virtually constitute its
essence: the belief in its “intrinsic value” and the interest that it extorts. These will occupy us
shortly.

Canon law, which played an important role throughout the entire Middle Ages, prohibited the
charging of interest. Its principle was: “Money cannot beget money, and time belongs to God.”
This was based upon the “law of God.” Although the law of Moses did not allow the Jews to
charge interest from Jews, it permitted them by contrast to take it from foreigners (Exodus 22:25,
and Deuteronomy 23:19-20). On the other hand, Christ, who the Christians regard as a Jew and
who they allowed the Jews to crucify, said: “Lend, hoping for nothing in return.”27 In other words,
he outright forbade the charging of interest.
 20

The religious and secular power of the Middle Ages was based upon this. As far back as the First
Council of Nicaea, in 325 AD, all clergy were forbidden from taking interest, even though it was
permissible under state law. Pope Leo (440-461) went further and forbade it from the laity. The
Second Lateran Council (1139) instituted a general ban on interest. In spite of the threat of being
drummed out of the Church, however, it does not seem to have been very effective, as the Third
(1179) and Fourth (1215) Lateran Councils renewed and toughened the ban. In 1150 Pope
Eugene III declared in response to a query: “Whoever takes more than makes up the amount
of the sum lent involves himself in the sin of usury.”

Among the nobility, reference should be made to Charlemagne, who threw the weight of secular
power against interest in the Reichstags at Aachen (785) and Nijmegen (806).

In these early periods there was still an almost entirely natural economy;28 borrowers back then
were poor people, so lending was thus held to be an expression of Christian charity. The
Crusades brought about a complete transformation in circumstances and also in outlook. Trade
developed, and alongside the natural economy the monetary-economy appeared. With it arose
bonds for the purposes of production. Merchants borrowed money in order to be able to trade.
Here even the Church did not preclude the charging of interest, since it was actually a case of
profit-sharing rather than risk-free lending. Medieval trade yielded huge profits. One should not
forget, however, the dangers under which it developed. The merchant not only put his fortune,
merchandise, and vehicle – whether ship or wagon – on the line, but also his life. He was
threatened by wind and weather, by footpads, highwaymen, and pirates. Whoever did business
in those days had to be of hardier stock, and had to make up his will before every journey. Added
to this was the tremendous loss of time brought about by transportation along miserable roads
or by cockleshells at sea, not to mention the modest quantity of goods which could be transported
in a single trip. Large profits were justifiable here. A distinction was also made between risk-free
lending against fixed interest, which was branded as usury, and loans for profit-sharing, which
spoke for a higher stage of maturity of folk-economic knowledge. The participation of two
partners in a business was usually arranged in such a way that one advanced ⅔ of the necessary
money, while the other put forward ⅓ and invested his labor into the enterprise. They divided
the profits equally.

The social ostracism and persecution of the Jews in the Middle Ages were not the result of
religious differences, but were instead the product of their charging of interest, which brought
them into starkest opposition to the beliefs of the Christian Aryans. The idea that the ghetto
(Jewish quarter) made the Jews what they are today is one of the many good-natured foolishnesses
which Germans parrot about full- and half-Jews. It is as stupid as the completely unfounded
expression “vandalism” for describing destructive behavior (“Romanism” would be more
appropriate). We Germans are all too ready to foul our own nest, especially through fawning
over foreigners. No, the Vandal was a true German, who preserved works of art and did not
destroy them, who stole no paintings, unlike the lowly descendants of the proud Romans in 1919
– and the Jew is simply a Jew, i.e., a usurer, the same whether in antiquity, the Middle Ages, and
in modern times, both inside and outside of the ghetto!

How much interest the Jews charged can be seen from the following examples: Frederick the
Quarrelsome of Austria mandated a maximum interest rate of 173⅓% (!) in 1244. In 1255 the
Rhenish League of Cities attempted to push through a lower rate of interest, namely 43⅓% for
short-term loans and 33⅓% for yearly loans. A clarification was added that the “Christian usurer”
would be compelled through religious and secular punishments to reimburse his charged
interest, while Jews could exploit their interest monopoly excessively.
 21

The enormous rate of interest can only be explained by the fact that money was rare. The Jew
had it, always strived after possessions with it, and availed himself of both to the fullest. The
profits which he derived from it did not allow others any peace; the “Jewish spirit” was a
contaminant, and so alongside the Jewish usurer the Aryan usurer appeared, although at first
only sporadically. When in 1146 the monk Radulphe appealed in his Crusade sermon for a
persecution of the Jews because they charged interest, i.e., practised usury, Bernard of Clairvaux
confronted him with the evidence that there were Christians who were doing exactly the same
thing, if not worse.

The Jewish spirit, however, had become active not only within individuals, but also in entire
races. The descendants of the Romans in particular, the Italians, were among its leading
representatives. They took 66-125% interest for larger sums, and up to 270% for smaller ones;
they were thus the true cut-throats. Various monetary terms, such as ‘Lombard’,29 ‘discount’, and
the like, are of Italian origin.

All of the Church’s prohibitions on interest were fruitless; an easy profit was far too appealing.
The daring merchant of yore was increasingly displaced by the usurer. One would not be
mistaken in linking this phenomenon, which was particularly evident within Italy, with the
suppression of the thinly-sown Aryan-Germanic race!

Thus was the transition to modern capitalism auspiciously heralded at the denouement of the
Middle Ages: naked robbery of land on the one hand, as we saw earlier, and usurious interest on
the other. Truly a wonderful development, and even lovelier was the offspring which ultimately
sprang from the union of the two: the bastard child30 Mammonism!
 22

The Transition to a Pure Monetary-Economy and to Factory-

Production Enterprises.
Occurring simultaneously along with the transformations in land law were those transformations
taking place within the financial system. In the end, all the prohibitions on interest were unable
to eliminate the temptations which lay in risk-free and effortless money-making and which
facilitated the emergence of the monetary-economy. The great trading houses, particularly the
Fuggers, exerted all their influence in removing the barriers of the interest bans. So it came to
pass that in 1515 a Catholic theologian, Luther’s opponent Dr. Eck, declared for the first time in
a disputation at Bologna that an interest rate of 4-5% was permissible for Christianity.

Luther, conversely, rejected this position in his Open Letter to the Christian Nobility of the
German Nation (1520). The following passage, which is directed against the Fuggers and their
kind, is worthy of note:

“Doubtless we should also find a bit to place in the mouth of the Fuggers and similar
companies. How is it possible in the lifetime of one man to accumulate such great wealth,
worthy of a king, legally and according to God’s will? I am not skilled in accounts, but I
really cannot understand how a man with one hundred Gulden can make a profit of
twenty in one year, yes, or how one Gulden can make another – and all this not out of
tilling soil, or by raising cattle, where the increase of wealth depends not on the wit of
men, but on God’s blessing.”

By 1524, however, he already despaired of the possibility of maintaining the prohibition on

interest completely. He therefore counselled against the enactment of a governmental ban on the
charging and taking of interest, and advocated instead merely a reduction in interest rates.
Nevertheless, he continued to preach against usury, which he still understood to mean any form
of interest. He also allowed his pastors to do the same. In his tract: Admonition to the Pastors to
Preach Against Usury, it says:

“I am told that nowadays 10 Gulden, i.e., 30 per cent, are charged in any Leipzig market;
some add also the Neunburg market so that it comes to 40 per cent. I don’t know
whether it is even higher... Whoever in Leipzig now has 100 Florins, takes 40 in a year:
this means that he has eaten up a peasant or a burgher in a year. If he has 1,000 Florins,
then he takes 400 in a year: that is, he eats up a knight or a nobleman in a year. If he has
10,000, he takes 4,000: that is, he eats up a rich count in a year. If he has 100,000, as
must happen in the case of the great merchants, then he takes 40,000 in a year: that is,
he eats up a great, rich prince in a year. If he has 1,000,000, then he takes 400,000 in a
year: that is, he eats up some great king in a year. And he suffers not any danger in so
doing, neither to his body nor to his treasure; he labors not, sits instead by the fire and
roasts apples. Thus a chair-brigand31 may sit at home and eat up an entire world in 10
years.”

These remarks are also instructive for the reason that they grant us an insight into the financial
circumstances of that time. As can be seen from them, money was still uncommon.

Zwingli also rejected interest. But Calvin, the French Reformer, approved of it. It is therefore no
coincidence that his adherents were the most ruthless pacesetters of capitalism, which was now
descending like a flash flood! The last dam, already damaged, burst open; the new era had begun.
The invention of gunpowder did away with the knightly armies and also, along with them, the
 23

feudal system; the invention of the art of printing, but even moreso that of the compass, brought
about further radical changes. In 1498 the sea route to India was discovered. The landing of the
returning ships in Lisbon caused the price of Indian spices in Venice to drop by half! The
importation of indigo led to the impoverishment of the woad farmers and of the cities of Erfurt,
Gotha, Arnstadt, Tennstedt, and Langensalza, which had become rich through woad – previously
the only blue dye available.

The discovery of America by Columbus (1492) did not allow adventurers from all over the world
any rest. The wealth of gold in the new continent beckoned with irresistible power. Cortez and
Pizarro ravaged its south with fire and sword in the name of a profaned Christendom. The
empires of the Aztecs and the Incans were destroyed, their populations brutally slaughtered, their
golden treasures hauled away. For a time Spain became the most powerful empire, until it
aroused the envy of England, which in the meantime had been consolidated internally. Thus the
great whirlwind dance around the golden calf began! Modern capitalism was born. Its history is
written in blood! Everything old, as solid as it might have seemed, began to waver! Even the
papacy, previously so immutable over the course of history, saw its star fading: in Spain and
France its power was limited by that of the royalty, while in England its power was completely
abolished. Only in Germany, which offered – as usual – a picture of disunity, did it find a foothold
thanks to the Habsburg emperors. The unfortunate consequence was the Thirty Years’ War!

In previous sections we encountered astonishingly low prices for foodstuffs and commodities.
The reason for this was to be found in the shortage of money. In the Middle Ages only silver was
considered for coinage, but the wealth of silver was scarce. Now an unprecedented abundance
of precious metals, and gleaming gold into the bargain, was poured over Europe. The result of
this was – an increase in prices! As our source, we cite Luther once again. In his Admonition to
Pray Against the Turks (1541), he concurrently justifies – practical as always – the pastors’
demands for an increase in their yearly salary from 30 to 90 or even to 100 Gulden as follows:
“Nobody thinks that whoever receives 30 Gulden cannot now receive 100 Gulden. Why?
Previously a bushel of grain accounted for two or three Groschen, fifteen eggs for three Pfennigs,
and so forth in all respects: now for grain one must pay 9, 10, 11, 12 Groschen; for fifteen eggs,
18 Pfennigs.” Everything became substantially more expensive, and the price of property also
rose. In 1574, for example, Baudin observed – over a span of 70 years – a sixfold increase in
France.

In Germany the principal representatives of the new, great power – money – were the Fuggers in
Augsburg. They had immigrated there as craftsmen in 1400. By 1500 they operated, alongside
their commercial silver mines in Tyrol, mercury mines in Spain and copper mines in Hungary.
The Spanish Habsburg Charles put forward 4 million Gulden of his own out of the 6½ million
which he needed to bribe the electors in order to become the German Kaiser Charles V. Before
the election he had to pledge – an irony of world history32 – to abolish all commercial monopolies,
a promise he could never honor owing to his obvious dependence upon the money-lords, as per
the example above. This demand had its origin in the extreme bitterness against the trading
houses which had sprung up everywhere. Indeed, the average annual profit of the Fuggers in the
1511-1517 period was 54½ per cent. The other trading houses were exactly the same. For
example, an employee of the Höchstetters who had put 900 Gulden into the business demanded
after 6 years to be paid out 33,000 Gulden profit, and ended up being awarded 30,000 in court!

Growing wealth made the great merchants addicted to aristocracy. They acquired country estates
and abandoned the cities, taking their riches with them. The result was the cities’
impoverishment, and with it the spread of narrow-mindedness and pettiness among city
 24

administrations and their main pillars, the guilds. They began to resist advancements; inventions
by individual master craftsmen could not be exploited in order to avoid disadvantaging others.
The natural consequence of this was that the German trades – previously the pride of the cities,
the basis and source of their prosperity – declined and fell behind in comparison with foreign
countries. A further consequence was that most journeymen now closed themselves off to the
possibility of ever being able to become independent.

Thus, the new estate of wage-laborers [Lohnarbeiter] arose along with modern capitalism. Urban
journeymen constituted one group of this estate; the other was represented by the uprooted
peasantry who had been displaced from their plots, whose property the lords had appropriated
by virtue of their power and through Roman Law!

The economic outcome from all of these upheavals was the transformation of the city economy
into the state and national economy. In Spain, France, and England, centralized völkisch states
emerged. Germany was not as successful in distancing itself from the causes already identified in
the previous paragraphs; only territorial principalities developed here. Its foundation constituted
actual power. Only those who could tip the scale of the means of power – then as now – were
able to impose their will, to assert their real or supposed right. The military provided this means
of power. With the emergence of mercenary armies, warfare became expensive and war a
capitalist enterprise, which Wallenstein especially knew how to bring to a higher level. If ever,
the remark “War begets economy, economy war”33 applies here, because “No penny, no
paternoster”34 – no gold, no soldiers; no soldiers, no power!

Even after the Thirty Years’ War and the transition to slightly cheaper standing armies – in which
native subjects took the place of expensive foreign-born soldiers – the armed forces still remained
the center of all state power. They were of the greatest concern, attracted the lion’s share of state
revenue, and were the focus of all economic and population policies, because gaining power
meant possession of wealth in both people and property!

The work of the period’s constitutional law professors and economists was primarily directed
towards this objective. Of chief concern was the increase of the population, particularly after the
Thirty Years’ War. Thus, among other things, the Franconian district assembly in Nuremberg in
1650 decided that, “every male person be allowed to wed two wives.” Taxes upon confirmed
bachelors and single ladies35 sought to curtail celibacy, immigration was promoted as much as
possible, and so on. Prussia in particular was exemplary in this respect. It welcomed the
Protestants expelled from France and Salzburg, and by 1740 had achieved through internal
settlement alone an expansion of its population by around 600,000 people.

The acquisition of wealth was the second objective of this period, known as the mercantilist era.
Even the pseudoscience of gold-making, alchemy, was in use. It even yielded gold, albeit in a
different manner than one might suspect. For example, porcelain was invented by a gold-maker.
Seafaring and commerce were also fostered to the greatest extent possible by the state.

The utmost care, however, was devoted to the production of goods. This took place within
“manufactories”, i.e., large-scale artisanal enterprises. These were the forerunners of the
factories, although missing their essential, distinguishing feature – machines. Goods were
supposed to be produced inexpensively, for which cheap raw materials and low wages were
required. Child labor was therefore favored. Frederick the Great forced the pupils of the
orphanage into the service of the silk industry, even though this led to their lessons being
neglected and to a fivefold increase in their mortality rate.36 In Austria, the economist Sonnenfels
 25

proposed with all seriousness “to bring the orphanages into some kind of association with the
workhouses and the manufactory-houses.” Manufacturers were hailed as benefactors because
they managed the “heightened idleness which prevails among children to the point of annoyance,
by guiding them towards useful work.” What came of this is demonstrated in one of Joseph II’s
edicts to the governor of Lower Austria, which said: “While visiting Grünmühle, I discovered
there endless infirmities in the hygiene of the children, who were full of scabies...”

If wages had been high in the Middle Ages, now the opposite became the case. The Reichstags-
Abschied of 1731 imposed severe penalties upon work stoppages;37 in cases of “extreme
recalcitrance,” even the death penalty was threatened. All the freedoms which the journeymen
had won for themselves in the Middle Ages, such as the “Blue Monday,” disappeared. Whoever
shirked from his labor on a working day was punished with 3 days in prison on bread and water
for his first offence, then 14 days for his second. The wages of domestic servants were kept low
by the state; employers who paid more risked a fine of 50 Thaler for each they paid in excess,
and 100 Thaler for each in the event of a repeat offence. The export of raw materials and the
import of finished goods were prohibited. In order to increase the export of goods, smuggling
was encouraged, practically even organized. The measures taken often extended into personal
life. In England, for example, corpses had to be swathed in woollen sheets in order to support
the textile industry; in Prussia, the mourning regulations [Trauerordnung] of 1716 forbade long
mourning times because sales of colored textiles suffered as a result; Frederick Wilhelm I
prohibited Wendish Spreewalders from entering the city of Berlin in clogs in order to support
the shoe-making trade, etc.

The army contributed the most to the transformation of the artisanal small business into a large-
scale enterprise. For example, Prussia under Frederick Wilhelm I had 80,000 soldiers. These
needed 80,000kg of bread a day alone; due to the need for regular delivery, the grain for that
could only be acquired from certain agricultural holdings. The introduction of uniforms and of
consistent weaponry in turn promoted large-scale handicrafts enterprises; the army alone now
needed 200,000 cubits of cloth of the same kind and color each year. It proved once again the
veracity of the words, “War begets economy,” because by the time of Frederick the Great’s death,
the small, poor country of Prussia already counted 165,000 wage-laborers in the linen, wool, silk,
cotton, leather, and metal industries, who were responsible for producing 30 million goods per
year.

What the manufactory started, the factory ended. It is peculiar to that distinctive form of mass
production which was only made possible by mechanical operation. It constitutes the most
tremendous revolution in the field of human labor, not only in size and scope, but – and this is
most important – in essence. Work became soulless, man a machine. The journeyman of the
Middle Ages had grown intellectually and spiritually with his work; it was his creation, a piece of
himself. The modern industrial worker no longer knows the joy of the creator. The machine
virtually thinks on his behalf; he does not even have an opportunity to truly complete a piece of
work. How many hands does it pass through, how many machines does it rush through, until it
is actually finished? Of all the things which afflicts the factory worker, it seems to us the cruellest
that the machine robs him of the joy of creation, that it moulds his creative work into soulless
activity, into working for wages. Herein lies the tragedy in his life, which makes him, even more
than the insecurity of his existence, into the disinherited, the uprooted, into the proletarian
cheated of his human happiness!
 26

Materialism and Mammonism.

The manufactory began the revolutionization of the artisanal economic system; the factory ended
it. Its hallmark is the machine. The spinning-machine was invented in 1764. So long as it was
powered by human labor, it worked with 18 spindles. But ever since steam or electricity became
the driving force, the number of spindles on a machine has risen to over 200. In 1832 there were
scarcely 12 million spindles in all of Europe’s cotton mills; by the beginning of 1913 there were
142 million. In 1800 the world production of pig iron amounted to... 825kg; in 1910... 67,000
million kg. By 1911, the pig iron production of the former Austria-Hungary had increased to
virtually the same amount yielded by the entire world in 1840. In the German Reich in 1913 it
had risen to more than 19 million tonnes, and became one of the reasons behind the awakening
of England’s jealousy. The first coke blast furnace was built in 1826; in 1863 there were 155, only
44 in 1911; but the performance of such had increased thirty times. Coal extraction has also
skyrocketed. In 1854 the output volume in Austria was 1.6 million tonnes; by 1912 it was 42
million. In the German Reich the year before it had made up 234.5 million tonnes, of which two
fifths were attributable to the Rhine-Westphalia region alone. Peoples’ funding shares were
doubled.

This thoroughly frenzied advancement brought about the steam engine on a large, even
Herculean scale. It was the real revolutionist. It was invented in 1785; by 1845, steam engines
with 1.6 horsepower were in use throughout the world, producing 55.6 million horsepower total
already by 1895. In more recent years, piston steam engines have been replaced by steam
turbines, the largest of which yield 20-30,000 horsepower. The daily consumption of such a
monster amounts to 32 railway carriages full of coal.

Parallel with the development of industry, the development of traffic also increased. One was the
trigger for the other. In 1825 the first railway was built in German lands; in 1837 the first line was
opened in Austria (Vienna to Wagram). In 1830 the length of the entire railway network on Earth
amounted to – 332km; conversely, by 1910 it was 1,030,014km, i.e., twice the distance of the
moon from the Earth! In 1818 the first steamship crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a 26-day journey;
in 1913 one needed only 62 days to travel around the entire Earth! The World Postal Union was
established in 1874. In that same year in Austria, 103 pieces of mail were transported; in 1911,
by contrast, 2,318 million were. In the German Reich, postal traffic in the same year amounted
to 5,994 million pieces.

Telephones and teleprinters (telegraph), motor vehicles and aircraft, the growth from medium-
sized towns to large cities, from large cities to cosmopolitan metropolises – these complete the
picture that our species is so proud of, that it hails as our crowning achievement, indeed as the
“culture” of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Is this really culture, or is this in actual fact merely a corruption of the concept? Culture, in the
German ethos, encompasses creations in every area of our underlying intellectual, artistic, and
particularly moral-religious life; folk-culture means that all folk-comrades38 recognize and
encourage the creative works of individuals in these fields. However, we are seriously far removed
from this state of affairs. Operettas, moving-picture dramas, and the shallow tabloid press are by
no means culture, in spite of all the praise; the newspaper industry, and even technological
achievements, are not culture either. At most one can call them civilization, i.e., custom. They
are inherently multi-ethnic [allvölkisch], international; morality however is völkisch, national!
Each Volk still has to create its own; the mishmash of humanity39 can accomplish nothing. Our
forefathers had culture; it greets us from the Gothic cathedrals, from the works of Goethe and
 27

Schiller, from the music of our masters, Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner. Culture is bound to races
[Völker], not to a passage of time!

Let us therefore be wary of speaking of mankind’s cultural progress, and let us not be under the
illusion that eating well and expensively, driving in a motor vehicle, and having a fine apartment
and a box at the theatre constitute culture. One can see in them only the most vapid materialism,
i.e., the glorification of the crassly sensuous.

The beginning of the Machine Age was still witness to the tirelessly active individual entrepreneur,
who – highly gifted and inspired by an unquenchable creative drive – dedicated all of his strength
to his profession, with his purpose in life being not so much the pursuit of profit as creative
production. These were the Krupps, the Schichaus, etc., who, out of humble and difficult
beginnings, steadfastly and courageously created their life’s work. These were people of the same
calibre as the Germanic seafarers of ancient times, the Vikings. They shaped, as it were, the
Germanic era of modern capitalism. Its founders were men who worked their way up entirely
through their own power. Even though they may have often been ruthless, even though they may
have spared other workforces as little as they did their own, they still managed to win our respect.

But, little by little, the picture changed. In place of the individual entrepreneur there appeared
the “jointly-owned enterprise” in the form of the share company. The individual member was
no longer the one making decisions, but instead the corporate equity, the stock. Their quantity
tipped the scales; whoever owned the most, made the decisions. It is true that, in Austria in 1902,
96.5% of all commercial enterprises were still sole proprietorships; but 28% of all employees
were already employed in the share companies. By 1911 there were 736 companies with a share
capital of almost 4 billion, and average net earnings of 10.5%. In the German Reich in 1910 there
were 6,524 companies with nigh on 10 billion in share capital. Almost half of all wage-earners
were in their employ.

The continued existence of individual business ventures, be they jointly-owned or sole

proprietorships, is contingent upon competition, i.e., mutual struggle. Even though this keeps
prices low, it does not permit the desired large profits. Pronounced exploitation is only made
possible through “monopolies,” i.e., of those things which are not available in endless quantities,
such as mineral resources. In order to eliminate competition, companies in one sector of the
economy unite together to form “cartels,” i.e., a number of individual businesses which are
bound together through contracts. Such associations do not constitute a disadvantage for
customers so long as they are only concerned with the standardization of types of merchandise,
because standardization means a reduction in prices. Agreements on prices are not innately
dangerous, either, because they generally do not last very long. The cartel becomes dangerous
when it fixes the amount which the individual enterprise is permitted to produce, when individual
companies are shut down altogether and prices are kept high by artificially restricting supply. The
elimination of competition means the artificial creation of a monopoly where such does not
naturally appear to exist. For this reason, all outsiders are fiercely opposed. How harmful such
associations can be was demonstrated by the Austrian alcohol cartel. Before its founding in May
1911, a hectolitre of spirits cost 144 Kronen; on 1st September it cost 161.75 Kronen, and by 1st
December it had already reached 176.50 Kronen. That signified an increase of 22.6% within six
months. The excess profit in this case amounted to 22.5 million Kronen per year! Alongside this,
our particular attention is drawn to an “inter-state” cartel of arms factories. It made sure that no
state was armed any worse than the others.
 28

Within the cartel, the individual entrepreneur is somewhat hampered in his movements, but he
is still fairly independent. He loses his independence completely, however, if the cartel becomes
a “trust” (in German a “Treuhandverband”),40 i.e., a single gigantic company. The homeland of
these establishments is, of course, America! With them prices are not only fixed, no longer
determined by the volume of products, but the purchase of raw materials and the distribution of
finished goods are also carefully regulated, the division of labor is realized down to the smallest
detail, and all companies which fall behind are summarily closed down.

Two such organizations in particular have attracted public attention. One of these, the petroleum
trust under Rockefeller, controlled 63 American companies before the outbreak of the Great
War, along with numerous others from other countries. It owned its own railways, ships, and
petroleum trucks (Vac. Oil Comp.)41 in every country, and produced all the barrels, cans, pumps,
etc. itself. Virtually the entire world was under its influence – was, so to speak, a colony of the
“Petroleum-King” Rockefeller, who as absolute master controlled enterprises which had an
estimated value of around 25 billion Kronen before the War. Greater even than the petroleum
trust, however, was the steel trust. Its king and god was named Morgan. It was the largest
controlling company in the world. When it was founded, its share capital amounted to 5.5 billion
Kronen, and its net profit in the first ten years reached – the same amount! In 1912 it employed
221,000 workers in its countless companies.

To cite another example, 93 American money-lords control over 75% of railway track, over 81%
of proceeds, and over 82% of all railway ownership in the United States. It is more or less the
same in other fields as it is in railways, petroleum, and steel. The formation of trusts is nowhere
else so completely realizable, of course, as it is with petroleum and steel – evidence for the validity
of our observation that private monopolies (and trusts count as such) are only possible in the
long run when they deal with the extraction and immediate processing of natural resources.
Outside of this area, only the transportation system allows for a permanent monopolization.

Incidentally, the conditions described here are relevant in terms of clarifying the rationale which
induced America to enter the War, even if the deception of the infamous “14 Points” has already
been exposed in the meantime. The reason for its entry was neither the escalation of submarine
warfare, nor the torpedoing of the Lusitania, and least of all was it the heartfelt desire to rescue
human civilization from the so-called barbarism of Prussian militarism. The Hebrew rabble
could only convince good-natured Michel42 of that one, and he believed it, in his infinite stupidity!
The true and only motive was the fervent cry of the American billionaire’s soul for control of at
least a part, if not the entirety, of the European market.

In other countries, too, businesses were drawing increasingly closer to the ideal of the American
trust in many areas. Such was the case, for example, in the Austrian iron cartel, with the Alpine
Mining Society and the Prague Iron Industry Company as the dominant undertakings. The
production of matches was controlled by two companies, and so on.

The progression from sole proprietorship to share company, from share company to cartel, and
finally from cartel to trust, is set in motion and encouraged by the “banks.” Originally currency
exchange offices, they have risen to their current, formidable position in economic life through
appropriation of the savings business. They dominate literally everything nowadays. Whether
foodstuffs, clothing, household items, the trades, commerce, or agriculture, the bank is behind
them all, everywhere. It converts the individual enterprise into the share company, turns the
company into the cartel, forms enterprises into trusts; it actually stipulates for us whether we can
 29

feed ourselves, how we may dress, whether our room is hot or cold. It is the Supreme God before
which everything bows, it dethrones princes, it sustains and destroys states!

There is no exaggeration in these words. Austria was by no means at the forefront of economic
development. Nonetheless, the eight largest Viennese banks in 1909 directly controlled 147
commercial enterprises, and by 1912 they already controlled 257. In 1912 the General
Commercial Bank was involved in 15 enterprises, the Anglo-Austrian Bank in 54, the Vienna
Bank Association in 54, the Land Credit Association in 21, the Credit Institution in 55, the State
Bank in 30, and finally the Lower Austrian Discount Company and the Union Bank in 9 each.

This small selection should be sufficient. One finds the most diverse kinds of business jumbled
together, all higgledy-piggledy. Commercial progress is of course secondary, all that matters is
profit!

During the war the banks threw themselves into business with state-controlled manufacturing.
The “central office”43 turned over the hunting-dogs to them. A comparison of net profits
demonstrates how profitable this was. As an example, the eight banks mentioned:44

A full 62 million increase in five years is not bad! And how have things turned out in the
meantime? We are in the middle of an economic collapse, one no longer confined solely to
Central Europe but to Europe overall. Victors and vanquished will presently be able to join
hands, because the difference between them is only in degrees, not in essence, and is increasingly
becoming blurred. Stagnation in sales, restrictions in production – these are the hallmarks of the
era. Yet new bank branches are appearing on every street corner, proof that loan-capital is not
doing too badly. And why is that? Because the vulture feels most comfortable upon a field of
corpses.

Thus we see Mammonism at work. Its mission is the subjugation of productive circles under the
all-pervading power of money, and the shallow materialism of our age serves as its breeding-
ground – but its driving force is the Jewish spirit!
 30

The Jewish Spirit.

The Jewish Pursuit of World Supremacy.
“Remain a stranger (!) in this country and I will be with you and bless you, since
to you and your offspring I will give all these lands.” (Genesis, 26:3)45
“You shall consume every nation.” (Deuteronomy, 7:16)
“Foreigners shall build up your walls, and their kings shall serve you... and your
gates shall always stand open, day and night, so that nations may bring to you
their wealth and usher in their kings.” (Isaiah, 60:10-12)
“You shall suck the milk of nations, and the breasts of kings shall nurse you.”
(Isaiah, 60:16)

Sensitive readers will find the eye-catching title we have given this particular chapter disturbing.
When one stirs up such delicate subjects, one becomes suspect all too easily of a lack of
objectivity. Well, we do not wish to shy away from the topic, although we have deliberately let
the Jews speak only for themselves. That is why our reflections are prefaced by the outstanding
testimonials listed above. They are undoubtedly irreproachable, as they originate from the Old
Testament, which is highly regarded both by Christians and by Jews.

“You shall consume every nation...” and “Remain a stranger in this country”; truly, no Volk could
more clearly brand itself so pronounced a parasite and usurer as the Jewish Volk do with this
self-characterization.

There have always been simpletons, and thanks to the Jewish influence over the masses via
money, the press, the arts, and science, there are nowadays more simpletons than ever who
believe that the poor Jews were just as honest and hard-working in antiquity as all other races. It
was only due to the fact that the villainous Christians in the grim Middle Ages persecuted them
out of religious hatred and shut them up within Jewish districts that Jewry turned to usury,
nurturing within themselves that understandable hatred of the oppressed against its tormentors
which soon began to flare out into the open. All that was required was to make the Jew into an
equal fellow citizen and he would undergo a radical change, transforming himself through a kind
of metempsychosis back into a docile little lamb, exactly like – the Aryan sheep! Based on this
reasoning, the so-called Jewish emancipation – i.e., the political-legal equality of the Jews – was
carried out in the 19th century. Only a few dared oppose it, such as Otto von Bismarck in the
Prussian Landtag (1847) and Moritz von Mohl in the National Assembly at Frankfurt.46 The
minutes of these proceedings record turbulent interruptions and shouts throughout the speeches
of both representatives as they struck out along their own independent path!

Only someone who is devoid of all historical knowledge could babble such nonsense about the
Jewish lamb, about how he was only made into a ravening wolf by the wicked Christian Aryan.
His own prophecy, not to mention his entire history, are argument enough against this fairytale.
The Jewish Volk emerged gradually, through the crossbreeding of thoroughly diverse racial
elements combined with extensive inbreeding (see Chamberlain, Foundations of the 19th
Century, vol. 1); Semites and non-Semites surrendered their seed and passed down their worst
qualities. The ancestors of today’s Jews already fell upon foreign lands as locusts do upon the
harvest which they themselves have not sown. “I brought you into a fruitful land to enjoy its fruits
and its bounty,” (Jeremiah 2:7)... “You devour the fat, clothe yourselves with the wool, and
slaughter the fattened sheep, but you do not care to tend the flock,” (Ezekiel 34:3). This is
precisely what is characteristic about the Jew: The sheep always needed others to take care of
him, and he always found good-natured people who would do this work – including the agrarian
 31

people of the Israelites, whose name he ultimately borrowed for himself without at the same time
embracing their outlook upon life. This union with the Israelites, in which Israel was the dupe,
finds its Biblical expression in the eternally relevant story of Esau and Jacob. It states:

“Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples shall be separated from your body.” ...
“The first to be born was reddish-blonde, and they called him Esau. Then the second
came out, hanging onto the heel (!) of the former. Hence, they called him Jacob (i.e., ‘the
sly one’, ‘the rogue’).47 And now that the boys were both grown, Esau became a hunter
and a tiller of the soil, but Jacob was a plain man who dwelt in the tents of the people.”
(Genesis, 25:23; 25:25-27)

The first of the biblical passages cited above suggests that these are not brothers in the usual sense
of the word, but that they are in fact two separate peoples [Völker]; that they are fundamentally
different is corroborated by the second passage. Esau later informs us with bitter words what the
name ‘Jacob’ means: “He is rightly named Jacob, for he has now cheated me twice. He took my
birthright from me, and now he has also taken my blessing.” (Genesis, 27:36). In light of the
preceding, we have to appreciate that the robbery of the birthright and blessing is in actuality the
robbery of the country and its fruits. The plain man who dwelt in the tents of the people, dressed
himself in wool, and ate what was fatted, but did not want to take care of the sheep – Jacob, this
arch-rogue, set himself an eternal monument within the Bible, quite against his own intentions.
And so the Bible, this book of books, is truly a holy book even for the Gentile, because it shows
everyone who has eyes to see where the enemy of honest labor, the clear beneficiary of the
painstaking work of others, is to be found.

From the beginning of its history to the present day, Jewry has always followed the principle:
“Foreigners will build your walls and tend to your flock,” and it has always remained a foreigner
within any country which so hospitably opens its borders to it, which invites it in to participate in
its institutions. Once it has appropriated enough of a people’s wealth and made itself so
unpopular through its behavior that it has to depart from a country either voluntarily or under
compulsion, it does not do so without first taking along as much foreign property as is possible.
Such was the case in Egypt, among other places. “So Joseph bought all of Egypt... and made the
people into bondservants... and gave law unto the Land of Goshen, and they controlled it, and
grew and multiplied greatly.” (Genesis, 47:13-27).

The Egyptians, in their simple-heartedness, fancied that they could somehow compel the
uninvited guests to perform honest labor: “And so they set taskmasters over them, and forced
them to do honest (!) work, for they had to help with the building of the cities. But, no matter
how much they were repressed, they multiplied and became a scourge (!) unto the Egyptians...”
(Exodus, 1:11).

All of this effort was therefore in vain. It was not only in trade and commerce that Tarnopolian
morality48 prevailed in ancient Egypt; this Volk had moral laws of its own which encompassed
every sphere. Their excessive lechery was as dangerous to the daughters of Egypt then as it is
today with those youth who seek their victims among the female population of their host nation.
Indeed, one of them even dared to approach the wife of Egypt’s foremost state official. It was the
famous Joseph. “The Hebrew servant, which you brought unto us, came in to me and wanted to
defile me. But when I raised a cry and shouted out for help, he left his garment behind and fled.”
(Genesis, 39:14-18). Those good people who cling to the idea that the old Jews were much better
than those today, now would have us believe that the wife of Potiphar had her eye upon the
 32

handsome Joseph and desired to seduce him. He was only able to evade her grasp by fleeing.
Although, it is certainly curious why she screamed when she was apparently the seductress!

When nothing else worked, there remained only two paths open to the Egyptians with which to
rid themselves of this plague. They could do as the Jews used to do with their enemies: “And the
children of Juda caught ten thousand of them alive; they led them unto the top of a cliff, and cast
them down from there so that they were all dashed to pieces.” (II Chronicles, 25:12) ...“And
David led them out, and put them under saws and barbs of iron, and under iron hammers, and
burned them in brick-kilns.” (II Samuel, 12:30-31).49 This the Egyptians did not do, although the
Jews certainly would have done so, had their positions been reversed. The Egyptians, who were
not a “pious” Volk like the Jews, instead only expelled the children of Juda from the country,
even though the Jews had done them much harm. This meant that others now had the pleasure
of getting to know God’s Chosen People. But before they set out from Egypt, they were left free
to help themselves to various sundries which did not belong to them; their concepts of property
and law are simply different. “And I will grant this people favor in the eyes of the Egyptians, so
that they shall not leave empty-handed. But each woman shall request of her neighbors, and of
those tenants staying at her house, vessels of silver and gold, and raiments; you shall put them on
your sons and daughters, and steal them (!) from the Egyptians.” (Exodus, 3:21-22; 11:2).

Pious as always, they did exactly as their God commanded – – “and they borrowed (!) of the
Egyptians articles and raiments of silver and gold – – and they stole (!) these from the Egyptians
– – and they brought along with them a mass of foreign rabble (!) and sheep and cattle, and a
great many livestock.” (Exodus, 12:35-38). It goes without saying that the sheep and cattle did not
go along voluntarily; certainly, they would have been borrowed like the silver and gold items. So
here we have, apparently, the exodus of a colony of outright criminals. They moved “into the
land of the Canaanites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites; a land flowing with milk and
honey.” (Exodus, 3:17). These peoples were, to be honest, not particularly enthusiastic about the
unwelcome influx. In fact, they resisted it fervently, though were defeated – albeit not through
force of arms, but through cunning. About that is written: “And Moses sent spies to Jazer; they
seduced the daughters of the Amorites, and deceived (with their help) all who were therein.”
(Numbers, 21:32).

They did much the same with all the other tribes and cities, as is written: “So we captured every
city at that time, and killed every man, woman, and child, leaving no survivors. Only the cattle
did we plunder for ourselves, along with the spoils which we found in the cities.” (Deuteronomy,
2:34-35).

Intermingling with other peoples thus no longer took place. Their origins in the criminal colony
in Egypt were quickly forgotten. Already they felt themselves to be that “Chosen People” which
tolerates nothing else besides itself, for their watchword is: “Take care that you make no covenant
with the inhabitants of the country into which you enter, that they do not become a nuisance
among you; rather you should overturn their altars, smash their idols, and eradicate their sacred
groves.” (Exodus, 34:12-13).

In the blessed Land of Canaan, in the Promised Land where milk and honey flowed, Judaism
developed an awareness of its true mission. “To a foreigner you may charge interest, but not to
your brother, in order that Yahweh may bless you.” (Deuteronomy, 23:20). So Moses
commanded them, and in turn also promised them: “Yahweh will gift you profits, as he has
promised you. Thus you will lend to many nations [Völkern], but will need to borrow from
none.” (Deuteronomy, 15:6). This promise was fulfilled faster than can be imagined. “And as
 33

Israel became strong, it made the Canaanites into tributaries, and did not drive them out – – –
nor the inhabitants of Kitron and Nahalol – – – and those of Beth Shemesh and Beth Anath
became tributaries unto them – – – But the Amorites dwelt on Mount Heres, and the hand of
the house of Joseph rested heavy upon them, for they all became tributaries.” (Judges, 1:28-35).

Juda had thus come to the realization that it was better not to kill other races, but rather to make
them subject to interest, and to maintain its rule over them through instruments of debt rather
than openly via the sword. The God Yahweh to whom they prayed was never the benevolent
Father of the Aryans; he was never a god of light like the Germanic Ziu50 or the Greek Zeus, even
if they had named him similarly – Zebaoth.51 He was the old El-Shaddai to whom Abraham had
made his covenant, the desert god who burned all, the destroyer and exterminator. “Your Lord
Zebaoth is he who, when he touches the land, causes it to melt, so that all who dwell on it must
mourn.” (Amos, 9:5).

This is how Jewry has been since antiquity, and how it has remained down to the present day.
Formerly a desert nomad, the Jew has for many centuries (as far back as ancient Rome and
Greece) been the quintessential big city dweller who knows no ideals. The Aryans, in their lunatic
blindness, have ascribed to him a belief in a loving God in Heaven, while in actuality he only
worships an idol, one which is perfectly suited to his rage for destruction. The Jew has never built
up, always only destroyed. Where is his culture, where are the intellectual works and artistic
treasures which he has created? Always has he adorned himself in borrowed plumes and traded
with foreign goods. The only landmark which the Jews had, the Temple of Solomon, had to be
erected by foreign builders and had to be decorated by the hands of foreign designers, because
the Jews themselves possessed only usurers and hagglers, never any artists! And are things any
different today? One would have to declare the trash-operetta52 a work of art in order to be able
to find a Jewish artistic achievement.

Is it not incredibly strange that the yearning for a Messiah [Messiashoffnung] apparently lived
within such a thoroughly materialistic Volk? Of course, utmost caution is required here, too. The
prophets who awakened and nurtured this yearning came exclusively out of northern Palestine.
Thus they were not actually Jews in the true sense of the world, but the descendants of nobler
races which were gradually subverted and absorbed by Jewry. Their actions arguably had a deeper
basis, stemming from an awareness that the ongoing blending of the most variegated racial
components was a sin against nature, and they aspired to retain the spirit of the better race. It was
an endeavour as desperate as it was futile, because for the true Jewish people, ruled as they were
by their priesthood and their interest bonds, the realization of the hope for a Messiah never
signified anything other than gold, outer splendor, and power and dominion over subjugated
nations!

This is most clearly demonstrated in the behavior they exhibited upon the appearance of Jesus
of Galilee. He chased the moneychangers out of the temple and opposed the Pharisees and
scribes. “Your father is the devil,” he said to them, “and you want to carry out your father’s
desires. He was a criminal from the beginning, in whom there is no truth. When he lies, he thus
reveals his own nature, for he is the father of lies.” (John, 8:44).

The Christ did not offer this soulless people power and splendor, but only a kingdom that was
not of this world; he wanted to give them back their soul once more, return to them the capacity
for the most innermost of experiences! They did not understand him, could not understand him
in all of his methods, and he ended up on the cross like a criminal! He was denied being the
Messiah of the Jews; but for that he became more: The Saviour of the Gentiles! The Jews hate
 34

and mock him to this very day, because it has always remained inconceivable to them how one
can sacrifice themselves entirely for ideas, how one can cast aside what to them seems most
precious – life – in pursuit of a greater cause. But that was what Jesus, the Nazarene, did, and
that is why he was hardly of their blood, which his origin from the north speaks to.

Christianity eventually prevailed amongst the Aryans, among whom it found a natural affinity. Its
path was arduous enough, because these peoples had no need of a new faith, as their own Gods
already corresponded entirely to their nature. What finally expedited its reception among the
Germanic peoples, and what still – consciously or unconsciously – captivates us Germans today,
is neither the Latin Pope nor the German Luther himself, but the sacrificial death which the
Saviour took upon himself for the sake of his mission. This deed is spirit of our spirit, blood of
our blood; it is the eternal difference between heroism and commercialism [Händlertum]. One
plunges exultantly into the spears for the sake of an idea, the other clings to life for the sake of
profit. One is Baldur’s son, the other sprung from Loki’s brood!

Times changed, but the now fully-incarnate Jew’s actions remained unaltered. Thus, following
the destruction of Jerusalem, the Roman Rutilius Namatianus complained: “Would that Pompey
had never subdued the Jewish enemy! Would that Titus the hero had never triumphed over
them! The infection of this plague, though just overcome, now spreads far; those that defeated
them now become overwhelmed by those whom they conquered.” And in the year 821, the
Persian Manâwi al-Manlid judged the Jews as follows: “To expect honesty and a sense of right
from the Jews is the equivalent of seeking maidenhood in an old harlot.”53

We have already described in an earlier chapter how Jewry in the Middle Ages had complete
control over business, and how the Jews received approval for a maximum interest rate of
173⅓%. Under such circumstances it should come as no surprise that the anger of the exploited
population against the bloodsuckers occasionally spilled out into persecution of the Jews. This
natural impulse had as little to do with religious hatred as do the pogroms of today. At most, to
use the discourse of the Marxists, these were class struggles, i.e., struggles of the oppressed and
the powerless against their oppressors. In his book The Social-Democratic Programme, Dr.
Robert Danneberg naturally recounts all sorts of negative things about the nobility, the merchants,
the Fuggers, etc. On the topic of the usury of the Jews, and of the 173⅓%, he prudently remains
silent.

Thus far we have quoted an ample selection of scripture from the Old Testament which exposes
the Jews as something completely alien in nature to our own. In order to remain totally impartial,
we have allowed only they themselves to speak to us. Centuries of co-existence with others have
not been able to change them in the slightest. Commerce and usury have always remained their
sole preoccupation. Their faith not only permits this of them but, as we have seen, actually
requires this of them. The commandments of the Bible are supplemented by the Talmud, i.e.,
the writings of the Jewish intellectual giants, the rabbis. Everything that is humanly possible in
pride and arrogance, cruelty and lust, selfishness and greed, coalesces together to its greatest
extent into the hideous image of the Jew. It seems to us as though he came from another world.

Certain examples may provide proof for this assertion. “You are called men, but the peoples of
the world are not men, but cattle,” is stated within the tractate Bava Metzia (s.144, 2).54 In the
tractate Sanhedrin, the prohibition on causing harm against fellow Jews is affirmed as follows:
“You should do your neighbor no injustice, by which is not meant the Goyim.” (Tr. Sanhedrin,
s.57, 1).55 This statement, which sheds due light upon the fraud of humanitarianism that is driven
by the Jews especially, is further complemented by the following philanthropic command: “The
 35

Goyim (Christians) or heathens – as with robbers, who are the equal of heathens – are not to be
raised out of the pit if they have fallen therein, but are to be left there so that they must die.”
(Avodah Zara, s.13, 2).56

We are told the most wonderful fairy stories about how sacred marriage is to the Jews, about how
adultery is frowned upon by them. Like everything else concerning the Jews, however, this is only
partially correct, and only insofar as it deals with adultery between Jews. The wife of the Aryan,
the Aryan maiden, these the married Jew can covet and abuse, as the following passage
demonstrates: “Moses states: You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, and whosoever commits
adultery with his neighbor’s wife is deserving of death. Thus, for the Jew, only adultery against a
neighbor, i.e., against the wife of a Jew, is punishable. The wife of the Gentile is therefore
exempt.” (Tractate Sanhedrin, s.52, 2).57 They thus throw themselves upon Aryan women and
girls with an unspeakable voraciousness; the blondes in particular are not safe from their
pestering. Anyone who walks through the streets of the big cities with his eyes open must certainly
concur.

Finally, to complete the picture, something should be said about the sanctity of oaths. The so-
called Kol-Nidre Prayer opens our eyes on that subject. It reads: “All vows and obligations and
conjurations and oaths, which we shall vow, swear, and pledge, from this Day of Atonement until
the next, we repent of them all, and they shall be dissolved, remitted, abolished, annulled; our
vows shall not be vows, and our oaths shall not be oaths.” (Shulchan Aruch I, §619).58 Luther
therefore was right to warn: “Trust no fox on the wide heath, and no Jew upon his oath.”59

The cited passages from the Bible and the Talmud clearly demonstrate that we have, in the Jews,
a Volk whose nature is fundamentally different from our own. The great historical researcher
Mommsen, who can be said to have had no opposition to the Jews whatsoever, but instead quite
the opposite, referred to them as the “ferment of decomposition.”60 They have their fingers in
the pie of every subversion; eternal has been the “Revolution of the Star of Juda,” and eternally
have its turbid mud-flows flushed Jews and yet more Jews to the surface, again and yet again. In
a certain sense we really are dealing with a Chosen People here. Apparently, they have been
chosen to provide the leaven [Sauerteig] in the development of their host societies. Too much
leaven, of course, exerts a decomposing effect.61 Their nature has been made clear to us over the
previous passages. It is nothing other than the spirit of the most flagrant selfishness and the most
despicable self-interest; the spirit of intolerance and ruthlessness against anything foreign; the
spirit of lies, malice, and perfidy; the spirit of destruction!

As the previously-cited biblical passages demonstrate, the Jew harbours a real disgust for
productive work – particularly for more strenuous forms of physical labor. In order to prove that
his convictions in this area have remained unchanged, we will here make use of numerology
(statistics). We thus find, for example, that even in the older records of the Dortmund Mining
Office there is an article which deals with the participation of the Jews as workers within the
mining industry. This census dates from 16 December, 1893. (Taken from the Täglichs
Anzeiger:62 ‘The Workforce of the Mines and Saltworks in the Dortmund Mining Office District,
according to the Census of 16th December, 1893,’ part 1, s.VIII). It states: “In going by religious
denomination, there emerges a ratio of 47.91% Protestants, 51.82% Catholics, and 0.27% other
religions. – An examination of the statistics of the 435 (0.27%) of those encountered within the
census who are of other faiths, who are not further covered within Table 1a, yields 122 Baptists,
68 dissidents,63 17 Jews (9 from Westphalia, 4 from the Rhineland), 5 Mennonites, 2 atheists, 1
member of the Free Religious movement,64 1 member of the Brotherhood,65 and 219 without any
specified denomination. Apart from 11 miners within this latter category who are employed in
 36

ore mining, the remaining 424 of other faiths all belong to the coalmining industry. Among the
Jews, who are likewise all only employed in coal, there are: 1 senior foreman (since killed in a
workplace accident), 1 pit foreman, 8 hewers, 2 coal shovelers, 1 shaft inspector, 1 signalman, 1
sorter, 1 coke-worker.” From a total of just 17 Jews, there are still two employed as foremen, i.e.,
in a supervisory capacity (see also the next section).

So far, in order to cover the issue objectively, we have in general only allowed Jewry to describe
itself, and we will continue to do so here. The founder of Social-Democracy, Karl Marx
(Mordechai), concisely and accurately portrays the Jewish spirit to us as follows: “What is the
worldly culture of the Jew? Huckstering. – What is his worldly God? Money.” It is probably for
this reason that Ferdinand Lassalle (Feist Lasal), 66 the second spiritual father of Social-Democracy
and a Jew like Marx, warns: “The labor movement has to keep its distance from capitalists and
Jews; wherever they appear as guides and leaders, there they instead pursue their own interests.”
Social-Democracy has not heeded these words faithfully, however, and will perish by Jewry
exactly like the liberals.

The Jewish spirit is not confined solely to born Jews. Certainly it arose out of the Jewish Volk,
and has since been passed down to their children as an inalienable inheritance. But this Volk
owes its existence to an accumulation of sins against nature; it represents a state of degeneration
into which others can also sink. The process of Jewification [Verjudung], whose essential
characteristic is that Jewish spirit which stands out to us so clearly within the pages of the Bible
and the Talmud, can also take ahold of men of other blood, and even of entire races.

According to a Jewish fairytale, for example, the English are the descendants of the Ten Lost
Tribes of Israel. This is, of course, a fabrication which is flattering to the English, intended to
represent them, as it were, as a second Chosen People; in any event the fairytale is well-contrived,
and there is more than a grain of truth to it, for it is beyond dispute that a spiritual kinship exists
between both races. In one we have the purebred pirate of old Viking blood; in the other we
have the bandit of the desert.

When we speak of the Jewish spirit’s transferability to other races, we must also not forget one
very important factor: namely that there is a great deal of Jewishness concealed within the
Christianity of the churches, the influence of which is tremendous. Supported as they were by
the markedly Jewish Old Testament, most of the Church Fathers were also of very dubious racial
origin, and many Jesuits, for example, and even a Pope himself – the infamous Alexander VI of
the Borgia dynasty – were actual Jews! Thus, in the context of Jewry’s aspirations for world
supremacy, which arise out of the Jewish hope for a Messiah, we are faced not only with
economic slavery through the essence of a thoroughly Jewish Mammonism, but are also
threatened with a spiritual Jewification!

That Jewry strives unrelentingly for world domination is demonstrated by, among other things,
the peace terms which the Western Powers, as the principal representatives of Mammonism,
were able to impose upon the German Volk on 28th June, 1919; these showed the truly cruel,
and therefore cowardly, methods of Jewish warfare – a war of starvation, of the demoralization
of the hinterland through flyers, and through newspapers and parties standing in the service of
Judaism. This operation calls to mind the biblical passage: “They seduced the daughters of the
Amorites.”

The attempt to establish Jewish world supremacy is also undertaken, however, from a second
flank. If the tendency which we have just addressed bases itself in the West upon Mammonism,
 37

then the second, which originates from the East, is founded upon communist Bolshevism. Both
are only seemingly in opposition to one another, because the aspirations of both are
unmistakeably aimed at contaminating the non-Jewish races spiritually and physically, and at
exploiting them economically in order to thereafter reduce them to slaves and to rule over them
dictatorially. The Jew understands only one form of rule: dictatorship! Whether this is capitalist
or communist is certainly of little real consequence to the oppressed; it is oppression in either
case, and in both situations the ruler is the Jew. It is therefore only a matter of course that any
and all leadership positions within Bolshevist Russia are staffed by Jews. This is exactly how things
were known to be in Hungary in the time of Bela Kun, and in Munich during the period of
council rule. But it is also equally self-evident that, even when communists rule, no Jew who is
outside the communist circles of leadership – no matter how wealthy – will be mistreated.

How does Juda aim to achieve world supremacy? The 24 Protocols of the Elders of Zion – in
brief, the “Jewish Protocols” – are informative in this regard. These Protocols were first published
in 1906. According to them, the path to Jewish world supremacy runs through the division of
other races, through their spiritual confusion and economic subjugation. Only a few passages are
quoted here from these very informative Protocols.

As it says in the first Protocol: “The valuable qualities of a nation – honesty and openness – are
practically vices in politics, for they bring about its downfall more reliably and more certainly
than does the most powerful enemy. Such qualities are attributes of the unbelievers (i.e., the
Gentiles); we cannot allow ourselves to be guided by them.”

Furthermore: “On the rubble of the hereditary nobility of the unbelievers we have set up the
aristocracy of our educated classes, and above everything the aristocracy of money.”

Furthermore: “We will enforce wage increases which, however, will be of no benefit for the
workers, because at the same time we will produce an increase in prices for the most essential
foodstuffs, while simultaneously alleging that this is a result of the decline in agriculture and cattle-
breeding. We will also artfully and deeply undermine the production of goods by instilling
anarchistic ideas into the workers and by encouraging their consumption of alcohol... In order
that the real state of affairs is not noticed prematurely by the unbelievers, we shall mask it under
feigned efforts in support of the working classes, and by promulgating the great economic
principles for which our economic theories are carrying on an energetic propaganda.”67

“Even in the ancient times,” the First Protocol continues, “we were the first to cast the slogan
‘Liberty, Equality, Fraternity’ among the masses. Since then these words have been parroted
countless times by poll-parrots, who have gathered around this bait from all sides and have
thereby destroyed mankind’s prosperity and true personal liberty.”

In the 5th Protocol we find a very informative explanation that the endeavours which we have just
quoted in actuality amount to mass fraud. It states: “In all ages, the peoples of the world, like
individuals, have accepted words for actions... For this reason we will organize sham institutions
that conspicuously parade their dedication to progress.” From this one can gauge how little
seriously one should take the democracy and socialism which the Jews are behind.

In the 11th Protocol, open contempt for Gentiles is expressed with the words: “The unbelievers
are like a flock of sheep.”
 38

All 24 Protocols speak of the Gentiles with the deepest contempt and with an infinite knowledge
of their nature. But they also plainly demonstrate the clarity and ruthlessness with which the
senior leadership of Jewry pursue their goal. The World War and its repercussions brought this
goal within easy reach: We are facing Jewish world supremacy. In this context it should be noted
that the Zionist leader Dr. Max Nordau, friend of Dr. Theodor Herzl, had already predicted the
World War and its expected course in 1903. This occurred at a gathering in Paris, one month
after the 6th Zionist Congress at Basel in August, 1903. The carefully guarded secret which lay
behind these events has finally been revealed by an article in the American Jewish News
(Amerikanische jüdische Nachrichten) from 19th September, 1919, entitled ‘When Prophets
Speak’.

This fact clearly illustrates that World Jewry was the driving force behind bringing about the
World War. One of their weapons, the famous negotiated peace, is mentioned in the 2nd Protocol
of the Elders of Zion. It reads: “It is indispensable for our purpose that wars, so far as is possible,
do not result in territorial gains. This will give war an economic character.” We understand what
misfortune this formula has brought upon our people.

To summarize, we can say that the whole of international democracy, whose so-called ideals the
major press and great parties represent and whose standard they swear by, is nothing other than
the political crystallisation of the Jewish spirit, and that it ultimately serves no other purpose than
the establishment of Jewish world supremacy!
 39

Democracy, International, and Collapse.*

What is democracy? This Greek word means ‘rule by the people’. Such a thing ultimately never
actually existed in the ancient Greek city-states, inasmuch as only the smallest part of their
population consisted of citizens with political franchise, while the overwhelming majority were
slaves without rights. The concept of ‘rulership’ was in general foreign to the Germanic tribes.
They had no rulers, only leaders, whether duke or king. Final decision lay with the Free People’s
Assembly, the “Thing.” The leadership-concept runs like a golden thread through the early days
of German history, up to that moment when the German Peoples’ Kings became Roman
Emperors. 68 It was only with this otherwise disastrous step, as we have already seen, that the
concept of rulership arose in German lands.

What is nowadays cautiously called “democracy,” that is, government by the people, is no longer
party-rule, but is in actuality party-terrorism.

Democracy as a form of government is as possible in a free state (republic) as it is in a monarchy.

It is founded upon the parliamentary system adopted from England, presupposes a
parliamentary majority, and ultimately means that not only should the government be composed
according to the wishes of this parliamentary majority, but that all leading civil service posts
should be staffed with its men. When part of a political party name, the word implies that the
relevant party is concerned first and foremost with upholding democracy within the state.

The deficiencies of the democratic form of government are obvious. Governments and civil
servants which are drawn from political parties feel – save for very rare exceptions – a
responsibility only towards their parties, and will never manage their offices impartially, but will
always act out of benefit for their party. † They therefore never enjoy the public’s trust. In order
to mitigate these deficiencies, Switzerland, for example, was the first state to introduce the
referendum, in which the voice of the entire population carries weight. It is a reversion to the old
Germanic Thing. Further improvements lie in the system of proportional representation, which
allows the minority to come into play, and in the establishment of popular representation upon
a bicameral structure (a political chamber and an economic chamber, the latter on the basis of
occupational representation, the so-called House of Estates).69 There is one flaw, of course, which
cannot be remedied, and that lies in the fact that it does not always have to be the best and most
capable members of a Volk who end up acting upon the parliamentary stage. These are
representatives of the strongest parties, certainly, but that still does not mean that their views are
not utterly shallow and unproductive, and that financially powerful interest groups cannot

*
See the pamphlet: How It Happened (Erzberger), by the same author, as well as Einhart 1914-1919.70
†
The circumstances in the German Reich, German-Austria, and Czechia provide an instructive example for these
claims. The governing parties regard each other with suspicion; the welfare of the party is everything to them, the
public welfare secondary. The Czechs are still in agreement when it comes to us Germans, but we Germans are
never in agreement when it comes to them. The following incident throws a great deal of light upon German
parliamentarism: following the cancellation of the London Conference, German Foreign Minister Dr. Simons gave
a full report to the Reichstag and to the “Confidential Committee.” How ‘confidential’ these confidential discussions
were was made clear enough the next day, when all the newspapers put out reports of their exact details. (The
German parliamentarian cannot help but gossip). But that is only by the by. In the Reichstag, a vote of confidence
was expressed in support of Dr. Simons. The Majority Socialists also voted in favor, but not for reasons conducive
to the wellbeing of the state, not a bit! Rather, the Berlin Vorwärts of 12th March, 1921 gave us their reason in the
following words: “The enmity of the extreme right is, in our eyes, the only positive asset of the present Reich
government. In this sense it may also enjoy our confidence until its eventual collapse.” Thus the strongest party of
the German Volk, which had supposedly “matured” over the course of the Revolution, acted utterly childishly in its
Volk’s gravest hour since Versailles!71
 40

manipulate elections in the most undesirable way so that, ultimately, Mammonism sets the
agenda. This is the reason why the call is sounding ever louder: “Away from parliamentarism and
back to the corporatist [ständischen] constitution.” This idea has taken root in National Socialist
circles in particular.

But most concerning of all is the idea of electing public officials. This would only open the
floodgates to the most ruthless party-rule, partisanship, and venality. (See the United States of
America). Officials must only be appointed on the basis of their professional qualifications,
without regard for their political opinions, and their independence from the ruling parties must
be ensured. Representative bodies and employee associations [Angestelltenvertretungen] serve
to defend against rule by officials and the arbitrary use of power by civil servants. Lueger’s tenet
that, “Social-Democrats and Pan-Germans will not be employed,”72 was as reprehensible then as
it is customary now: today everything gets shoehorned into the Social-Democratic organization.

Thus, with so-called democracy, the philosopher’s stone has by no means been found, and – as
experience has shown – no age of unalloyed bliss has dawned. Instead, like all works of man, it
has abundant drawbacks and deficiencies which must be laid bare and remedied as far as is
possible. If, after this, there is then nothing further left to it other than the name, this is no real
cause for concern.

In any event, one thing is certain: that democracy becomes a caricature without the accompanying
political maturity of the population. Rigorous civic education remains, therefore, its chief
prerequisite. Our Volk has proven itself to be particularly lacking in political maturity through its
actions during the days of the Revolution. Like a child breaking his own toy, it shattered
Bismarck’s creation and crippled its own power in order to elevate impotence into a political
doctrine.

Let us take note, then, of how this breakdown came about. “The light comes from the East,”
rejoiced some, while others gazed spellbound to the West, from where they expected a great
enlightenment to come. But the light which came from the East was merely Trotsky-Bronstein
and Radek-Sobelsohn, and those singing hymns of praise to them, the leaders of Social-
Democracy and the producers of certain newspapers, were of one and the same tribe as them.
In the West others were once again taken in by the French, English, and American democracies,
which were acclaimed to be the highest of all goals even though the most ruthless Mammonism
undoubtedly lurks behind them. Beyond the Atlantic, the new Columbuses at length noticed a
new European, emerging like Venus from the flood of dollars.73 His 14 Points, and Trotsky-
Bronstein’s right to self-determination, did their job upon our unsuspecting Volk. Why continue
fighting when everything should be organized for them so nicely?

Although Trotsky-Bronstein was glorified by our Jewish press for a time, he was eventually
outstripped by Wilson. In the end Wilson too was duly pushed aside for Erzberger,
Scheidemann, Lammasch, etc., to say nothing of Haase, Liebknecht, and Ledebour, who – out
of their natural hatred against Germandom – deliberately aimed for the destruction of the
Bismarckian German Reich.

Every international tendency was represented in the hatred for Bismarck’s creation; the Red, the
Black, and the Gold stood together in fraternity.74 The Jewish spirit worked within some, the
Roman spirit within others. Some agitated against the Junkers and the military, others against
Protestant Prussia, and all endeavoured to outdo each other in disparaging their Fatherland
before the eyes of foreign nations.
 41

As if France and England were not much more militaristic; * as if the nobility, and in particular
the plutocracy, had been without influence in England and Russia; as if these states had been
strongholds for every form of liberty!

Such systematic vilification naturally led foreigners to eventually appropriate it for themselves,
causing them to look upon Prussia/Germany as the bastion of darkest regression. The errors of
the statesmen who followed Bismarck contributed significantly to this ever-proliferating hostility.
This behaviour was most characteristic, however, of Jewry. In none of the other modern states
did they arguably take such total control over the fields of politics, economics, arts, and science
as they did in the German Reich.

The national census of 1905 indeed counted only 607,862 people of the Mosaic faith, i.e.,
scarcely 1% of the entire population. Through baptisms of Jews, and especially through mixed
marriages, which in recent years have increased tremendously, the actual proportion of Jews in
the population has multiplied by threefold at least – and this is not to forget also the general
contamination of our blood through extramarital intercourse. † If one takes into account the
enormous number of christenings of Jewish children, which in the German Reich was estimated
to have been over 400,000 between 1870 and 1919, one can arrive at an approximate picture of
the alarmingly rampant Jewification of our Volk, especially among its upper strata. The
overwhelming influence of Jews within professional life is particularly evident. According to the
occupational census of 1907, the following were active:

*
Militarism, 1913:

†
For every 100 Jews, the number who forged marriages with those of German blood: 1875 to 1884, 10; 1901 to
1904, 19; 1907, 26. In the large cities the following picture emerges: Frankfurt 1907, 20, and 1908, 31; Berlin 1901
to 1904, 35, and 1905, 44; Hamburg 1903 to 1905, 50. The Jewish professor Gans said about Jewish baptisms and
mixed marriages: “Baptisms and even crossbreeding are useless. Even in the hundredth generation we remain as
Jews, just as we were 3,000 years ago. We do not shed the scent of our race, not even after crossbreeding ten times
over, and in any copulation with any woman our race is dominant: young Jews are its result!”
 42

Perhaps most disturbing is the image provided by that of the intellectual professions. In 1914,
instead of there being 31 Jews among the 3,140 university teachers overall, which would have
corresponded with their proportion of the total population, there were instead 937. The
University of Vienna counted among every 100 students: in 1913/14 – – 30 Jews; in 1914/15 – –
45 Jews; and finally, in 1918, 92 Jews; * in the German Reich, among every 100,000 male persons
in 1917, there were 111 Germans and 662 Jews attending its universities. For every 1,000
Germans there is 1 doctor, for every 1,000 Jews there are 8. Among the 1,098 doctors in Munich,
644 are Jews; among the 734 in Hamburg, 412 are Jewish. Within the legal system, the
occupational census of 1907 counted:

Instead of 1 per cent, 43 per cent of lawyers are Jews!

They have total control over the financial system. In positions on the supervisory boards of the
banks, their ratio to that of gentiles is 44.5:1 instead of 1:100; among directors it is 24:1 (according
to W. Sombart).75 A decade ago, in the various branches of industry, on average 16.5 out of every
100 directorships were occupied by Jews, and out of every 100 supervisory board positions 26
were filled by them. In 1917 the Jews Louis Hagen (Lewy), Walter Rathenau, Dr. Salomonsohn,
Arthur von Gwinner, Kurt Sobernheim, and another seventeen of Abraham’s Seed together held
794 supervisory board positions, an average of 36 each! Louis Hagen alone held 57.

Let us also take a look at politics. Strobel,76 a member of the revolutionary Executive Council of
Berlin in 1919, became indignant that 83% of its members were Jews; he was quickly given the
boot! Of the leadership positions held by Jews: 18% for the Majority Socialists; 65% among the
Independent Socialists (before unification); and for the Communists it was actually 87%. One
can see how Jewification is intensified on the Left.

*
The Germans were away at the Front.
 43

Finally, 1 in every 1,000 Germans is active in the press and in literature, compared with 10 out
of every 1,000 Jews. If one includes both baptised Jews and Jews by lineage among those which
are directly plying their mischief in these fields, then the proportion easily rises by threefold. Of
the entire Reich-German press, only 5% is under direct Jewish leadership. The rest are
dominated by the Jewish advertising monopoly (Mosse, etc.).77 Of the 806 major publishers, 365
of them, i.e., 45% (instead of 1%), are Jews!

As can be seen from these figures, which are by no means exhaustive, the Wilhelmine German
Reich was already an out-and-out Jewish state. The repercussions from these circumstances were
expressed within the overwhelming influence of the Jewish spirit in the economic and intellectual
life of the state. It influenced the state’s domestic and foreign policy into a lopsided, commercial
direction. The Bethmanns etc. were merely its henchmen. Everything that could have
contributed to the awakening and the strengthening of our folk-consciousness
[Volksbewußtseins] was deliberately suppressed rather than encouraged; the German had to
remain a citizen of the world in order that he would not disturb the Jewish community. This
conundrum, which so often ensured that German nationalists in the Ostmark lacked reciprocal
völkisch sympathy among Reich-German circles, finds a ready solution.

Under Juda’s spiritual leadership the German Reich completely misjudged its world-historical
mission. It should have been directed primarily at empowering and reclaiming every German
outside of the borders of the Reich, instead of letting them play the role of cultural-fertilizer78 in
Austria, Russia, etc., and allowing valuable portions of our Volk be lost to Americanism. * The
Jewish spirit befogged the German so that he only saw and thought economically. His sense for
those uncertainties (Bismarck’s “imponderables”)79 which play a huge role in the lives of nations
– consider the Czechs, Poles, French, and the like – was lost to him; he aligned himself
Westwards with the appendant influence from the East.

In this way nothing was really achieved other than mere mistrust and resentment. The German
merchant in particular has harmed us immensely abroad. This is understandable when one
considers that this ‘German’ merchant was, in the overwhelming majority of cases, a Jew.

*
For example, millions of our folk-comrades live in the United States, and yet their political influence there is nil.
 44

The Western-democratic “orientation” (we employ this word because it is related to “Orient,”
and therefore most aptly characterizes the relevant driving forces) triggered terrible disaster even
during the War. It was the causal factor behind every hesitancy in warfare; it was to blame for the
respect for “Greek neutrality,” for the postponement of intensified submarine warfare out of the
eternal and oh-so-futile hope for a peace settlement, for the premature winding up of the Polish
question and of the constitutional question in Prussia. These are the root political causes behind
the eventual collapse of the state. Everything else is a corollary.

The new German Reich thus ultimately ended up in ruins, because – despite being a state with
an overwhelmingly German population – its leadership and administration proved to be
completely subordinate to non-German interests. It possessed the strongest Social-Democratic
movement, which coincidentally was the most anti-German, and the strongest and most cohesive
clerical party, which received its orders from Rome. Jewish liberal Radicalism80 played a huge
role as the third member of this alliance. In addition there were the Alsatians, Poles, and Danes.
The views of the folk-conscious German parties were scarcely reflected within the German Volk’s
political representation; scuttlebutt about the supposed influence of the Pan-Germans is nothing
but empty lies. This demonstrates more than anything else the pernicious course steered by the
vessel of the German Reich!

Thus did the Bismarckian Reich enter the struggle for life and death! That it managed to endure
as long as it did merely demonstrates that its masses were better than their leaders, that the Jewish
poison had not yet eaten into it deeply enough. But, encouraged by the special circumstances of
the War, this poison swiftly caught up with what it had until then neglected.

“The German Reich must not be victorious!” So ran the rallying cry of all internationalists,
whether Red, Black, or Gold, whether Marxist or pacifist! Everything was put into the service of
achieving this one goal. Northcliffe-Stern81 set the tone in London, the full- and half-Jews picked
it up in Berlin, while those in Vienna and other cities rounded out the hoarsely croaking chorus.

Germany could not be permitted victory, because then it would no longer have grovelled so
readily to Jewry, which lusted after global supremacy – for the attainment of world domination,
the realization of the hope for a Messiah in this sense, was and remains Juda’s deeper ambition!
It holds firm and steadfast to its goal; whatever pushes back against it is destroyed. Just as it says
in the Bible: “You shall consume every nation!”

This same guiding principle, which was valid a thousand years ago, still applies today, as the
Protocols of the Elders of Zion confirm.

The Aryan adherents of Marxism and of bourgeois-capitalist democracy serve as the cronies for
aiding in the realization of these ambitions, and yet they are still proud of the pitiful role they
play, even though it ends with their subjugation. It was not Wilhelm II but the Bismarckian-style
German Reich which arguably formed the final obstacle on the Children of Abraham’s road to
world domination, a goal which England, France, and North America had already contributed
to and to which Trotsky-Bronstein’s Russia had in the meantime joined. The Reich as a result
had to be eliminated! Anyone who dared to disagree was slandered and smeared. When it came
to this subject, every faction of the Jewish press was of a single mind, no matter how they might
otherwise stage mock fights against one another.

The Black International, which always received the most loving support at the Viennese court,
was in turn an irreconcilable opponent of Lutheran German imperial power, and remained so
 45

despite all the good will from Berlin. The so-called “pacifists,” i.e., the Friends of Peace,82 who
openly assisted in the demoralization of the German Volk, were partly Jews and partly Romanists.
Among the gravediggers of German power, Erzberger, Lammasch, and Prof. Foerster (formerly
of Vienna, then Munich) should be mentioned alongside Scheidemann, Eisner, and Haase. The
Pope set the tone with his peace proposal. What he demanded from us at the time was a
renunciatory peace of the first order. Nonetheless, he found a chilly reception among the Entente
Powers, while the Marxists, democrats, pacifists, and clericals of the Central Powers lovingly
embraced his efforts. From that point on the Viennese court’s old animosity towards Prussia-
Germany began putting down much stronger roots. It found a lively echo in the Jewish and
clerical press. Austria, one of the principal causes of the war, which had originally tossed the
sparks into the powder-keg, was now suddenly touted as a peace-loving lamb; the ravenous wolf,
who did not desire peace, depicted as sitting in Berlin!

Our Volk have been unconscionably demoralized. First their food was rationed according to a
model inspired by that of Joseph of Egypt, a model which reared its head once more by way of
Walter Rathenau’s war corporations – although not without simultaneously spreading the Jewish
spirit of usury into the Volk’s circles through scandalous high prices which had hitherto been
absent, and which opened the door wide to black-marketeering and to chain-merchants.83 This
spiritual diet was served to them in excess, of which the secret cook was Lord Northcliffe-Stern
of London!

Thus our Reich and our Volk finally collapsed! What hope do we have from the future?
 46

At the Gates to the Future.

The present state of affairs in Germany is, so to speak, the fruit of the peace diktats of Versailles
and St. Germain, and is often compared with the Tilsit Peace Treaty which Napoleon imposed
upon a humiliated Prussia. Historical comparisons such as these are not always exact, and can
therefore only be drawn to a very limited extent. If we choose to make such a comparison here,
however, then the Tilsit Peace Treaty, as egregious and extortionate as it was, does not in actuality
come close to what was done to us at Versailles and St. Germain in the least. Our Volk’s living
standards at the time were incomparably more favorable. Prussia, like Germany in general, was
still an outright peasant-state during the time of the Napoleonic Wars, while the present-day
German Reich, and Germany in a broader sense, is a highly-developed industrial state. For such
a state, overcoming the consequences of war is, in and of itself, much more difficult. In addition,
even Napoleon did not disarm a downtrodden Prussia as extensively as occurred with Germany
after the end of the Great War. Finally, and most importantly: The poison-weed of pacifism is
in full bloom within our Volk today. A virtually pathological addiction to self-emasculation and
self-abuse has spread among broad sections of the population; their sense of pride seems to have
completely fallen by the wayside. They kiss the whip that strikes them. Whoever does not join
in with the chorus and feel the burning shame within themselves is branded a regressive.

There are thus reasons enough for despair, and the general belief in “mankind” may have been
thoroughly broken in many after the all too abundant samples of it which they have experienced
in recent years.

We National Socialists, who never believed in mankind, who always recognized as tomfoolery
all the drivel about the culture of man, ennoblement, human progress, etc., have no reason to
despair. We believe in our Volk and in their renewal. We were “Siegfriedler” at a time when the
entirety of the howling mob was being unleashed against the “annexationists,” “war-prolongers,”
etc., and we are splendidly justified today for being so.84 Our faith in our Volk’s resurgence from
their state of shame and bondage will prove to be equally justified!

This belief of ours is by no means founded upon any hopes for a speedy shift of the international
political situation in our favour. For those people who understand things purely with the intellect,
this may admittedly not be all that comprehensible. But it is those true men of reason, the experts
with their eternal doubts, who are precisely the ones who have plunged us into the abyss – may
they now make every frantic effort to shift the blame onto others.

Well, we can furnish even these eternal doubters with proof that our hopes are justified. Let it
be revealed to them that we maintain not only a most profound belief in the industriousness and
vitality of our Volk, but that we also possess an insight into the very essence of the Great War,
which by no means came to an end with the peace diktats of Versailles and St. Germain. In our
eyes this was not a war like any other, it was no mere battle for sales markets, no simple
confrontation between two imperialisms. Instead our opinion is that it was a struggle between two
worldviews, and in this sense served only as the beginning of one of those tremendous spiritual,
political, and economic upheavals in history, such as took place, for example, during the
Migration Period, the Reformation, etc. One world is buried, and amidst the pain and
convulsions a new one is born.

This time it is essentially a struggle between personal ambition and the community will, or, to put
it another way, between individualism and socialism – hence a process which is the exact opposite
of that which took place in the Western world at the denouement of the Middle Ages, when the
 47

age of fiefdom (feudalism) was superseded by that of plutocracy (capitalism). In such struggles
the tendency which ultimately proves victorious, irrespective of any setbacks or defeats, is that
which can claim for itself the higher moral justification, the more ideal pursuit. Yet when we
consider both individualism and socialism from this point of view, it is beyond doubt to us today
which is truly the more superior of the two. Erstwhile, when feudalism was degenerating, the
situation was reversed.

In the Great War, individualism was embodied by the Entente – above all by its driving force,
England – and socialism by the German Reich. Of course, this was not always so readily apparent,
but it is indisputable that the German Reich had the better organization; i.e., it had at its disposal
the more seamless integration of the individual into the needs of the collective as a whole, and
England, despite its far more numerous resources, could ultimately only maintain itself by way
of imitating, with its characteristic tenacity, every aspect of the German model.

However, we by no means see the essence of German Socialism within Marxism – this by-
product of materialism and industrialism is instead only its caricature. Socialism is therefore not
conditioned by how many or how few Marxist organizations there are, but rather socialism – i.e.,
collective work, communal will – is German essence, German spirit, par excellence. It is based
upon the conception of work as a moral duty! This outlook runs like a common thread through
the whole of German and, in more recent times, Prussian history. This is not surprising. Our
Volk had things immeasurably worse than did others. While the Franks and Anglo-Saxons were
on the whole able to settle upon the colonized soil of the old Roman Empire, our ancestors –
with the exception of a few regions – had to painstakingly wrest their Lebensraum piece by piece
from the seas, forests, and moorlands. The only way such labor could have succeeded was
through hard, tough, collective work, and so socialism and the German spirit as a result outright
became one. Perhaps we are going a little too far with this assertion. Doubtless it does not apply
to every single German tribe and territory, but it does at least apply to all those where they were
active as settlers. Oswald Spengler speaks of Prussians in this context (Prussianism and
Socialism), and sees the old Order-spirit alive within them, while in Englishmen the Viking-spirit
of the Normans has prevailed since the time of Cromwell.85

Modern industrialism – which was instituted here with the turbulence of a mountain torrent after
the German Reich’s reestablishment, part of a feverish endeavour to rapidly enter the world
economy at the eleventh hour – was indeed able to obscure this basic feature of German nature,
but was not able to eliminate it.

England had its revolution in 1642, France had its in 1789. Both resulted in the elimination of
the feudal constitution and in the ascendancy of the bourgeoisie to participation in political
power, which until then had been reserved almost exclusively for the nobility and the Church.
The political goals of the new social estate [Standes] now coming to the fore culminated in the
restriction, as far as was possible, of the state’s field of activity, which hindered its economic
ambitions. In Germany things were inherently different. There had been no strong state authority
for centuries, and before the regional principalities could reach their fullest development there
were already a plethora of powerful city-states in which the bourgeoisie were able to express
themselves politically. This is one reason why there was no revolution here equivalent to those
in England and France – the Peasants’ War was an uprising of a different kind. The second
reason is to be found in the fact that, after the Reformation, Germany became a European theatre
of war.
 48

On taking a closer look at the motives behind the great French Revolution, we find ourselves
agreeing with Werner Sombart, who (in Merchants and Heroes) identifies its much-vaunted, lofty
goals of “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity” as being true and genuine merchant values. After all, in
spite of all the window-dressing, its true objective was simply the demolition of the medieval social
order and of those constraints which had become inconvenient. In place of that order’s Western
worldview of collective work – socialism – there came instead a striving after the greatest possible
and most reckless development of the personality – individualism. Individualism forms the
foundation of capitalism, and is the driving force behind that spirit which we have classed as
‘Jewish’ and which lives and works within the Anglo-Saxon. There is little room in its thinking
and feeling for the state according to our convictions. The state may be there to protect the
citizenry; about their life-style and activities it does not concern itself any further. The English
state is therefore only a society of private individuals.

In German lands this outlook became known as Manchester Liberalism. While it managed to
establish itself amongst every social stratum in England (including the working-class), * it never
succeeded at doing so in Germany. On the contrary, it was precisely those strata which in other
countries are opponents of strong state power who reconciled themselves with the state relatively
quickly. Instead, the state’s opponents became – contrary to their true interests – the masses of
industrial workers led astray by Marxism, a quality primarily attributable to the influence of Jewry.
Even though there may have been a lot to find fault with in the German Reich under Wilhelm
II (particularly its cultural shallowness and decline), one thing remains undisputed – that it was
the only country in which socialism had virtually established itself through the authority of the
state.

In the opinion of every Marxist and every democrat it is said to have been an evil that Germany
did not have a revolution equivalent to those of the English or the French. The revolution of
November 1918 is therefore eulogized as the realization of this occurrence, at long last.

But if we look more closely, this revolution does not signify progress; rather it was an obstacle in
the evolution towards socialism, since it directly undermined state power in favour of forces
which were hostile to it, forces which were rooted in Manchester Liberalism and which we can
sum up under the term ‘loan-capital’.

The Communist Manifesto, to which Social-Democracy still appeals, incorporates the doctrine
of the double revolution. It makes the assertion that proletarians support the first revolution not
in order to benefit themselves, but to advantage the “enemies of their enemies.” The relevant
passage reads verbatim: “At this stage, therefore, the proletarians do not fight their enemies, but
the enemies of their enemies.” According to Marxist theory, the proletarian’s enemy is the
capitalist. But he does not fight the capitalist, but rather the capitalist’s enemy; which means, in
other words, he fights his own friend and ally.

Now, this manifesto was written on the eve of the 1848 revolution, and the above-quoted passage
is therefore probably intended as a consolation, in the sense that it states that only after this first
(political) revolution will the second revolution carry out the work of social liberation. This is

*
The French worker has little feeling for organization in general; the English worker prefers Manchester Liberalism
to pseudo-socialisms like the now-commonplace Marxism. The number of organized Marxists who previously
belonged to the Second International can serve as evidence for this. They amounted to (according to Lensch’s
Social-Democracy: Its Aim and its Achievements): around 1 million in the German Reich; in France, conversely, a
mere 80,000; and in England, with its splendid trade-unions, just 38,000, which into the bargain were divided into
three competing groups. In the ‘International’ the three countries had, of course, an equal number of votes.
 49

how the uprising of November 1918 was interpreted within Social-Democracy: “Fight against
capitalism and for its overthrow,” was the motto. And what was the outcome? Just another
political upheaval – an irony of world history – to the benefit of that very capitalism which the
Marxists – and they alone – allegedly combat so fiercely, and whose absolute rule they directly
helped to establish.

But how could this have happened? It happened because the socialism proclaimed by Social-
Democracy was not real. It was born out of envy instead of coming from the heart; instead of
love it preached hate. For only love can build things up, and this false socialism thus inevitably
had to degenerate into orgies of hatred and destruction.

It was, according to Max Wundt86 (On the Spirit of Our Time), “a mockery of fate that the social
revolution, which was supposed to break the power of money, was itself engendered by a spirit
which had been bred by the greed for money.”

Thus the “glorious” German Revolution of November 1918 – devoid of any major progress –
petered out in a string of wage demands. Instead of an era of socialism, it brought about instead
the virtually unlimited rule of capitalism, and led to the indisputable victory of individualism!

The instant the historical moment arrived for which Social-Democracy had prepared itself and
had drilled its troops for decades, the Social-Democrats, rather than performing a heroic lay for
us, instead merely put on a farce. This is the tragicomedy of Marxism or Social-Democracy,
which even in its name expresses the discord that lives within it, as Max Wundt again aptly points
out when he says: “Social-Democracy: it almost sounds like a square circle.87 For socialism means
surmounting the rule of capital, while democracy is capital’s definitive form of rule.”

And now the game can begin anew; now, after they let the best opportunity to bring down
capitalism – England’s defeat – slip by, after they committed suicide in mad delusion just before
the finish line, they can start all over once again – with exactly the same results!

The communist movement, which arose in opposition to Social-Democracy, arguably finds its
purpose – albeit not always clearly understood – in the recognition of this self-inflicted defeat.
The communists have a point when they accuse the Social-Democrats of aiding the power of
capitalism. The now increasingly-evident, intimate alliance between the Red and Gold
Internationals in the German Reich corroborates this view. The Social-Democrats ultimately
only fight against national capital, which on the whole works productively, but not against truly
international Jewish loan-capital, which lives off of the work of others. Of course, even
communism has not proven successful when put to the test – neither in Russia, nor in Bavaria
and Hungary. It merely exhausted itself through its destruction and eradication of better racial
elements. A religion of hate cannot very well act otherwise. Socialism and materialism are, after
all, simply incompatible, because the former is the highest altruism, while the latter is the most
flagrant egotism. And so socialism built upon materialism again ends only in individualism!

This spirit of individualism also ends up becoming entrenched if – as our Marxists do – one
constantly invokes the French Revolution of 1789 in order to come across as “revolutionary.”
What does this event actually have to do with socialism? Nothing, absolutely nothing, provided
one does not view socialism’s essence as being the arousal of bloodthirsty ideas, the awakening
of the worst instincts of the crowd. This is ultimately, however, what the entire activity of Marxist
agitators has amounted to for decades. Education for them has always been a side issue,
expansion the most important thing. They have constantly threatened their own folk-comrades
 50

with violence, while with foreigners they have demonstrated an attitude reminiscent of desperate
servility. Lensch, in his aforementioned book, aptly castigates this with the following words:

“Violence certainly loomed large within the fantastical imaginings of future social
revolutions, and the dictatorship of the proletariat was also never far from peoples’ minds.
There was still opportunity here for the exercise of any latent revolutionary energy, and
in the background people enjoyed letting the ‘hatchet’ flash. It was, after all, all about a
great reckoning with the ruling classes of one’s own Volk. Yet in the struggle of nations
[Völker] against one another this theory of violence abruptly begins to break down. Here
only peaceful persuasion and free will are supposed to prevail...”

If we remain with the idea that irreconcilable differences exist between the years 1789 and 1914,
then the German Revolution did not begin on November 8, 1918, but on August 4, 1914, when
an entire Volk – brushed by the wings of the Angel of Fate – began to suspect with a holy shudder
that their spirit, their substance, was of a different nature to that of others, and that they were
hated because of it.

To reclaim this spirit of 1914 is our Volk’s first task, and is the first step towards their resurgence!

But is this still possible for our demoralized Volk, internally divided as they are by class struggles?
The Marxist-organized masses are generally unreceptive to advice coming from third parties, no
matter how well-intentioned. They are enclosed within their armour of distrust. Yet these matters
concern them most of all. Only misery, that great teacher of men, is capable of advising them
any better. Our enemies admittedly make our work a little easier by way of the fact that they have
cast aside their mask of humanitarianism somewhat prematurely, in consequence revealing
themselves to be the real bandits. Thus even a section of the Reich-German Social-Democrats –
the so-called Majority Socialists – are slowly beginning to realize, albeit reluctantly, that what is
really at stake is nothing more nor less than the enslavement of our Volk, that we Germans as a
whole are intended – the working-class most of all – to become the thralls of more fortunate
nations.

The Marxists coined the expression “tenants of the Volk”,88 and meant by it those segments of
the population who were more or less excluded from the nation’s legal, economic, and
intellectual accomplishments. Today we can apply this expression to our entire Volk, in reference
to their relationship to the Volk of the “victorious” nations. They are the masters, we are their
servants, their serfs, their tenants; they are the haves, all of us the have-nots; they are awash in
happiness, in abundance, while we are the ones whose good fortune has been disinherited!

This is the current state of things. Of course, it has always been like this, more or less – up until,
after the founding of the new German Reich, we also began demanding our share of this world’s
wealth. Sticking with the Marxist phraseology, there has always existed a class conflict between
our Volk and other, more fortunate peoples, one far more severe than that within our own
population. Only now is this fact becoming more evident, more obvious to everyone. That this
has not been recognized hitherto is due to our inability to think in geopolitical terms.

The Englishman, politically more gifted, has always been aware of such things. * The English
worker guards Great Britain’s advantage just as jealously as does the English businessman. During

*
The reason is to be found in the English Volk’s course of development, which bears similar traits to those of the
Jews: an advantageous barricade via their island position, an involvement in piracy and the slave trade, etc. See
Alexander von Peez, England and the Continent.89
 51

the War the English trade-unions even zealously recruited among their own members for entry
into the army. The Social-Democrat Lensch, who has already been quoted several times thus far,
makes the following comments regarding the national solidarity [Volkssolidarität] of the English:

“What purpose does this war have (written in 1916) other than to prop up English class
rule across the world? Through this struggle the entire English Volk feel themselves to
be in solidarity together as the ruling class of the world.”

This class conflict taking place between the nations is, however, not capable of bringing about a
“world revolution” – or more precisely, it prevents one from breaking out, for the English
working-class will, for example, be careful not to sacrifice their privileged position for the sake of
an ideal. Any hopes to the contrary are, for this reason, delusional.

But what should and will happen instead?

Under the pressure and compulsion of adversity, insight into the reality of the present
circumstances will take root within ever broader circles of our Volk. Even those masses corrupted
by Marxism will – educated through further unpleasant experiences – finally be forced to
recognize that the International and the world revolution will bring them no assistance, that
salvation instead is only possible on the basis of one’s own strength. Only then will that unity be
established which is natural, unconstrained, and therefore permanent, for unity really only arises
out of a harmony of perspectives. And along with it, the desire to break the chains of racial
[völkischer] and economic bondage will also be awakened nationwide!

Only adversity can bring about such a major change in thinking; it is the only thing which forces
our thoughts into channels which they would otherwise never voluntarily enter. Let us take a look
back at the annals of history. Why did the Germanic tribes once overrun the Roman Empire?
This certainly did not take place out of a desire for conquest, but because the soil of the
homeland was no longer able to support the accumulated masses of people. And the reason for
the roughly 50 campaigns which the German kings and emperors led against the Slavic tribes in
the four centuries between the years 800 and 1200 is primarily to be found in the intention to
create space for the population, which proliferated without their yet having the necessary means
at their disposal to manage the still-overwhelming natural world. The German needed space to
live, which he could only acquire from nature or from the Slavs. Since nature was more powerful
than the Slavs, he thus had to wage war against the latter.

Let us follow this train of thought further: At the time of the Wars of Liberation, Germany was
still a peasant country. Its population within the borders of what would later become the German
Reich (before the shameful Peace of Versailles) numbered 21 million. By 1850 this number had
already risen to 35.4 million, by 1900 to 56.4 million, and by 1910 to 64.9 million. What to do
with the surplus, since the available agricultural land could not cope with such a large population
density? So long as industrial development had not yet begun, the surplus population had to
emigrate. They turned mainly to America, where in the United States especially they served as a
politically uninfluential cultural fertilizer [Kulturdünger]. Industry then created work; emigration
steadily declined, yes, it even finally ceased altogether; yet in spite of every improvement the
native soil was no longer able to support the population on the basis of the prevailing land law.
The German Reich eventually had to import 20% of its food needs. Its hard-coal production
amounted to 190 million tonnes annually, its consumption 157 million tonnes. ⅖ of the iron ore
required by Reich-German industry had to be imported.
 52

Let us now consider the consequences of the Versailles Peace. Through the loss of the Saar
region, and through the coal deliveries made to France, Belgium, and Italy, only 70 million
tonnes of our total annual coal production remain. The loss of Upper Silesia has further reduced
this amount by half. The cessation of Lorraine means the loss of ¾ of all iron production, so that
scarcely more than ⅕ of our peacetime iron requirements can be met by domestic ores.

If one also takes into account our financial hardship, which inevitably must manifest itself in an
increasingly scandalous tax burden, * then the inevitable consequence is a curtailing of industry
or a wide-ranging reduction in the living standards of all those employed in it, and consequently
also a reduction in the living standards of the entire population, for approximately half earn their
daily bread working in industry.

If anything the situation is even worse in the area of nutrition. Among the territories lost there
were also those with highly-developed agriculture and with small population densities. As a result
of their loss, not only has a good part of the domestic food supply also been forfeited, but at the
same time the average population density in the Reich has risen from 120 to 128.

All in all this means that at least 10 million people would have to leave today’s German Reich in
order to secure pre-War living conditions for the rest. A further 10 million are left to languish
miserably in Austria and in Czechia, as well as in Poland, Romania, etc. Clemenceau’s words
that, “There are 20 million Germans too many in the world,” hover before us in all their
remorseless harshness and cruelty.

Where can we move the excess population of the Reich? To England or America? They already
have enough unemployed, which is why both are resistant against immigration. To the overseas
settlements? Those are gone.

No matter how we may look at it, the task is insoluble via hitherto conventional means. One day
the so-called Policy of Fulfilment – i.e., the enslavement of the German Volk to Entente
capitalism, or to Jewish world loan-capital, which is the same thing – will come to an end, even if
only inadvertently. And what then? Then, presumably, the French invade and occupy parts of
the Reich. But Napoleon I eventually discovered that it was in a disarmed Spain in particular
(1807) that he first came to know the limits of his power.

Today’s France would fare no differently. Of course, those who now stand at the helm of the
Reich – a Reich which was once led by the likes of a Bismarck – tremble before this possibility,
just as they tremble even over that semblance of power still remaining to them. But destiny is

*
The most important items from the Reich Budget:
 53

stronger than human beings, and it brings within reach that moment when more will collapse
than the German Reich! Should the iron ring of Versailles break, then Jewish world-capitalism
also must fall, and that can only occur after the first “Impossible!” issues from German mouths.
Of course, this would also signify the beginning of a period of suffering for our Volk. Such would
have to be endured, because there can be no salvation without sacrifice. But then comes the era
of National Socialism. The future belongs to it. It will establish the new, truly German Reich,
whose first deed must consist of a resolution of the land question [Bodenfrage] and with it the
homestead question [Heimstättenfrage], for the German should again stand as a free man on
free soil!

This is where doubts arise. We hear people question where the land is to come from. Now, so
far as is possible, it will be sourced from within the borders of today’s Reich. But if the
Lebensraum there becomes too constrictive for our Volk then it will inevitably, driven by
necessity, have to push forth yet again whence our ancestors once marched: To the East!
Bolshevism has certainly made sure that there are fewer people there.

If a part of our industry has also been lost then this is not the worst possible thing, because the
loss does not necessarily have to result in others profiting at our expense. What has Czechia got,
for example, through its sacking of the bulk of the former Austria’s industry? Many things which
to us seem valuable in fact have only a nominal value. Real value lies in the labor force, and in a
Volk’s unbroken will to live. Both seem lost to us today. But they are not. The iron hardship
which – unless all indications are deceptive – will soon come upon us will awaken both of them
anew.

We thus look to the future unbowed and unbroken. Though it may be far in the distance and
still shrouded in fog, we nonetheless see it rising, the goal for which we are fighting:

A free, social Pan-Germany!

To prepare for this creation, to work towards it with a fiery heart and a tenacious will, steadfast
and confident, is the duty of

National Socialism!
 54

Part Two:
Development and Documents
of National Socialism
Introduction.
National Socialism is not merely the programme of a political party; nor is it an artificial invention
or the creation of some egghead or ambitious careerist. If it were, then the movement which
carries its standard would have long since perished in the tempests which have raged around it,
instead of outlasting them to time and again plant the storm-banner anew – often atop the rubble.

What we call National Socialism is so much more. It is a Weltanschauung. It can exist quite well
without the National Socialist Party, and indeed has existed without it, as our observations so far
have demonstrated. Even if it arose in its purest form within our Volk, it has never remained
confined solely within their borders. Similar phenomena and movements have arisen, and
indeed tend to arise more commonly, among other races [Völkern]. Indeed, one can honestly
say that it was only in our Volk that alien Marxism – which, incidentally, is not socialism at all –
was able to win over the masses, while the socialists of other peoples were and are consistent
National Socialists, more or less.

We are accused of not having a doctrinal system such as that possessed by Marxism. But is that
necessary? What our forebears forged and created, what Fichte, Friedrich List, and Adolf
Wagner taught, was nothing other than National Socialism. We could also call it German
Socialism, because the ideas and emotions which live within it are tied to no other Volk so
intimately as they are to ours. What other peoples call ‘socialism’ is simply not the same as what
we mean by the term; their interpretation is more surface than substance, arising more out of
imitation than from an inner compulsion.

Every movement requires time; the historic hour for each strikes eventually. If they also seek to
be effective, then they need an instrument which is at their disposal unconditionally, without
reservation! A rousing idea alone is not enough. This idea is, of course, the substance, the core.
But it requires a vessel. And so the German National Socialist Party is its instrument and the
vessel which it fills. Not the only one, of course, because alongside the political movement the
trade-unions and cooperatives operate on the same foundations. Even if these are in the main
politically colorless, i.e., not directly associated with the party, their work still moves – whether
consciously or unconsciously – along the same channels, so that they too can be considered
instruments of National Socialism.90

How did it come about that the concept of National Socialism – first unconsciously, then clearly
and consciously – found its embodiment in this movement which is considered to be the bearer
of its will? A brief historical review of this topic should prove instructive to us.
 55

The Development of National Socialism.

The Sudetenland of old Austria was the cradle of German National Socialism. Although
Naumann and Damaschke attempted to establish a National Social Party in the German Reich
during the 1890s,91 that development mainly occurred later, and even then it did not really get
beyond an experiment because it was undertaken with ineffectual means. The struggle against
alien Marxism can never be carried out by a woolly social movement, likely still permeated with
foreign elements, but only by a strictly völkisch and socialist movement. It must be able to see
the whole picture, and in a certain sense it must be revolutionary. If, out of a clear recognition of
the driving forces of economic life, it rejects economic revolution, if it here instead treads the
path of reform, then there is still one thing which it must never, ever reject: spiritual and also –
with the way things stand today – political revolution. And one thing must it not shy away from:
Struggle! What is meant by this is not a cheap struggle conducted with the tongue, but the
dedication of one’s entire personality, i.e., of one’s life, the moment that the hour calls. Socialism
is not peaceable; it cannot be and must not be. Peacefulness is the ideal of stuffed-shirts, not of
socialists!

The German National Socialist movement arose in the conflict-ridden region of the Sudetenland.
Born from ethnic struggle, over time its objectives also became economic struggle and – in
conjunction with it – spiritual struggle. At the end of the 1880s, local German-national workers’
and journeymen’s associations appeared, first in German-Bohemia, then in Moravia and Silesia.
Originally they were neither unionist nor political in nature, but were instead for the most part
protective associations directed against the inundation of German settlement areas by Slavic –
predominantly Czech – labor, which German entrepreneurship, consumed with the
Mammonistic spirit, brought in based upon its cheapness and without any corresponding
resistance from Social-Democrats, in spite of their internationalist mania for equality and justice.
German businessmen and German Social-Democrats established and encouraged the Czech
minorities in the German settlement area of the Sudetenland.

Present at the birth of the German-national labor movement were the journeyman bookbinder
Ludwig Vogel, who passed away 30 years ago, and the typesetter Ferdinand Burschofsky, who as
our eldest is still active in the movement today (currently a city councillor and typesetter in the
North Moravian township of Hohenstadt).

Politically, as might be expected, the movement ended up in the orbit of the Pan-German Party
under Schönerer. At the end of the ’90s an effort was made to merge the hitherto loosely-
associated workers’ associations into a unified organization. This effort, for which Burschofsky
in particular campaigned with all his energy, was successful, and in 1898 the Mährisch-Trübauer
Verband was established.92 Regrettably it was not granted a long life; as early as 1902 it perished
under the influence of the quarrel which had erupted in the Pan-German Party between Wolf
and Schönerer.

Something new now had to be painstakingly created from the ruins. If bourgeois circles today
accuse our movement of not fulfilling, or of only inadequately fulfilling, our most important task
– winning over the German manual worker – then let them be reminded of the Wolf-Schönerer
dispute, as well as of the fact that the so-called support for the German workers by the
bourgeoisie, enthroned on high in their positions of ownership, has always extended at best
merely to clumsily-made declarations of goodwill which, incidentally, were never actually asked
for. But whenever the moment called for the promotion of the movement with deeds, the
bourgeoisie instead only ever impeded it, adding insult to injury93 through their employment of
 56

Slavic workers and their deplorable lack of social insight. Municipal offices in particular, with
their nepotism and cronyism, have often been a refuge for these bourgeois-reactionary views.
The only politician of repute with a genuine understanding for the situation of his poorer folk-
comrades was Georg Schönerer, who passed away in 1921. He, who was the primary trailblazer
of the völkisch movement, will always be held by us in the highest esteem.

The unedifying conditions in the Pan-German movement, which was originally conceived of as
a grass-roots movement, inevitably led to the evolution of a unique political and trade-unionist
tendency. This tendency reached its consummation in 1904 with the founding of the “German
Workers’ Party.” In its principles, the thus-named Trautenau Programme, the party demanded
– as the National Socialists do today – a partial socialization in the form of economic
nationalization and provincialization.94 One would therefore be perfectly correct in regarding this
programme as a socialist one.

The party could not really make much headway at first. The original foundation for such a
movement, the manual workers united within the Mährisch-Trübauer Verband, had been largely
dispersed following its break-up; the intellectual workers, meanwhile, for the most part stood
behind K.H. Wolf within the Free Pan-German (later German-Radical) camp. It was not until
1909 that things changed for the better. A number of intellectual workers with trade-union
backgrounds joined the party, mostly from the German-Radical movement. These were the
“young guns,”95 who have since that time, of course, already reached middle-age. In 1911 the
party captured three seats in the Austrian Reichsrat (Knirsch, Fahrner, Seidl†); in 1913 it won
three more in the Moravian Landtag (Jung, Prayon†, Rogelböck†).

In 1912 the idea of reviewing and revising the party principles began to seriously be considered.
Jung was entrusted with the preparatory work. At the Iglau Party Conference (1913) the platform
was broadened and deepened, even if it was not taken as far as the rapporteur wished, who
already at that time was advocating for the inclusion of land-reform and monetary-reform (the
fight against ground-rent and interest) within the party principles. In 1918 – in the interim no
Party Conferences were able to take place – this finally occurred; at the same time, the party’s
now more clearly-defined socialist character was also reflected in the adoption of its new name.

The outbreak of war struck the party just as it had begun a wide-ranging expansion of its branches
across Moravia and Silesia, an effort which the War brought to a standstill here as elsewhere.

In 1915, Reichsrat deputy Seidl, the party’s most formidable speaker, fell as a military volunteer
in the eastern theatre of war. Prayon also died that same year. Of the party’s leading officials,
only Gattermayer and Jung remained behind; all the work rested upon their shoulders. There
was little opportunity for any discussion of organizational activity on their part, particularly as one
lived in Vienna, the other in Iglau, and both were overworked jobwise. It was a tough time, and
yet the party managed to weather it out. If every now and then one of the other leading officials
was able to return for a brief period of leave from the front, then conferences would be held. In
1915, following one such meeting, Jung drafted the Outline for a Homesteads for Soldiers Act
(see the first edition),96 and in November he wrote the Memorandum of the German Workers’
Party. This summarized everything that the party had to say regarding Austria’s völkisch and
socio-economic reorganization. It was presented to then Minister-President Stürgkh on 12
December, 1915. *

*
Already in the 1913 programme (the Iglau Programme) the party had called for “the dissolution of the Crown
Lands and the creation of new, self-governing regions determined on the basis of ethnic settlement.” As the first of
such measures it demanded the “provincial bipartition of Bohemia,” but this demand met with opposition from all
 57

In May 1917, after a more than four-year hiatus, the Austrian Reichsrat convened once again.
The party’s representation had dwindled down to just Knirsch and Fahrner as a consequence of
Seidl’s death. In this assembly, an institution which lasted until the Empire’s collapse, Knirsch
put forward a significant bill on July 3rd, 1917. It pertained to the establishment of homesteads
for soldiers (based on the aforementioned draft outline). A second submission, for the
reorganization of the state according to regions of ethnic settlement – thus involving the
implementation of so-called völkisch self-government or national autonomy, the essential
features of which were included in the aforementioned Memorandum – did not progress beyond
the purview of the German National Association97 (see the Parliamentary Accountability Report
of 1918). A proposal tabled by Fahrner on July 1st, 1917, demanded the redevelopment of the
economic centers. On 23rd January, 1918, Knirsch delivered a comprehensive speech in the
Reichsrat against the orgies of hatred which had broken out against the German Reich and many
others under the government’s sympathetic connivance.

All of these factors meant, in the end, that the German National Socialist Party was the only
German-völkisch party of old Austria to survive the state’s collapse.

On 21st October, 1918, in the Constituent National Assembly of German-Austria, deputy Knirsch
made a sincere avowal to Pan-Germany – a notable contrast to the partly-dismissive, partly-
meandering declarations made by the party-chairmen representing the Christian Social, Social-
Democratic, and German-National bourgeoisie, none of whom were willing to relinquish the
idea of a Danubian Federation or the Habsburg Empire.

Knirsch’s historically-momentous declaration, as well as a second, equally-important speech

which was delivered on 1st June, 1920, at the People’s Assembly in Prague, are both included
under the “Documents of National Socialism” in the following chapter.

In the meantime, within the German Reich two groups of an identical nature had emerged – the
German Socialists and the Bavarian National Socialists. On the 7th and 8th of August, 1920, all the
National Socialists of German-Austria, the German Reich, and Czechia united in Salzburg to
form the

National Socialist Party of the German Volk.

In 1921 the movement even began to spread from Bielitz into Poland. The following chapter
lays out the guiding principles for the entire movement, as well as the deliberations and
resolutions which are important to it. The Outline for a Homesteads for Soldiers Act and the
complete Guiding Principles of the German-Austrian and Sudeten (Czechoslovakian) Party
Group can be found in the first edition of this book.98

the remaining German parties, who chose to stick with Prague as the common capital. What the timely
implementation of this measure would have meant during the collapse of the Empire probably does not require
further elaboration.
 58

Documents of National Socialism.

Guiding Principles of the National Socialist Party of the German Volk.
(Adopted at the Inter-State Representatives’ Congress of 7th and 8th August, 1920, at Salzburg.)

The German National Socialist Party seeks the uplift and liberation of the German working-
classes from economic, political, and spiritual oppression and their full equality in all areas of
völkisch and state life.

It professes itself unreservedly to the cultural community and the community of fate of the
German Volk, and is convinced that only within the natural limits of his folkdom [Volkstums]
can the worker achieve full value for his labor and intelligence.

It therefore rejects amalgamation on a multi-ethnic [allvölkischer] basis as unnatural. An

improvement in economic and social conditions is attainable only through the cooperation of all
workers on the soil of their own people. Not revolution and class struggle, * but purposeful,
creative reform work alone can overcome today’s untenable social conditions. Private property
in itself is not malign, insofar as it arises from one’s own honest labor, serves labor, and is limited
in size so as not to damage the common good. We reject, however, all forms of unearned income,
such as ground-rent, interest, and usurious profits squeezed from the misery of one’s fellow man.
Against them we stridently advocate the value of productive labor!

The private economy can never be wholly or violently abolished, yet all forms of social property
should exist alongside it and be increasingly expanded. We advocate unconditionally for all large-
scale capitalist enterprises which constitute private monopolies to be transferred into the
possession of the state, province (völkisch self-governing bodies), or municipality.

We see the guiding principles for future progress in the purposeful conversion of all others into
cooperative property by steadily increasing the profit-sharing of all those who work within them,
whether physically or intellectually.

The National Socialist Workers’ Party is no narrow class party; it represents the interests of all
honest, productive labor in general. It is a liberal [freiheitliche] and strictly völkisch party and
hence combats all reactionary tendencies, all clerical, noble, and capitalist privileges, and every
racially-foreign influence – but above all does it combat the overwhelming power of the Jewish-
commercial spirit in all areas of public life.

The influence of work and skill in state and society is our goal, the economic and political unity
of the working German Volk the means to this end.

We demand therefore:

1. Consolidation of the entire area of German settlement in Europe into a democratic, social
German Reich, with the most vigorous protection for all our Volk inhabiting areas ruled by
foreign peoples;

*
In the third paragraph of the principles, delete the words “and class struggle” after the word “revolution.” In the
sixth paragraph, instead of “the German National Socialist Party is no narrow class party; it represents the interests
of all honest, productive labor,” substitute: “the German National Socialist Party is the class party of productive
labor.”99
 59

2. Equal and universal suffrage in provinces and municipalities following their prior völkisch
safeguarding; creation of second parliamentary chambers on the basis of occupational
representation;

3. The moral renewal of our Volk, and the development of their religious life in the German
spirit;

4. Protection against any interference in the exercise of national rights, in particular against the
utilization of wage conditions and terms of employment to restrict personal rights to self-
determination;

5. Crackdown against party rule, in particular through the introduction of plebiscites

(referendums) for all far-reaching laws in Reich, state, and province; creation of a People’s Army
[Volksheer].

Resolutions by the Inter-State Representatives’ Congress of the National Socialists of Greater

Germany in Linz.
(13th and 14th August, 1921.)

The resolutions of the Linz Congress cited in the footnote on page 58 are based on decisions made at the
Sudetenland Party Conference at Troppau, 25th – 27th September 1920, which read as follows:

Motion by [Max] Karg:

“The words ‘the German National Socialist Party is no narrow class party’ shall be
replaced by: ‘the German National Socialist Party commits itself to the class standpoint
of productive labor.’”

Motion by Jung:
“The words ‘and class struggle’ shall be deleted.”

Resolution by Jung:
“In economic life there are only two major groups, which stand in opposition to one
another – the one, which performs productive work; and the other, which receives
unearned income. The German National Socialist Party declares, ‘that it commits itself
to the class standpoint of productive labor.’ It is therefore a class party. In its view,
however, the concept of ‘class’ does not encompass some narrowly-defined occupational
category, such as physical and intellectual workers alone; instead ‘workers’ are, according
to its conception, all those who live from the earnings of their own honest – intellectual
or physical – labor, in other words, the entire mass of the economically vulnerable among
our Volk.

“The party further declares that it stands upon the ground of class struggle, insofar as this
is understood to mean the confrontation between productive labor and unearned
income. This struggle, however, should not be decided through social revolution, but
instead should be decided by way of reforms for the benefit of productive labor.

“On the basis of these considerations, the Party Conference mandates that the entire
party leadership take steps to ensure that all National Socialist groups accede to this
position and that it is expressed clearly and firmly in the Guiding Principles of the
National Socialist Party of the German Volk.”
 60

Supplement to the Guiding Principles for the Czechoslovakian State’s Sphere of Influence.

The following resolutions, which were composed on the 25th of August, 1919, in a joint session of the
provincial party leaderships of Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia, and which were approved at the Party
Conference in Dux (15th and 16th of November, 1919), represent a supplement to and a clarification of
the existing Guiding Principles.

I. Political Declaration
Adherence to the Right to Self-Determination. – The Demand for the Self-Government of
Ethnically-Demarcated Areas.

At the joint meeting of 25th August, 1919 in Aussig, the Bohemian, Moravian, and Silesian state
party leaderships of the German National Socialist Party declare that:

With complete disregard for the loudly- and solemnly-proclaimed ‘right to self-determination’,
our Volk have been sacrificed to Czech imperialism against their will. Almost 4 million Germans
will – there is no longer any doubt – be incorporated into the Czechoslovakian state.

Deceived by parties of an internationalist orientation, the German Volk disarmed themselves.

As things stand there is currently nothing left to do but to submit to this ruling, based as it is upon
the military power of the Entente...

The least that can be done to make life in this state bearable for us Germans is the granting of
complete self-government on the basis of nationally-demarcated areas.

We urge the German Volk in the Sudetenland not to give up hope. A Volk of our strength, of
our cultural accomplishments, can perhaps be overwhelmed at an unfortunate moment, but they
cannot be permanently subjugated. Spiritual and moral purification, economic revitalization,
uniting in organizations founded upon national and social self-help – these will pave the way for
our völkisch renewal.

II. Against the Nationalization Policy.

The National Socialist programme calls for the transfer of those large industrial enterprises which
have a monopolistic character, and which are therefore capable of bringing harm to the common
good, into the possession of the state, province, or municipality. Furthermore, it also calls for the
expropriation of large estates by the state and their division into small and medium-sized
farmsteads.

The specific national circumstances within the region of the Czechoslovakian state, as well as the
position adopted by our party with respect to our Volk’s vital living requirements, make it our
party’s duty to review all these fundamental demands.

The joint meeting of the Bohemian, Moravian, and Silesian state party leaderships of the German
National Socialist Party, held at Aussig on the 25th of August, 1919, declares that the party will
roundly reject any form of economic nationalization within the Czechoslovakian state. Instead,
nationalization should be superseded primarily by municipalization and secondarily by
provincialization, whereby the term “province” is understood to refer only to national, self-
governing territories.
 61

The party is committed to a generous land reform which aims in particular at making the
workforce feel rooted to their home soil [bodenständig]; this is the best way to protect German
labor and the German workplace within German territory. Likewise, the workforce (physical and
intellectual workers both) are to be granted a share of the profits within their enterprises, thereby
giving them an interest in the revenue.

III. National-Cultural Work.

An Overview of all Völkisch and Cultural Work.

The desperate plight of the German Volk within the Czech state makes it essential that they pool
all their intellectual, cultural, and economic forces. Any division must be avoided.

For this reason the joint meeting of the Bohemian, Moravian, and Silesian state party leaderships
of the German National Socialist Party, held on the 25th of August, 1919, considers it necessary
to declare its position as follows:

In the völkisch-cultural field, the unification of all those protective associations and organizations
whose mission is the national education of the Volk is regarded as essential; this union would
have to take place within a German cultural association. Its task would be to fundamentally enrich
the entire national life of our Volk.

Furthermore, the importance of the economic question must not be overlooked. Our economic
life must also become national, through and through. To this end it is necessary to organize even
the monetary system on a völkisch basis and, before anything else, to consolidate into a single
bank all those banks which are predominantly German in their management and membership.
This single bank should not serve the lust for power of individual capitalist groups, however. It
must instead be a genuine People’s Bank [Volksbank], established on the broadest democratic
foundation. Its purpose is the accumulation and provision of all the finances required in our
national-economic life.

Constitutional Declaration
of the German National Socialist Party, delivered on 21st October, 1918, to the Constituent National
Assembly of German-Austria in the Vienna Landhaus by deputy Hans Knirsch.

“We National Socialists reject from the outset the idea of uniting German-Austria with a
confederation of the Slavic states which emerged out of the old Austrian Empire. In the national,
social, and cultural interest we instead demand German-Austria’s constitutional Anschluss to the
German Reich as a federal state.

“The settlement of diplomatic and trade relations with our newly-established neighboring states
can only be carried out under consideration for the collective interests of the whole of
Germandom; it must therefore be the concern of all the federal states unified within the German
Reich.

“Only in a unified German state can we Germans of the Eastern March [Ostmarkdeutsche] hope
to realize those state-socialist principles which will heal the wounds caused by this war and which
will lead our 80 million Volk into a prosperous future of work and activity.

Long live free, social Pan-Germany!”

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Constitutional Declaration
of the German National Socialist Workers’ Party, delivered on 1st June, 1920 to the Czechoslovakian
National Assembly in Prague by deputy Dr. Rudolf Jung

“After Austria’s collapse, the Reichsrat delegates elected as a consequence of the implementation
of universal, equal, and direct suffrage, and representing the German territories of the
Sudetenland, exercised that right to self-determination so solemnly preached by the Allied and
Associated Powers and, with the unanimous assent of the population, joined together to form
the provinces of German-Bohemia, the Sudetenland, German South Moravia, and the
Bohemian Forest District. These territories were just as unanimous in proclaiming their desire
to be annexed to German-Austria.

“Contrary to this demonstration of the will of the entire Sudeten-German Volk, however, and
contrary to every principle of international law, these territories were forcibly occupied – partly
under the title of a power allied with the Entente, partly with reference to the armistice agreement
concluded on 4th November, 1918.100 Through the Peace Treaty of St. Germain they were
incorporated into the Czechoslovakian Republic under the rationale (a rationale which goes
against all historical fact) that these German provinces had joined the new state of their own ‘free
will’. This incorporation was openly carried out in complete disregard for the right to self-
determination proclaimed by the Allied and Associated Powers. Representatives of the territories
mentioned above were not involved in the Treaty of St. Germain. They were neither consulted,
nor were their protests and warnings heard. The Sudeten-Germans were also denied the
possibility of a free referendum on their national affiliation.

“We German National Socialists hereby declare before the world, at the moment when we enter
the National Assembly of the Czechoslovakian Republic, that the provisions of the Peace Treaty
of St. Germain relating to the arrangement of the national territory of the Czechoslovakian
Republic constitute a monstrous historical lie and that we will never recognize this treaty as a
source of law. The perpetuation of the injustice committed against the German Volk is an
impediment to world peace and to the economic renewal of Europe; it is only by the free will of
a Volk alone that state associations can be brought together to provide a secure basis for social
reconstruction and for the exchange of all cultural achievements.

“We will raise our voices at any time on the soil of the Czechoslovakian state and in its first
elected parliament in support of this conviction, and we will expend all of our strength for the
inherent rights and independent existence of our Volk, until they have the same right as other
peoples: the right to free self-determination.

“Participation in the legislature of this state shall not compromise our legal perspective in any
way.

“Our Volk’s welfare and the achievement of their freedom will be our supreme law!”
 63

Part Three:
Goals of National Socialism
Introduction.
The explanations here have been preceded by the key documents of National Socialism. These
are, in the main, the Guiding Principles of the National Socialist Party of the German Volk, i.e.,
the guiding principles of the party-groups in the German Reich, in Austria, in Czechia, and in
Poland; and the Constitutional Declaration which was delivered to the Constituent National
Assembly of German-Austria in 1918. Alongside these there is the Supplement to the Guiding
Principles for the Czechoslovakian State’s Sphere of Influence, which naturally also applies to
Poland and to all other multinational states [Völkerstaat] created out of the peace diktats. For the
outcome of the work of Versailles, St. Germain, and Trianon consists largely of the violation of
the right to self-determination, as well as the Balkanization of Central Europe and western
Eastern Europe. One Austria-Hungary was shattered in order to establish several smaller ones
in its place. This Supplement is therefore merely the natural corollary to the Guiding Principles,
which set as their goal the national, unified state. For National Socialists this is just as self-evident
as is the Constitutional Declaration of 1918. But nothing is so obvious that it lies outside the
framework of our movement. All too often we have encountered accidental and deliberate
misinterpretations. Because we now consider clarity to be the first requirement for a successful
German folk-policy, we have detailed all the most significant declarations of our movement in
order to demonstrate not only to National Socialists, but also to everyone else, that the movement
is clearly and steadfastly striving towards its goals. That is why the Constitutional Declaration
delivered to the Prague National Assembly has also been cited.

The political goal of the National Socialist movement is – as already stated – the national, unified
German state, i.e., Pan-Germany. Naturally this Pan-Germany should be a state of the Germans;
it should be free and social. It should be free of all foreign influences, whether they originate
inside or outside of its borders, and it should be social, i.e., imbued with equal love and equal
justice for all of its children. With both of these goals we are already moving beyond the narrow
framework of a political party. National Socialism, as previously stated, is not just the programme
of a political party. It strives, purely and simply, for the reform of life itself. Its goals therefore lie
in the political, cultural, and economic fields, but all of these only within the limits of its own
Volk. How other races wish to build and furnish their homes is of no concern to us, so long as
they do not disturb us in ours. We have no intention of ruling or educating them, but neither do
we wish to allow them to lecture or abuse us.

All in all, what we are striving for is nothing more than what the likes of Fichte, Freiherr vom
Stein, or Friedrich List set for themselves as their goal. It can be summed up in just a few words:
It is the working-community101 of all who produce, or – if we prefer to make use of the admittedly
imperfect term “Volksgemeinschaft,” which is nonetheless still in common use today – the
reconciled Volksgemeinschaft.

Further discussion in following chapters, in which we will elaborate upon our Guiding Principles,
will validate this assertion. Our words are addressed to the entire Volk, whether they today be
friend or foe. But they are principally directed towards those whose thinking and feeling is aligned
with ours, or is at least analogous to it, i.e., to all newcomers to the efforts at renewal and
consolidation, to the youth associations, to the gymnasts,102 to the student youth. You are
 64

passionate, as must all those be who wish to ascend the stony path with us, far from the well-
trodden road of habit and convenience! At the forefront of our considerations is our commitment
to folkdom, for in our sense of the word the term “national” means “völkisch.”
 65

Our Commitment to Folkdom.

“It (the National Socialist Party) professes itself unreservedly to the cultural community and the
community of fate of the entire German Volk, and is convinced that only within the natural limits
of his folkdom can the worker achieve full value for his labor and intelligence.

“It therefore rejects amalgamation on a multi-ethnic basis as unnatural.”

These words can be found within our Guiding Principles. What do they mean to us?
Representatives of the so-called bourgeois-nationalist tendency claim to stand upon the ground
of what they call “pure nationalism.” They aim to give expression to the idea that, in order not
to tarnish our folkdom, occupational or class issues should not be associated with one’s
commitment towards it. They therefore prefer to call their political parties “people’s parties”
[Volksparteien], and stress that every folk-comrade can find acceptance and representation within
them. In the same breath, however, they also refer to them as “bourgeois,” and herein lies the
contradiction. In this day and age the bourgeoisie as a concept of class is just as absurd as is the
working-class of the Marxists (a term which, in essence, they understand only to encompass
manual workers), because, as we shall see, class divisions need to be evaluated differently today
from how they were four or five decades ago. Yet the word “bourgeoisie,” despite its lack of
actual substance, is still in use today. For a meaning does still lie behind it. To be bourgeois these
days means to hold fast to the prevailing conception and distribution of property. It also means,
more precisely, a strict adherence to Roman Law (above all to the land law), to the private
monopoly over natural resources, and to interest-slavery. In spiritual terms it means a loyalty to
materialism and therefore to the Jewish spirit. That is why the adherents of this tendency
represent not only the complete restoration of the former economic order but also, for the most
part, the restoration of the former state order along with its Roman-Jewish centralism. Pure
nationalism of this type thus incorporates various admixtures which cloud its purity quite
remarkably.

A second genus of bourgeoisie, the bourgeois-democrats, represent democracy in its principally

Westernized form, i.e., as the rule of the moneybags. Consequently they have always been the
most faithful shield-bearers for Jewry in its craving for world domination, which is too cowardly
to assert its demands openly and hence hides itself away behind all kinds of protective barriers.
In our case it is “freedom” which is raised as the shield. The essence of this “freedom,” however,
consists only of the freedom for Jewry not to be insulted, while under the protection of its shield-
bearers it reserves for itself the full freedom at any time to smear and belittle at its discretion
anything which does not suit it, as well as the freedom to wear down and contaminate its host
society both spiritually and physically. Economically the bourgeois-democrats are representatives
of the Golden International, morally they are champions of the Jewish spirit, and politically they
are the standard-bearers of Englishness upon German soil.

The Social-Democrats – or, in order to cover every group, the Marxists – although declaring
themselves to be pan-ethnic (internationalist), at the same time like to stress that they are the best
and, all things considered, that they are the only group who are genuinely völkisch. As grounds
for this assertion they put forward the claim that all their thoughts and energies are directed
towards the economic advancement of the broad masses of the population and towards the
elimination of that which is hostile towards them, capitalism. There might be something to be
said for this assertion if they were truly serious about capitalism’s overthrow. But there can be no
question of that, for the Marxist never, ever fights against loan-capital, which is truly harmful and
is concentrated primarily in Jewish hands. On the contrary, the Marxists in their various
manifestations – from the Second International (right), to the 2½ International (left), through to
 66

the Moscow Third International (communist) – instead constitute Jewry’s most faithful shock-
troops and protection-squads. The bourgeois-democrats are the officers, the Marxists the rank
and file.

The aforementioned assertion is also unconvincing from the perspective that those who stand
firmly upon the ground of propagating class-hatred among the entire Volk while outwardly
preaching pacifism (i.e., a love of peace taken so far that one is actually willing to renounce one’s
own freedom for it) have no right to speak of nationalism at all, for nationalism means a love for
one’s own Volk. Whoever loves their own Volk should certainly not be constantly exaggerating
its existing weaknesses while intentionally minimizing or even denying the faults of all others, as
the Marxists have done since the beginning. But neither should they – and this is their cardinal
sin – place the craving for wealth and possessions at the forefront of all their considerations, and
deliberately discourage the good instincts of the masses of the Volk. We do not blame the broad
masses of our Volk for this whatsoever. They are better than the Marxists and their right-wing
adversaries commonly assume. Above all they are willing to make sacrifices, and are still capable
of showing enthusiasm while doing so, evidence that they remain healthy in their core. One only
has to know how to awaken these good instincts. The 4th of August 1914, and the plebiscites in
Prussia, Schleswig, Carinthia, Upper Silesia, Tyrol, and Salzburg following the collapse in the
Sudetenland are all evidence enough that the Marxist-Jewish spirit has not yet wreaked such
devastation among our Volk as one might fear, that this spirit is instead only a veneer under
which the good spirit of our Volk still lives. (Excluding, of course, the Marxist intellectuals).
Marxism, however, is something foreign, something completely incompatible with the German
character. It cannot provide us with the fertile soil required for a wholehearted commitment to
our folkdom.

The same is true for clericalism or ultramontanism, which in recent times have usually appeared
under the guise of Christian Socialism. Christian Socialism pretends that it desires nothing more
than to restructure life according to Christian principles. The masses who make up its adherents
certainly believe this; they make an honest effort to try and serve the Volk to the best of their
abilities. But things here are exactly the same as they are with Marxism: What is said is not what
is truly strived after in reality, and what is actually strived after is prudently concealed. Clericalism
has set itself the goal of re-establishing the rule of the Spanish-Roman Papal Church. It receives
its secret orders from a power that lies outside of our Volk, indeed, one that has been – as our
history teaches – frequently hostile to it. Even if, like Marxism, it is not always able to entice the
masses into open treachery against their own Volk, it still binds and weakens them often enough.

Aside from these decidedly political movements there are also others which are no less
dangerous, such as, for example, the Freemasons. Concealed behind their pretext of serving
purely humanistic ideals is Jewry’s pursuit of world domination.

In briefly summarizing what we have discussed so far, the following picture emerges: Every
endeavour of a political, cultural, or economic nature which is based upon ostensibly humanist
ideals, or which makes its position towards folkdom dependent upon any kinds of terms and
conditions, cannot be regarded by we National Socialists as a clear commitment to folkdom. We
commit ourselves “wholeheartedly,” i.e., without qualifications or reservations, to our Volk, who
are a community of culture and a community of fate. Whether they choose this or that form of
government, or this or that economic constitution, whether they are the best Volk or the worst,
is of no consequence to us. In our eyes however they truly are the best, because they are a Volk
of producers, i.e., a people who are creatively inclined and who are therefore thoroughly
multifaceted in everything that they do. In spite of the fact that the individual can only produce
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in association with others, i.e., within the “working-community” as O. Dickel terms it in his book
The Resurrection of the West,103 and although we are as a people – to make use of a bromide –
fanatical clubgoers,104 it is still difficult to bring us all together under one roof. Consensus is not
easy for us; in other words, we are not a herd-race [Herdenvolk]. That may be regrettable at
times, yet it is one of the purest, most productive aspects of our Germanic heritage; it must not
be excised, because it enables us to yield the highest of achievements.

This characteristic is what distinguishes us from other races; we should not concern ourselves
with seeking to emulate or to understand them. We will never penetrate their spiritual and
intellectual world, and they will never penetrate ours. That is why we hold the opinion that it is
folkdom which defines the natural limits of our abilities; for this reason we reject internationalism
(cosmopolitanism, pan-folkdom), no matter what motives it may arise from and no matter what
guise it may be garbed in.

Of course, internationalism – albeit an internationalism on a grander scale, one which has nothing
to do with the caricature of today, which manifests in the form it does as a consequence of
ignorance – has always run like a crimson thread through German history. It arises from two
different sources, because two different peoples are its representatives. Both are Germanic, both
have an intrinsic, Faustian urge toward the infinite. Whether they like it or not they are compelled
to seek out vast expanses, which in political terms means to strive after world conquest. One is
Gothic Man. He is personified by our medieval kings and Kaisers. As the Godhead’s elect they
felt themselves called to rule over Christendom. In the decaying Rome of the centuries around
the turn of the first millennium they established order, and lifted the papacy out of the filth and
depravity. That was their destiny, for this purified papacy became the most dangerous enemy of
German kingship in the struggle for control over Christendom. While we may upbraid them for
this, we must still admire these royal dynasties, the Saxons, Salians, and Staufens. The very same
universal idea was alive within the knightly orders, and then passed over to the Spaniards. The
Viennese Court of the Habsburgs inherited it from them. It still lives on today within the Papal
Church. It is therefore no wonder that the Catholic International finds such tireless advocates
upon German soil.

The second sub-type of Germanic blood which is representative of the idea of world conquest
constitutes those men who have Viking blood in their veins. They share the compulsion for far
horizons, for unmeasured expanses. But what drives them is of a fundamentally different nature
than what drives Gothic Man. They seek to conquer in accordance with the right of domination,105
not in service of a divine idea. Their goal is to acquire riches, to seize plunder. Such people
created the British Empire. There were always some of this type in Germany, too; an inner urge
previously drove them to the West, to America, because they felt that in Germany there was
insufficient land available to satisfy their compulsive need for activity. Already akin to the Anglo-
Saxons in their thinking and feeling, once far afield they quickly became fully Anglicized. After
the founding of the new German Reich this class of people also found an opportunity for activity
upon German soil.

Alongside these two distinctive human types there is yet another sort walking about upon German
soil, a kind of half-Englishman. They lack the competence and courage to become whole, and
so instead they merely imitate the Englishman, producing a caricature of him at best. These are
the petty-bourgeois democrats, whose veins flow with water or ink instead of blood. They have
no desire to be subordinate, they do not have what it takes to be revolutionaries, so instead they
swagger about as beer-hall intellectuals.106 They represent the type of German democrats who
played a leading role in the Frankfurt National Assembly and in that of Weimar after the collapse,
 68

and who carried out the caricature-revolutions of 1848 and 1918. Included in their number are
the leaders of the bourgeoisie and, since Bebel’s death (the only great leader which Marxism ever
produced in Germany), also those of Social-Democracy. Incapable of conceiving of a grand new
idea and of putting it into practice themselves, they instead paddle about in Jewry’s wake, thus
representing a thoroughly un-German International. Their spiritual leader is the born
internationalist, the Jew. The struggle should therefore be directed against them first and
foremost if the free, social Pan-Germany is to arise!
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The Concept of Freedom and Defensive Readiness.

“It (the National Socialist Party) is a liberal [freiheitliche] and strictly völkisch party and hence
combats all reactionary tendencies, all ecclesiastical, noble, and capitalist privileges, and every
racially-foreign influence – but above all does it combat the overwhelming power of the Jewish-
commercial spirit in all areas of public life.”

Further: “4. Protection against any interference in the exercise of national rights, namely against
the utilization of wage conditions and terms of employment to restrict the personal right to self-
determination;

“5. Measures to combat all forms of party-rule, in particular through the introduction of
plebiscites (referendums) for all far-reaching laws in Reich, State, and Land; creation of a People’s
Army.” (Guiding Principles of the N.S. Party)

“Freedom, that which I love, that which fills my heart,” sang the poet,107 thereby telling us that
freedom is something which cannot be explained rationally, but is something which must be felt.
Now, because freedom is a matter of emotion, it will be different for every Volk. English, French,
Germans, Czechs, etc., all feel differently, and therefore all also interpret the concept of freedom
differently. There are even different gradations within the individual races. Let us take the
Germans, for example. Does the supposedly revolutionary communist – who is certainly imbued
with the conviction that he is a thoroughly free-thinking person, standing far above the arch-
reactionary bourgeoisie – truly have a feeling for freedom when he, as is so often the case in the
German Reich, runs to the representatives of the Entente in order to sabotage his differently-
minded countrymen? Or when, for the same reason, he calls upon the help of the Czech
authorities, who are thoroughly imbued with the police spirit and are, moreover, capitalist? Is
not the exact same question relevant in regards to those bourgeois elements who, in their anxiety
over their property, appeal to alien peoples to protect them? And what about press censorship,
the prohibition on the publication of newspapers, as well as the forcible integration of people
into organizations?

In light of all the things which have happened to the German Volk since the days of the
Revolution, after all the lamentable manifestations of servility and indignity, all the errors of an
overstretched centralism, one might well doubt the very existence of a feeling of freedom.
However, we need to keep in mind that every great upheaval – and such is indeed what we are
presently in the middle of – is full of confusion and atrocities, and that brutal people, who tend
to be the most involved in these phenomena, are generally cowards within the depths of their
souls and are therefore not free at all, but are instead merely of a servile disposition. Only the
courageous are truly free. Alien to them is the pitiful fear of death which makes cowardly people
tremble, and hence makes them servile. That is why courage and the feeling of freedom, and
therefore also one’s readiness to defend themselves, belong together. One is inconceivable
without the other. But defensive readiness108 – if that is to serve as our touchstone – must be
voluntary and not coerced, because courage cannot be forced.

At present our Volk seem to have given up their capacity for self-defence altogether. It used to
be said that, “If anyone wants a disastrous war, then let him pick a quarrel with the Germans,”109
and wherever there was a fight, there the Germans were sure to be. Today anyone can trample
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upon them at will. * The old master Goethe bequeathed us the following wonderful words as a
legacy:

“Cowardly thinking, timorous shrinking,

Womanly hesitation, nervous lamentation
Mend not our misery, nor set us free.
Keep true to yourself, in the face of all might,
Never bow down, for to show you have fight
Will call forth the arms of the Gods to your side.”110

In these most fateful of days, this verse should always be hovering before the eyes of those who
lead our Volk.

What is a Volk’s feeling of freedom? Is it merely a matter of being delivered from state
interference perpetuated by other races [Völker], or does the concept of freedom imply
something of greater substance?

We will attempt to explain this in the following remarks, although it must be emphasized yet
again that we are dealing here with feelings, and that the dissection of feelings constitutes a
challenging place to begin. In any event, one thing seems certain: that freedom is as far removed
from fear and coercion as it is from wanton self-indulgence. It is precisely those who are truly
free, according to our conception, who are the most likely to fall into line when matters greater
than the welfare of one’s own dear self come into consideration. To us this seems to be a
fundamental characteristic of the German conception of freedom.

People talk so much about English freedom and portray it as a model. What does it consist of,
exactly? It encompasses all areas of public life. We have already stated previously (see the chapter
“At the Gates to the Future”) that in our view the English state is not actually a state at all, but a
society of private individuals. This is readily explainable as stemming from the merchant spirit of
this race. And yet the same state which conferred complete freedom upon its Anglo-Saxon-
Norman citizenry enslaved the Irish in an unprecedented fashion. How can such contradictions
be explained? Well, they can be explained by the manner of rule of the Normans, who acquire
territories in order to exploit them, for whom it is less the people as such who matter than it is

*
State of the German Army’s disarmament on 1st July, 1921:
 71

their commodities and natural riches. In one circumstance, however – when it comes to the
ownership of land – this manner of rule leads to the enslavement of a people from the outset.
This is the case in Ireland, where land and soil belong entirely to the English nobility, who exploit
them in accordance with the Norman bandit-system [Raubsystem]. Despite the Anglo-Irish
Settlement, the Irish were and still are unfree even today, because they do not own the soil upon
which they live.

The freedom of the English citizen in matters of public life is a natural concomitant of the Viking
spirit which lives and works within him. Its hallmark is the free struggle of one man against
another, ending with the victory of the stronger. This is that which we call liberalism, and which
consistently leads to the state’s dissolution. In its place there emerges the society of private
individuals. Many Germans now reject economic liberalism; yet, oddly enough, the same people
tend to rhapsodize about political liberalism, even though the two logically belong together.

But even this much-vaunted English freedom is by no means so unspoilt as some would have us
believe. It does indeed encompass all areas of public life. But working in tandem with it is a kind
of internal torpor, an inner bondage which for we Germans would be simply unbearable.
Consider, for example, the rather ludicrously distorted observance of the Sabbath, which does
not arise out of any inner feeling whatsoever. In Oswald Spengler’s writing (from his Prussianism
and Socialism) we find the following noteworthy passage about English freedom, that infatuation
of the German democrat: “The Englishman pays for his practical freedom with the loss of the
other kind of freedom: he is inwardly a slave, whether as puritan, rationalist, sensualist, or
materialist. For two centuries now he has been the inventor of all philosophies that do away with
inner independence – most recently of Darwinism, which makes man’s entire mental state
causally dependent upon material forces and which, via the particularly slick form propagated by
Büchner and Haeckel,111 has become the Weltanschauung of the German philistine.” Further,
the passage goes on: “For him (the Englishman) there exists private action, but no private
thinking. His life is governed by a uniform, theologically-oriented philosophy of little real content,
as fashionable as a frockcoat and gloves. The term ‘herd instinct’ is appropriate here, if
anywhere.”

Outer freedom, inner bondage is – we are in full agreement with Spengler on this – the most
salient characteristic of the Englishman.

What does the Frenchman understand by freedom? His ideal of freedom is anarchy. Proof for
this can be seen in his reluctance towards any form of organization. In France, for example, the
trade-union idea never really gained much of a foothold. The Frenchman hates strenuous work,
preferring instead the making of grand gestures. He oscillates back and forth between the poles
of anarchy and despotism – that is, between complete disorder and utmost coercion. We can
find the following relevant passage about this in Spengler: “The French instinct is that power
should belong to no one. There should be no subordination, and therefore no order. Also no
state, in fact, nothing whatsoever; instead there should be equality for all, ideal anarchism, its
practice periodically reaffirmed (in 1799, 1851, 1871, and 1918) through the despotism of
generals and presidents.”

Looking into the deeper causes of this condition, in our view they lie in the fact that the French
are a bastard-race [ein Bastardvolk] who did away with their better Germanic racial elements
during the Great Revolution.112 This race is therefore doomed to die, in spite of all appearances
today which might suggest otherwise. The Czech neo-Hussite movement is, incidentally, closely
related in its essence to that of the French.
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What then is the essence of the German concept of freedom? In the truest sense of the word,
we find it difficult to assess such a thing. Strictly speaking, we Germans are not yet a Volk in the
manner of the English and the French, i.e., a great herd, but are still a collection of tribes which
exhibit variegated racial characteristics and a disparate course of development, and who still need
to thoroughly blend together first. The reasons for this lie in our history, and are laid bare with
reference to the diversity of the old German Reich with its innumerable city-states and regional
principalities. If we nonetheless seek to outline the German concept of freedom, then it must be
noted that, in our opinion, every Volk needs to have fought for their freedom as the Swiss once
did. Now, in one of the most important periods in German history, the Napoleonic Wars, only
two tribes willingly stood up for the sake of their freedom, and those were the Prussians and the
Tyroleans (i.e., the Baiuvarii). For the moment we will discuss the Prussian conception of
freedom, and will then see whether and to what extent it is generally applicable. To contrast it
with the French conception, we can once more quote from Spengler: “The German, or more
precisely, Prussian instinct was: power belongs to the totality. The individual serves the totality.
The totality is sovereign. The King is only the first servant of his state (to quote Frederick the
Great). Everyone is assigned his place. He receives his orders, and they are obeyed.”

This Prussian instinct is, as Spengler goes on to explain, anti-revolutionary. Therein lies its
strength, when at the head of the state there are personalities of the same rank as Frederick the
Great or Wilhelm I, with a Bismarck or a Moltke to do their bidding – but this can also be a
weakness when (as occurred in the Great War) the first servant of the state, the King, is a
muddleheaded romantic whom Hindenburg and Ludendorff must obey in accordance with their
Prussian sentiment. In France the successful general would have deposed the incompetent King;
in Prussian Germany he and the totality had to perish together.

It is indisputable that something great lies in Prussia and in its concept of freedom. Strict outer
obligation fully prepares people for the winning of their inner freedom. It produces a person
averse to all outer trappings, a person with a deeply-engrained faith and a highly-developed sense
of duty. The Teutonic Order found its continuation in the Prussian statesman, general, officer,
and civil servant, but also in the worker and the peasant. If we wish to draw a historical
comparison, then we find in Hohenzollern Prussia traits similar to those of ancient Rome when
it was still a republic. Just as occurred there, however, overreach – and eventually exhaustion –
inevitably had to occur here, too. A strict sense of duty based on submission runs the risk of
ultimately leading to a purely extrinsic centralism and formalism. Such was the case in Prussia
over the past few decades. Unfortunately, before it could adapt itself to the change in its mode
of life which resulted from its marriage to the German south, it dared to risk the armed
engagement in which it was subsequently defeated. And with that the old Prussia died. About
that there can be no doubt. Thus we now stand at a new turning-point, and must shape anew the
German conception of freedom.

How are we to accomplish this? Well, we seek to hold fast to the Prussian spirit, to what is great
and noble about it: a sense of duty elevated to the point of highest selflessness, even to a level of
self-sacrifice, and a remembrance that the old Prussian maxim was: “Better to be dead than a
slave!” But we also wish to leave formalism and centralism aside. They perished along with the
old Prussia of the Hohenzollerns. In their place is substituted what is good about the German
south: its unfettered creative diversity.

In political life this quality must be made manifest through wide-ranging self-government, just as
was advocated by the non-Prussian Freiherr vom Stein during the time of the Napoleonic Wars.
 73

Our political endeavours should be directed not only against state centralism, however, but also
against that centralistic compulsion which naturally emerges within the major parties, who all
strive after party-rule. But we are also opposed to the exertion of pressure within economic life,
whether that coercion of conscience is committed by an employer or by a group of employees.
We will return to these matters a little later. For the time being, let me just say that we consider
our inner freedom, our freedom of conscience, to be by far the most precious thing of all. The
next chapter will therefore be dedicated to it. It constitutes the foundation of government.

Once we have attained freedom in political life and have set the German state upon those
foundations which are best suited to our Volk because they are in accordance with the Volk’s
innermost convictions, then the time is not far off when foreign rule of all varieties will be stripped
away. If the formation of another People’s Army subsequently proves impossible for us, then the
task will instead be ceded to the gymnastics associations in line with the spirit of Jahn,113 a man
who fought against every racially-foreign influence and for whom being German also meant being
free and, therefore, also being capable of self-defence.

We have no concerns about carrying this out once the core of the future state of the Germans,
the German Reich, is consolidated in such a way that it exerts an irresistible attraction towards
even those segments of our Volk who languish under foreign rule. The state of Wirth and
Rathenau,114 it should be stated outright, does not exercise any such appeal.

The state of the Germans must not be a Jewish state, but neither should it be under Roman
influence. What we are entitled to demand of it instead is that the German, and only the German,
feels comfortable and secure within it, and that only he may flourish within it in accordance with
his particular nature. It must be a real, true People’s State [Volksstaat], in which neither the
privileges of birth nor property apply, but only ability – i.e., a proficiency and a joy for creative
endeavour. All without the application of any pressure or coercion. Not the Roman-Jewish
concept of rulership, but the Germanic concept of leadership should be decisive within the
German state. Then will true republican freedom prevail, rather than the bogus-democracy of
the present.

Thus far we have made reference to both the Volk and the state. As we are striving after a national
unitary state, this means that ethnic borders [Volksgrenzen] and state borders are essentially
identical, so the distinction between the two does not particularly matter.

How would our Volk have behaved in 1918 if they had been imbued with a genuine sense of
freedom? Instead of crying, “Never again war!”, instead of voluntarily disarming themselves, they
would have set in motion a general People’s War. The banner under which this would have
occurred would not have mattered, even if it happened to be the red one. If Marxism was serious
about its struggle against plutocracy, if its revolutionary posturing was not mere bombast, then
the Marxists should have planted the red flag upon the trenches and declared war upon capitalism
instead of continuing to grind away at the Flemish front. This would have been a deed that would
have enflamed the entire Volk. Eternal hot air about world-revolution, by contrast, does not,
because experience shows that announced revolutions never take place. In its historical hour
Marxism failed, and it failed because it completely disregarded the fact that a people’s freedom
is based upon their readiness for self-defence. Contaminated by the thoroughly unsocialist spirit
of materialism, it instead threw itself into the arms of pacifism, that symptom of disease and
degeneration. Thus did it plunge our Volk into bondage.
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If we wish to become free again, this cannot happen solely through external means. What good
are weapons to us if – as things stand today – the overwhelming majority of our Volk are gun-
shy? The military machine which managed to overcome such obstacles has been shattered.
Therefore the spirit of the masses must first become something entirely different. Hardship and
oppression will certainly contribute to their transformation. We want to do our part by imbuing
the spirit of renewal into their hearts.
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The Concept of Renewal in National Socialism.

“The moral renewal of our Volk; development of their religious life in the German spirit.”

This is one of the most important demands from National Socialism’s Guiding Principles. It
stands in causal relation with the demand in the preceding chapter for the combating of every
racially-foreign influence, above all for the combating of the overwhelming power of the Jewish-
commercial spirit.

Those who see in National Socialism merely the programme of a political party tend to question
what such things are doing in it. Others believe us to be worshippers of Wodan and the like.
Several times now in this work we have already emphasized that National Socialism constitutes a
Weltanschauung – namely, the German Weltanschauung.

It is indisputable that the concept of renewal lives within our Volk. We see it struggling for
expression, more or less clearly, in the most diverse forms and associations. The Turner and
Wandervogel, for example, strive after physical fitness and, in connection with it, for intellectual
and spiritual renewal. Heritage societies, organizations for the maintenance of abstinence, and
the miscellaneous youth associations should all also be mentioned in this context. In any event,
it is all those who strive for a renaissance of religious life, such as that which flourished among
our Volk during the era of the Mystics, who ascend to the highest level. We are now faced with
the danger that all these valuable little sub-movements will eventually be at cross purposes with
one another, may even stand against each other, if they are not guided into a common channel
in time. It should therefore be made known to all of them that their efforts will be able to find
direction and purpose within our movement. That which all of these sub-movements consciously
or unconsciously fight against – selfishness and egotism, greed and avarice, materialism – our
movement has long since clearly recognized as the enemy, and has already forged the weapons
for their conquest! The concept of renewal is directed firmly against materialism, the greatest
enemy of our Volk.

Its objective therefore is the struggle against selfishness, to be replaced by selflessness. Two
elements thus make up its core: liberation from the Jewish spirit, and the quest for that expression
of spiritual feeling which is most appropriate for our Volk.

The Jewish spirit constitutes Jewry’s most effective weapon in its struggle for world domination.
By imbuing its host societies with this spirit, it thereby recruits from amongst its host’s ranks the
troops which it needs to help it achieve its far-reaching plans, plans which culminate in the words:
“You shall consume every nation.” One thing is indisputable: that church Christianity represents
an invaluable ally for the Jews. It has taken the teachings of Jesus the Galilean, the content of
which comprise the most supreme selflessness and a belief in the benevolent Father in Heaven,
the All-Father,115 and has garnished them with various ingredients sourced from the racial mish-
mash dwelling in Western Asia and on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. It has also associated
these teachings, which constitute a revolt against Judaism and its spirit, with the Old Testament,
the same Old Testament in which the Jewish spirit finds its purest expression. Furthermore, it
has equated the All-Father of the Saviour with the Jewish god Yahweh, even though Jesus
described Yahweh as follows: “Your father (i.e., the Jewish god) is the devil... He was a criminal
from the beginning, in whom there is no truth. When he lies, he thus reveals his own nature, for
he is the father of lies.” But by passing along the fraud that is the belief in a single god
(monotheism), as well as the fraudulent belief in the Jews as the Children of God, church
Christendom has only helped the Jews, has only contributed to so many nations viewing them as
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“God’s Chosen race” and willingly opening wide their doors to them. Eventually (and in the most
obvious contrast to the Nazarene) this shaped the church into an instrument of rule over nations.
Jesus founded no church and no priesthood; he was instead the bitterest enemy of Yahweh’s
priests. The rigid centralism and the international character of all Christian churches, but of the
Roman Church above all, as well as the Lutheran Church’s unquestioning faith in the Bible, are
the most markedly Jewish traits in church Christendom. Luther’s deed, which was supposed to
be a beginning, has unfortunately come to an end. The eminent historian Harnack has the
following to say about the Old Testament: “To reject the Old Testament in the second century
was a mistake which the great church rightly repudiated; to retain it in the 16th century was a fate
which the Reformation could not yet avoid; but to continue to preserve it within Protestantism
as a canonical document after the 19th century is the consequence of religious and ecclesiastical
paralysis.”116

If in certain circles today some now reject Christianity as something alien, as something which
simply does not accord with our nature, and if they instead choose to form German-believing
communities,117 then they are abandoning our conviction to a serious delusion. These attempts
will never get beyond the formation of sects, and therefore will never achieve their purpose of
engulfing our entire Volk – and not just individual circles of it – in a new religious wave which
will liberate them from materialism. Instead, and regardless of all the good and honest intentions
which are undoubtedly behind them, these efforts will only achieve one thing: that the already
existing ecclesiastical turmoil, which is our misfortune, will be multiplied.

In addition to these innovators, there are others now appearing who believe that religion no
longer really fits into our advanced times at all, that it is something out-of-date. These wiseacres
should take to heart the fact that the greatest minds of our Volk were certainly not lip-service
Christians, but were instead imbued with a deep, internal piety, and that the mystic Meister
Eckhart was not merely a German by chance. Should they open their eyes further they would
see the religious impulse which lives within our Volk. Does our love of nature – which drives the
hiker out into the woods and the meadows, which allows the regular big city dweller, the worker
shackled to his machine, to cherish his allotment garden – not arise out of the deepest inner
religiosity? Liturgical rites certainly do not make up its entire essence!

If we now speak of “the moral renewal of our Volk and the development of their religious life in
the German spirit,” this demand is closely aligned with our demand for liberation from the
“overwhelming power of the Jewish-commercial spirit,” a spirit which manifests itself in all areas
of public life, i.e., not only in the economic and political fields, but also in spiritual and, not least
of all, psychological areas. We desire for the German and non-Jewish spirit to steer our destinies,
viewing its essence as one of selflessness, as the subordination of one’s own welfare to that of the
whole, while the hallmark of the other, Jewish spirit is flagrant selfishness and the most ruthless
pursuit of personal gain.

We will now briefly outline our ambition, which we term the “People’s Church” [Volkskirche].
We are by no means considering the foundation of a new church, much less the replacement of
Christianity with a renewed faith in Wodan. As great and as phenomenal as that was, and as
much as we may like to indulge ourselves in reminiscing over it, it had nonetheless run its course
almost a millennium ago in the north – its last place of refuge – and had there sunk into idolatry.
The most gifted Germanic peoples – for example, the Goths and the Vandals – were already
Aryans, i.e., Christians, the moment that they filled the world with their glory. The worship of
Wodan was a faith for heroes, for princes, and ultimately it would have led to the self-annihilation
of the very best elements of the race, who wore themselves down in ceaseless struggle. The
 77

conciliatory streak inherent within the Christian faith saved us from the total eradication of good
Germanic blood, as well as from complete inundation by inferior racial elements. After all,
Christianity did not rob the Germanic peoples of their heroic, warlike characteristics, but only
softened these traits. The monks who cleared the forests of Germania, the bishops of the Saxon
and Staufer periods, the secular knights and the Teutonic Order, were all warlike in spite of their
Christianity, because they felt this Christianity to be German. For that is what matters; everything
is embodied by exactly what you put into it yourself. Every person and every Volk ultimately
perceive the Deity as corresponding to their own being. It is therefore entirely appropriate when
we speak of a German god. Let us quietly leave the desert god Yahweh, that spirit of destruction,
to the Jews; ours is called the All-Father!

Luther’s task of renewing the Church was ultimately brought to a standstill half-way through
because, for fear of disorder, he threw himself into the arms of the nobles, and therefore into the
arms of centralism. As a result, however, the living German People’s Church, which he had
created in opposition to Papal Rome, became a national church, i.e., an instrument of power.
The inevitable consequence of this had to be centralism, ossification, and religious dogmatism.
While the Roman Church, roused by the apostasy of so many Germans, began to purify itself,
the Protestants stagnated.

When we now speak of a German People’s Church, we have in mind an amalgamation of the
two churches spread out across German lands. This would have to involve a renunciation of
Roman centralism, the internationalist spirit, and the Old Testament, those fundamentally Jewish
entities, and would also have to be the work of German priests, priests who love their Volk and
are imbued with its spirit. Those who believe that they cannot free themselves from the influence
of Rome should bear in mind that the papacy was once rescued from filth and squalor in the
early centuries of its history by the German kings. If that had not happened it would no longer
exist at all. They should also remember that, without the Habsburgs, our entire Volk would be
Lutheran today. But what does cold, sober thinking have to do with living feeling? First attend a
religious service in Italy, and then attend one in, for example, our own Alpine countries; Catholics
there and Catholics here, and yet what a world of difference! There, idolatry and fetishism; here,
the deepest, most childlike faith in God!

Despite everything which may be cited against it, we are nonetheless of the conviction that the
German People’s Church is on its way. In the Sudetenland, at least, the Czech religious
movement will soon force us Germans onto similar paths.118

A prerequisite for the development of a German People’s Church is the separation of church
and state. Because this requirement is a matter of course with respect to our much broader
objectives, we did not need to set it out explicitly within our Guiding Principles. A People’s
Church – as we have explained – represents a rejection of all centralism, and is hardly conceivable
in association with the state. But least conceivable of all is the idea of a German People’s Church
in the Sudetenland dependent upon the Czech national state. In point of fact, here the separation
of church and state should constitute the first demand even of those circles who are Rome’s most
devoted champions, because it alone can forestall the prospective inundation of German territory
by Czech clergy. For understandable reasons we therefore reject any seizure of ecclesiastical
property potentially associated with this separation which benefits the state. Rather, this property
would have to be divided along ethnic lines and ought to devolve upon the respective parishes.119

To summarize: The Jewish spirit gives birth to materialism. This forms the foundation of
Mammonism. Each makes our Volk unfree, both inwardly and outwardly. The concept of
renewal, which strives for spiritual and psychological liberation from everything foreign, is
 78

directed against one. The other, Mammonism, we tackle with different weapons. Its central pillar
is unearned income. This, therefore, has to be combated. How this is to be done will be
demonstrated within the following chapter.
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Labor and Unearned Income.

“Private property in itself is not malign, insofar as it arises from one’s own honest labor, serves
labor, and is limited in size so as not to damage the common good. We reject, however, all forms
of unearned income, such as ground-rent, interest, and usurious profits extorted from the misery
of one’s fellow man. Against them we stridently advocate the value of productive labor!”

These words from the Guiding Principles are our introduction to the economic tasks of National
Socialism. They clearly and precisely outline its position not only on private property and labor,
but also on unearned income. It is not private property as such which is combated, but only a
particular category of it, namely that which does not originate out of one’s own honest creative
work.

Creativity! With the use of this term we here demonstrate that our goal is directed towards the
awakening of the productive impulses within the German people. Productive labor needs to be
safeguarded against competition from the moocher,120 whose entire focus is directed towards the
acquisition of unearned and effort-free income. “Producers here, moochers there” – such is the
rallying-cry, and in the battle which must be waged between the two if the German is to once
again find joy in creation, we stand on the side of the producer, i.e., on the side of the German
people. For the German has always been a producer!

Who then qualifies as a producer under today’s conditions? Is it only the artist in whose soul the
divine spark glimmers, the inventor, the far-sighted entrepreneur, the daring trader? No! It is also
true of the peasant, who with the sweat of his brow wrests nourishment from Mother Earth; the
forester, who tends the trees and animals of the woods; the teacher, who plants the seeds of
everything good and beautiful in the child’s soul; the public official, who labors for the common
good; the tradesman or the worker at the loom, lathe, workbench, or vice, who continuously
muses over how this or that technique could be improved; the anxious housewife – they are
producers all! If this seems difficult to believe, then give one or the other of these a patch of
ground to own. They will build themselves a rabbit hutch despite having never before learnt how;
they will plant a sapling without questioning whether they shall ever enjoy its fruit. The productive
instinct is kindled already in the child’s sense of play; a scrap of wood, a colored rag around it,
and the doll is ready. Every German, whether small or large, carves and tinkers and ponders.
We are a Volk of producers!

Who, then, are the moochers? They are the sons of the desert, transplanted into the sea of
houses that is the metropolis, this desert of the modern age. They also ponder, but their
pondering and their endeavours are geared only towards how they can best take advantage of the
work of others. Effortless acquisition is their lifeblood; strenuous production seems to them a
punishment from God.

There has been a lot of discussion back and forth about estates, strata, and classes. On the one
side are those who say that the workers constitute a class, meaning by this essentially only manual
workers, for they do not value intellectual labor very highly. On another side are those who
reaffirm that the three estates are those which are given to us by nature: bourgeois, peasant, and
worker. A third group in turn speaks of a harmony of interests; in response to the shrill
dissonance which echoes around them, they stop up their ears and consequently believe that they
have eliminated it.
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We National Socialists, however, say that (from the resolutions of the Troppau Party
Conference, 1920): “In economic life there are only two major groups, which stand in opposition
to one another – the one, which performs productive work; and the other, which receives
unearned income. The German National Socialist Party declares, ‘that it commits itself to the
class standpoint of productive labor.’ It is, therefore, a class party. In its view, however, the
concept of ‘class’ does not encompass some narrowly-defined occupational category, such as
physical and intellectual workers alone; instead ‘workers’ are, according to its conception, all
those who live from the earnings of their own honest – intellectual or physical – labor, in other
words, the entire mass of the economically vulnerable among our Volk.”

And because Germans always have been producers and always will remain so, and because we
wish to be Germans true and proper, we consequently commit ourselves to the

class standpoint of productive labor!

Above all, it is imperative to protect the proceeds of labor from being seized by moochers, in
order to prevent them from being diminished. They should be full and uncurtailed, as is proper.

The Full Proceeds of Labor

“Whoever does not work, should also not eat. Only work, honest work, confers value
and dignity upon people. We should judge our fellow man only by this measure.

“What is fair pay? Is it a matter of giving everyone the same, whether that means a lot or
a little? No, that is not a just form of remuneration! Fair pay is that which in the first
instance allocates the honest worker with enough that he can live without concern over
food and housing, without having to worry about the size of his family increasing, without
fear of illness and death. Fair pay is that which does not engender misery over
unemployment, over a reduction or loss of one’s capacity for work. Fair pay is not just
about money. It also takes purchase value into consideration, anticipating the expenses
which the worker has to meet out of his wages. Fair pay does not involve remunerating
everyone equally. The higher in value the work is for the community, the more difficult
and demanding it is, the more skills and qualifications which it requires, the higher the
just reward must be.

“Fair pay ensures that the artisanally trained worker receives more than the dogsbody,
the tertiary-educated civil servant more than the man who has never studied, the
researcher and inventor more than the common clerk.

“Fair pay recognizes those who are capable; only it gives free rein to the industrious.121 A
just remuneration is when those who perform the work are the ones who receive the
greatest share of the resulting proceeds of labor, not those who merely hand over tools
and money for the work without themselves contributing to it either physically or
mentally.

“The worker earns a daily wage of 10 Kronen, and the factory owner receives an interest
yield of 10 per cent – that is not fair pay.

“For the worker, the long working day and the short period of rest – for the banker
without work, only rest and leisure; for the worker, meagre food and a damp apartment
 81

– for the stock exchange speculator, the richly laid-out table and luxury accommodations.
This is not fair pay.

“For the diligent to receive the same daily wage as those who prefer to goldbrick; for the
industrious, experienced worker to receive the same wage as the bungler – this, too, is
not fair pay.

“We demand an alternative form of distribution. If the worker is its recipient, then his
exclusion from everything good and beautiful, from everything pleasant and exhilarating
which art and literature have to offer, also comes to an end.

“Those who work should also be able to relax and find joy. Away with the presently-
existing state of affairs.”

With these words, party-comrade Ertl122 once described our quest for fair pay. Its realization has
failed due to the fact that the dictum, “Whoever does not work, should also not eat,”
unfortunately no longer has any validity. Many, far too many, live off the earnings of the work of
others without working themselves. Hence why the worker, the producer, never receives the full
proceeds of his labor. Always must he work with his mind or with his hands to feed those who
do not work and yet want to eat, yes, want to eat much better than the producer does himself.
And therein – with respect to unearned income – lies the gross injustice of today’s (capitalist,
Mammonist) economic order.

But this injustice can only disappear alongside unearned income itself.

Unearned income, which is positioned in conscious opposition to labor and which diminishes
its returns, is known as annuity [Rente]. It makes it impossible for the producer – irrespective of
whether he is self-employed or an employee, whether an intellectual or a manual worker, whether
a public official or a member of the free professions, whether a resident of the city or of the
countryside – to attain the full proceeds of his labor.

How did annuity come about, and what forms does it take? It appears in two forms: ground-rent
and interest.

Ground-Rent and Appreciation

In the chapter “Changes in Land Law” we described how land and soil passed over from
common property to the property of individuals and developed, via the great estates and
latifundia, into a land monopoly. For example, we counted in the former Austria-Hungary 721
estates (=0.0252%) with an area of over 2,000ha., a total of 3,734,000ha. altogether (=13.2%).
These 721 large landowners thus owned almost 530 times as much as they would have received
had the land been evenly distributed.

In order to cultivate these vast areas, they mostly maintained a body of poorly-paid officials and
workers. It is true that other self-employed people in the trades or in agriculture also have
employees, and yet we do not count them from the outset as being mere recipients of unearned
income. Arguably they do receive more than they are perhaps entitled to, but they also –
provided, of course, that they run their own businesses – nonetheless actually perform work for
their income. But did the 721 large landowners, or even the owners of the 64 greatest estates,
ever run their operations themselves? No, they lived in their castles and palaces solely off the
work of others; for if any of them held high state office, they received their own compensation
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for this work. They were thus afforded with literal possession – unearned income in the form of
ground-rent!

But that is not the only thing harmful about the large landowner class’s monopoly over land. It
has also consistently exercised a highly adverse influence over agricultural policy, and has thereby
contributed substantially to the rise in price of agricultural commodities. Gravest of all, however,
is the harm which it has caused from a völkisch perspective, insofar as it has barred the broad
masses of our Volk from access to the soil. As a result, any policy of ethnic settlement has been
rendered virtually impossible, causing direct harm to us Germans; indirect harm has resulted
too, however, since for those precluded from access to the soil there was no choice left but to
move to the city. There they became industrial proletarians, and contributed to the increase in
ground-rent, to the rise in value of municipal properties, and, in connection with this, to the
housing misery123 with all of its consequences – endemic disease, infant and child mortality, etc.

How are things in the city now? The piece of sandy Brandenburg124 soil on which Berlin stands
(excluding suburban districts) was already estimated at 8 billion Marks before the War, the total
urban land value of the German Reich in 1909 at 40-42 billion Marks. With an interest rate of
only 4% this means that the population of Berlin had to raise 320 million Marks in annual
ground-rent, the population of Vienna 240 million Kronen. This amount is inclusive of
accommodation rent. The population ultimately pays this tax merely for the right to be permitted
to breathe the very air of the city to which they are bound by their profession.

Let us first clarify this phenomenon with some simple examples. In trade one speaks of supply
and demand. They regulate prices. When do prices go up?

In the commodities market, prices rise when demand on the part of buyers grows faster than
supply on the part of sellers.

In the labor market, wages likewise rise when the demand for workers grows faster than the
available supply of those willing to work.

Finally, in the bond market, the rate of interest rises when the demand for loan money on the
part of debtors (entrepreneurs) grows faster than the supply on the part of creditors (capitalists).

Thanks to Roman Law, which usurped our old German Law, land has now also become a
commodity. Thus, what applies to other goods also applies to it. Its price is also determined by
supply and demand.

In the property market, land prices, leases, and rents rise when the demand for land and housing
grows faster than the supply on the part of landowners and homeowners. The more a city grows,
the more people crowd together within it, and the greater the population density thus becomes;
as a result the demand for land becomes more fervent, and the price of land grows all the higher.

The more conveniently situated a commercial building in the city is, the greater the demand is
on the part of businesspeople, and the higher the store rent.

If a village or small town becomes connected to the railway transport system, then many of those
living there can now do so with an advantage which they previously had to do without. The
demand for land and housing subsequently grows, and rents and the price of land rise, especially
in the vicinity of the railway station.
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When a grain duty or wine duty is introduced, i.e., when the supply of grain and wine from
abroad is halted or diminished, then the cultivation of grain and grapevines becomes more
profitable, the demand for grain and vineyards increases proportionally, and the leasing and
purchase price of these estates rises.

As has already been stated, the increase in the base price of land arises from the fact that the soil
too has become a commodity. In contrast with other commodities, however, the supply of land
is limited, while demand is constantly growing (due to the expansion of the cities, the proliferation
of people, the creation of new industrial facilities, etc.). This rising demand not only leads to an
increase in the base price of land, but also brings about the existence of ground-rent.

Ground-rent is nothing more than the annual interest which flows from ownership of raw land
(excluding buildings). If someone leases a piece of land without structures, the yearly lease
amount is equal to the ground-rent. However, if he leases an entire property (land plus buildings),
the lease is divided into two parts, namely ground-rent for raw land and interest on capital for the
buildings and miscellaneous assets.

The same also applies in the city where, for example, land and buildings are assessed separately
in regards to insurance. Rental tariffs there are also divided into ground-rent and the interest on
incurred building costs (building-capital). This (capital-interest) remains the same for buildings
even when they are physically separate from one another, provided they were constructed in the
same period. Ground-rent, on the other hand, varies depending on the location of the property.

Let us visualize this by way of an example: The same master-builder builds two houses in the
same city, of equal size and in the same design. One is located in the heart of the commercial
district, the other outside, at the end of town. Since both are identical and were constructed
simultaneously, their production costs are obviously the same. The interest on the building-
capital expended is also the same. Nonetheless, both houses will not be worth the same amount,
and the rent will be different; higher within the city, lower outside of it. For the former, for
example: 100,000K (M); while for the latter, only 50,000K (M). Why? Because the ground-rent
is different.

The amounts are distributed roughly as follows:

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The expansion of the cities, along with all of the other causes behind the increase in the price of
real-estate, only raised one part of the rent – namely, the ground-rent. The interest on building-
capital, on the other hand, is determined solely by the level of the respective interest rate.

Ground-rent now has to be even higher:

1. The less land there is available, the lower the supply,
2. The more people there are who wish to live and work upon it, the greater the demand.

Soil is invaluable, but it is also a limited resource. Within these two qualities lie the origins of
ground-rent!

Ground-rent is, as we have seen, nothing other than interest. If it increases, then of course the
capital – in our case the land value – must also increase, and vice-versa. The difference between
the earlier (lower) and later (higher) land value is called appreciation. We shall clarify this this
with some examples.

In 1740, King Frederick William gifted Count Schulenberg a piece of land in Berlin; in 1875,
6,000,000 Marks were then paid for the bare ground required for the construction of the Reich
Chancellery. In Vienna, land prices rose over a period of 52 years as follows:

These examples can be multiplied indefinitely. If we now consider that the 28 million hectares
(that is, 280 billion m2) of rural land (in old Austria) were, according to an admittedly older
estimate (1896), worth 21 billion Kronen, so that 1 square meter ended up valued at 7.5 Heller,
then the effrontery of urban land prices becomes even more transparent, and one can see why
building, and hence also living, is so costly an enterprise.

Ground-rent and appreciation do not arise out of the landowner’s own labor, but are the result
of many people living together, of their collective work, their tax payments. Their acquisition by
individuals is therefore unjustifiable; they belong to the community which generates them! This
is the objective of land reform.

Interest
Interest is that form of unearned income which is associated with the possession of money. It is
entirely similar to ground-rent, and can be traced back to the exact same root causes: the
indispensability of money in a monetary-based economic order, coupled with the simultaneous
(or at any rate approximate) non-renewability of monetary materials, which since time
immemorial have consisted of precious metals. Originally the material which made up money
was silver, now it is gold. Since the demand for money has only increased with the upturn in the
national economy, yet the yield of precious metals – particularly gold – is limited and the
necessary quantity cannot therefore be raised, assistance has been sought through the issuing of
paper money.
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According to the wishes of its issuers, however, paper money is not supposed to be real money,
but is instead only a substitute currency, because it is not of “full value,” because it lacks so-called
“intrinsic value,” i.e., value in and of itself. Hence why paper money, i.e., banknotes or state-
notes, always bears a promise of payment, i.e., the assurance that it can be exchanged for metal
currency. Furthermore, there needs to be a certain coverage by the legally-recognized metal
currency, namely gold or silver or both, depending on whether the state in question uses gold,
silver, or bimetallic coinage.

Now, what is the so-called intrinsic value of, for example, gold? Is it a color or some other
distinctive characteristic, some immutable quality? No, it is nothing more than its market price,
as determined by an arrangement between all those states which have transitioned to a gold-based
currency! For example, at one time 1 pound of gold cost 1,395 Marks. From this it was concluded
that 1 Mark = 1/1,395th of a pound of gold. Now, gold only occurs naturally in a very few nation-
states; all the others have to purchase it. Like any other commodity, its price should be
determined by demand. The fact that it was made the basis for national currencies, and therefore
a very specific price was set for it, does not actually confer upon gold a fixed or intrinsic value;
instead it remains a commodity like any other. If today one were to switch to a different monetary
material – platinum, for example – then the price of gold would immediately fall, just as it did
for silver in its day after it had finished playing its part. Intrinsic value is, therefore, a self-delusion!
All of this serves to provide us with a better understanding of the following. To return to the topic
of interest again, it should now be clear to us that it owes its existence to the fact that money has
been tied to rarely-occurring metals since ancient times. Those who were in possession of them
could extort a levy from those who were not so fortunate, a levy which grew higher as currency
grew scarcer. This state of affairs explains the enormously high interest rates in the Middle Ages,
when the transition from the barter-economy to the monetary-economy had not yet been fully
completed. We have familiarised ourselves with several examples of this already. As soon as
money becomes the exclusive medium of commodity exchange and is manufactured in ever
greater quantities, the rate of interest declines in turn.

Nonetheless, interest does not disappear completely simply because currency is indispensable;
so long as it consists of precious metals, the material which makes up money is unable to be
reproduced in endless supply.

A second factor also keeps interest from disappearing: the utilization of money as a means of
saving. The purpose of saving is to accumulate large sums of money in one place, to be used as
desired. Small savers are lured by an offer of interest, and of course they go wherever they are
offered the most, without considering whether they might thereby bring harm upon themselves.
War bonds serve as an obvious example of this. The interest received by savers depresses the
national economy, and they eventually end up paying back via the price of goods several times
over what they earned in interest. The rich, of course, have an implicit advantage here. The
relationship between the big capitalist and the small saver is about the same as that between the
large landowner and the dwarf farmer.125 What benefits one is harmful to the other. The large
landowner, for example, receives a substantial ground-rent, and moreover enjoys all the
advantages of the agricultural protection policy; for the dwarf farmer ground-rent is something
completely out of the question, and furthermore he does not produce enough to be able to live
on, so he is forced to buy, and – thanks to the agrarian protection policy – to buy dearly. Thus
he at best winds up serving as cover for the large landowner, because, when it comes to justifying
the protection policy, people always point to the number of farmers who need to be protected!
This is exactly the case also when one compares Frau Huber126 with Lord Rothschild. She may
have a few thousand Kronen or Marks in the savings bank. This is how she obtains her interest.
 86

Naturally this state of affairs does not mean that she has become a ‘rentier’; it is, however, of
benefit to the Rothschilds, and is in actuality immensely harmful to her. She receives several
dozen Marks or Kronen in interest every year. But how many hundreds or even thousands more
does she have to spend on housing, food, clothing, taxes, rail travel, and the like, and all because
the Rothschilds and their allies wish to preserve themselves? For the House of Rothschild alone
already possessed approximately 40 billion before the War. This means: even if limited solely to
the pleasure of its interest, at 5% annually it would have accrued 2 billion in unearned income
from it. Years ago, everyone who produced and worked thus had to render an annual levy of 2
billion to the one uncrowned King of Juda, and Juda has plenty of other kings! In fifteen years,
at the present rate of interest, every fortune will have doubled; by then the Rothschilds will have
at least 80 billion to call their own, and the annual toll on our labor which goes to them will
amount to 4 billion! In thirty years it will be 8 billion, and so on.

But the Rothschilds are now not alone in their demands. Reich-German loan-capital before the
War amounted to 250 billion, and devoured 12.5 billion in interest annually. How meagre
industrial-capital appears in comparison to it; it amounted to a mere 12 billion, and during the
economic boom of the War it yielded 1 billion in commercial profits (otherwise, 600 million).
Add to that the 16,000 limited-liability commercial cooperatives, and you come to a total value
of 15.5 billion – a whole 6% of loan-capital, and this in the first industrialized state in Europe!

Let us examine the outrageous national and municipal debts, and ask ourselves who actually pays
and who benefits from them. They do not diminish, but instead continue to rise, and this despite
the fact that year after year thousands of millions in interest are squeezed out of the productive
people. And what is the result? After fifteen years these debts will have doubled, despite all the
taxes and charges borne by labor.

And now let us take a look at a figure which demonstrates at once the monstrousness and the
absurdity of today’s entire interest-slavery-based economic order. It will show us for whose
benefit the Entente waged war, and in whose favor it dictated the shameful Peace of Versailles.

10,847,548,000,000. At the end of September, 1921, at an exchange rate of 1 German

Reichsmark = 0.053 Swiss Franks, this was the number which typified the obligations of the
London Ultimatum. At the end of December, 1921, the Mark was at 0.027 in Zurich; it had thus
dropped to around half of the above value. The previously-cited number was thereby doubled
to 21,695,096,000,000!

Put into words, that is 21,695 billion, or around 21.7 trillion Marks. This is equivalent to 465.5
billion Goldmarks, which the 132 billion Goldmark figure, arising out of the London Ultimatum,
will accrue through interest until repayment has been completed.

21,695,096,000,000 Marks. If we divide this up among the 60 million Reich-German citizens,

this means that everyone – whether man or woman, elder or child – owes Jewish world loan-
capital around 360 thousand Marks each.

Is there a more harrowing example of an entire Volk’s enslavement to interest? This, then, is the
freedom into which the heroes of the Revolution have led us. Truly, the moochers could be
satisfied enough with the German Volk, provided the threads they have spun are not someday
broken. But their plans go much further. Lovingly included in these plans are not just the
German Volk alone, but also others, even the victorious nations. The United States of North
America, for example, is $2.43 billion in debt to the Wall Street banks, i.e., to Jewish finance
 87

capital. Since 1 Dollar at the end of December, 1921, was equivalent to 200 Marks, this comes
to the quite considerable sum of 4,860 billion Marks, or 4.86 trillion. England’s national debt
(excluding colonies) amounts to £7.5 billion (1 Pound = 800 Marks), France’s to 286 billion
Franks (1 Frank = 1,800 Marks), Italy’s to 72 billion Lira (1 Lira = 850 Marks). Canada, with its
population of around 7 million souls, is in debt to about $3 billion; Australia, with 5 million
people, to £381 billion. It can thus be seen from this that the children of Yahweh disperse light
and shadow between victors and conquered both.

Loan-capital therefore constitutes a limitless danger. Via interest and compound interest it swells
into a raging torrent. This is most clearly illustrated with the following example: 1 Heller or
Pfennig, invested at the time of Christ’s birth, would:
after 15 years have grown to 2 Heller (Pfennig),
after 30 years have grown to 4 Heller,
after 45 years have grown to 8 Heller,
after 60 years have grown to 16 Heller,
after 75 years have grown to 32 Heller,
after 90 years have grown to 64 Heller.
After 135 years, i.e., in the year 136 AD, the single Heller or Pfennig would have now become
512.

By the year 211 AD there would already be 16,384,

By the year 286 AD there would already be 524,288,
By the year 346 AD there would already be 16,777,216
By the year 421 AD there would already be 496,870,912,
By the year 496 AD there would already be 15,899,869,184,
By the year 571 AD there would already be 508,795,813,888
Heller or Pfennigs, i.e., more than 5 billion Kronen or Marks. By 646 AD the single Heller
would even have grown to the fantastic sum of 16 trillion, and today it would yield a sum greater
than the value of the sun and its planets if they were all made out of pure gold; the numerical
value would result in a 39-digit number! The absurdity of this can hardly be expressed any more
clearly, especially when one remembers that all of this occurs without a single finger being lifted.

How small industrial capital seems by comparison, how much more slowly it grows, and this
despite the fact that it is backed by endless labor and tireless productivity. Amschel Mayer
Rothschild began his fruitful activity around 1800, without any significant fortune of his own, by
speculating with the millions which Landgrave Wilhelm of Hesse had consigned to him for
safekeeping. By 1913 – as already noted – the Rothschilds owned 40 billion. The obverse of this
is the House of Krupp. In 1826 its founder passed away with no fortune to his name in spite of
all his hard work. In 1855 Alfred Krupp received his first order of 36 cannons; in 1873 the factory
counted 12,000 workers; in 1903 it was traded to the Krupp share company for 160 million
Marks; and by 1913 it was worth an entire 250 million Marks!

How much endless labor, how much effort, how much frustration has gone into the life’s work
of the Krupps and their employees, compared with that of the Rothschilds? How many beneficial
institutions the Krupps have established for their officials and for their workers, while the
Rothschilds care so precious little for their victims! The eternal contrast between the Germanic
productive urge and the Jewish-commercial spirit of usury is glaringly obvious to all those who
do not choose to be blind!
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If ground-rent is unjustifiable, then it is all the more imperative that interest should be stringently
separated from profit. Profit is inherently justified because it represents remuneration for work
performed. To wish to eliminate it would be an absurdity; it is pointless to want to set limits upon
it the moment that private monopolies disappear, because competition will then limit it from the
outset. Interest, however, is unearned income, and must vanish from the national economy
entirely.

This is what monetary reform strives for!

“Keep away from us with your reforms,” we hear again and yet again from those on the Marxist
side, “we international Social-Democrats, Communists, and so on are revolutionary. Only social
revolution is capable of changing the fate of the exploited.” We will see whether or not this is
true.
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Economic Reform or Revolution?

“Not revolution but purposeful, creative reform work alone can overcome today’s untenable
social conditions.” (Guiding Principles of the Nat.-Soc. Party.)

The private-capitalist order, with its orientation towards pure profit, with its rejection of every
idealistic pursuit, has reared its own enemy within the soulless materialism upon which it is based.
Yet materialism, with its pronounced egoism and selfishness, is just as ill-suited to providing the
spiritual foundation for that which is supposed to supersede this order: Socialism, that is to say,
social economy, social spirit.

The essence of socialism lies in working as a collective, for the collective. It finds its expression
within the principle: “All for all!” Now, this principle does of course require a great deal of self-
denial. Self-denial, however, is not a materialistic impulse, but an idealistic one. Hence why it
seems to us that, while one can arguably populate a workhouse127 with people brought up in the
age of materialism, socialism can never be realized in this fashion, and that a socialism attempted
on such a basis and with such people will end up hopelessly run aground! We will furnish
evidence to support this claim.

What is generally presented to us as socialism is in actuality communism with a Marxist stamp.

The dispute over which of two tendencies boasts the only suitable remedy for bringing people
happiness is again being repeated today between the Social-Democrats and the Communists, just
as it was once played out in the past in conflicts between the Eisenachers and the Lassalleans.128
Both are Marxists, both claim to be communists, therefore both adhere to the concept of
collective property.

History is not lacking for communist experiments. If they ever succeed, it is always only
temporarily, and always only in situations where the people at the head of the body politic have
been vested with absolute power. One of the best-known examples is the Jesuit state of Paraguay.
But the instant this condition of absolute power no longer holds true, they fail!

In recent times, i.e., ever since the collapse which the Marxists yearned for and endeavoured to
the best of their ability to bring about, we have seen examples of this close at hand in Bavaria and
Hungary. No one apart from their direct beneficiaries, i.e., Polish Jews of the most wretched race
like Kun, Toller, Levine, etc., would claim that these examples tempt imitation. At a somewhat
greater distance, in Russia, the drama is still being played out today. Murder, fire, devastation,
the gagging of different opinions, all are marking their passage there. This is nothing more than
a fresh attempt at establishing Jewish world domination, thus serving the same ends as capitalism
and undertaken by use of the exact same methods as those we have seen close by. Dictatorship
both here as there, hence also slavery here as there. Jewry does not know any other form of rule
whatsoever. It is therefore entirely within the nature of things when Lenin and Trotsky lay claim
to and assert their dictatorial power. In any other circumstance, after all, the Bolshevist system
would have collapsed long ago. If one is consciously a communist – and all Marxists surely should
be – then one has to resign oneself to this fact. It is thus absurd when Social-Democrats claim in
one breath to be communists, while at the same time being filled with indignation over the
admission requirements for the 3rd International.129 This attitude is, moreover, also disingenuous,
because in reality all Marxists strive after the realization of communism by way of social
revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat. With respect to this, take note of our previous
explanations given in the chapter “At the Gates to the Future.” There we cited the Communist
Manifesto and were aided by information from one of the best minds of the Reich-German
 90

Social-Democratic Party, Dr. Paul Lensch. Let us now throw in some additional remarks made
by that party’s uncontestably most gifted leader, August Bebel. In his widely-read book Woman
and Socialism, which has run through countless editions, the route leading to Marxism’s objective
of a social society is depicted as follows:

1. An intensification of class-antagonisms occurs, fostered by:

2. A concentration in capitalist industry.
This leads directly to:
a) the displacement of agriculture by industry;
b) progressive proletarianization;
c) a concentration of wealth.
3. Increasingly stark crises result.
4. These are followed by social revolution. This is predicated upon expropriation of the
expropriators, i.e., dispossession of the dispossessors; or, in other words: the abolition of
private property, the formation of socialist society.

In socialist society:
1. All able-bodied people shall be called upon to work.
2. A harmony of interests shall prevail.
3. Labor will be organized.
4. Productivity will expand.
5. Consuming power will increase.
6. The contrast between mental and manual labor shall disappear.
7. There shall exist an equal duty to work for all.

And then, in the opinion of Karl Marx’s collaborator Friedrich Engels, once people have
become perfect angels the state will finally extinguish itself. In its stead there emerges the
stateless society, a concept which Marx borrowed from the English intellectual world and which
we are already familiar with via our earlier remarks on the English conception of the state as a
“society of private individuals.” Incidentally, English (Norman) and Jewish thought intersect
once again on this point, for the state concept is naturally alien to the stateless Jewish Volk. The
longing for their own Palestinian state is limited only to such narrow circles that it constitutes
little more than window-dressing. Love for one’s native soil is absolutely essential to the state
concept. But who could instil this in a homeless people such as the Jews?

The state’s elimination is not to occur suddenly, but is to be achieved via the detour of the
proletarian class-state, i.e., the “dictatorship of the proletariat.” Engels comments on this in his
book criticizing Eugen Dühring: “The bourgeois state is not abolished. Instead the bourgeois
state is initially followed by the proletarian state, and since every state is one of class rule, then so
too is the state of the proletariat; and since every state is a mechanism of repression, then so too
is the proletarian state a mechanism for the repression of the oppressors and exploiters.”130

Accordingly the state should, as the instrument of rule for one class, transform itself into the
instrument of rule for another. By what means is this supposed to be achieved? Simply through
the exact same methods which others have used to maintain their own rule: militarism and the
like. Hence it is not at all surprising that the entire Marxist educational system was almost entirely
derived from this otherwise so-maligned militarism. Ever since it was eliminated, discipline and
drill among the Social-Democratic masses have suffered undeniable losses; it is only since that
time onwards that the addiction to schism and division have become incurable.
 91

Much imagery and aesthetic were borrowed from this otherwise so-maligned militarism,
including drilling. One need only recall the “booming step of the workers’ battalions”131 as they
filed past their mostly bandy-legged leaders, marching in mass rallies which resembled military
parades.

At the end of the day, those matters which we are to occupy ourselves with discussing next were
also borrowed from the militarist line of thinking: class-consciousness and class struggle. They
are, in essence, facsimiles. By way of explanation, allow us to make a brief historical digression:

The medieval nobility was a strictly segregated caste with its own customs and traditions and with
its own distinctive position of honor. After its dissolution these things were passed on as an
inheritance to the Landsknecht, and then to the standing armies, only to finally end up as the
sole purview of the officer corps during the age of universal conscription. Their purpose was the
cultivation of a caste with a specific duty of service. The Roman Church has a similar institution
in the marriage ban for its priests. Each of the three medieval estates – the nobility, the Church,
and the bourgeoisie – had its own distinctive customs and institutions. Then a fourth estate made
its appearance: the proletariat. At the time it made sense to tear them away from the body of the
Volk, like the nobility and the clergy, and to make them a caste of their own with an estatist
identity of their own: class-consciousness. Their immediate aim is supposed to be class struggle,
which of course is waged not only for its own sake, but also to serve a specific purpose: the
realization of socialism, true communism.

What does this class struggle look like today? Who is it directed against? Who is leading it, and
what are its weapons?

The Social-Democratic Programme (the 1901 Vienna Programme) states the following:

“The Social-Democratic Workers’ Party strives for the liberation of the entire Volk,
irrespective of nation, race, or sex, from the shackles of economic dependence... The
cause of these wretched conditions does not lie in individual political institutions, but in
the... fact that the means of labor are monopolized in the hands of individual owners.
The bearers of labor power, the working class, thereby fall into the most stifling
dependence upon the owners of the means of labor (which includes land), the large
landowning class and the capitalist class...

“Technical progress, the growing concentration of production and ownership... have the
effect of dispossessing ever wider circles of previously independent small entrepreneurs
and small farmers of their means of production, and of turning them into wage laborers,
employees, or debt slaves, directly or indirectly dependent upon capitalists. The
proletarian masses are growing, but the extent of their exploitation is also increasing...

“But the more that capitalism’s development swells the proletariat’s ranks, the more
obliged and empowered is the proletariat is to take up the struggle against it.

“The supersession of individual production also makes individual ownership all the more
superfluous and harmful... At the same time, the proletariat becomes conscious that it
must promote and accelerate this development... The bearer of this necessary
development can only be the proletariat itself, awakened to class-consciousness and
organized for class struggle.”
 92

What do we learn from these sentences?

1. The purpose of Marxist socialism is the elimination of the monopoly on the means of
labor.

2. The means of labor not only includes land, but also all capital property, including all
factories, their facilities, etc.

3. Proletarians are wage workers, employees, and the debt slaves of capital.

4. Individual ownership – without constraints – is harmful and should be eliminated. The

more or less concealed final goal correspondingly lies not only in the elimination of the
ownership of great estates and capital-holdings, but in the elimination of all private
ownership in general, that is, in an end goal of collective property, of communism.

5. The struggle against the wealthy is the class struggle; it culminates in the promotion
and acceleration of the aforementioned progression towards communism.

6. It is led by the proletariat, awakened to class-consciousness.

We have already noted previously (in “At the Gates to the Future”) how Marxism slept through
its historic hour. Since the chief representatives of capitalism – England, America, France – were
united as allies on the battlefield, the class struggle in 1918 should have been waged in the
trenches, instead of weapons being cravenly cast aside and people being encouraged to desert.
At that moment, when its time had arrived, Marxism suffered through its own fault – in the midst
of its supposed victory – its greatest defeat. German workers are paying for this fault and failure
on the part of their leaders with 42 years of bonded labor in the service of Entente capitalism,
i.e., Jewish finance capital. The embodiment of this dreadful fact lies in nothing other than the
21.7 trillion (i.e., 21,700 billion) Marks which the German Reich is enjoined to pay.

The Jewish leadership clique felt this defeat, even if they will never admit it. When the same
people who have always blathered on about social revolution, whose every other word besides
“revolution” and “expropriation” (dispossession) was “socialization” (social ownership), and who
have branded as “yellow”132 and as “employers’ lackeys” everyone who does not sing from the
same hymn sheet, now suddenly find the goals established in their own programme to be too far-
reaching, are harboring doubts that communism can be fully implemented, and who now only
want “to socialize enterprises that are ripe for socialization” – then what else is all this supposed
to signify, other than a complete laying down of arms before capitalism in the purest sense of the
word? But therein lies the difference between right and left; between Social-Democrats and
Communists; between 2nd, 2½, and 3rd International; between social-traitors133 and Bolsheviks.

At the same time, the so-called right-wingers emphasize again and yet again, at every opportunity,
that they too are communists. They would have to be, too, for Marxism and communism are
indeed one and the same!

For example, the first scholarly luminary of German Social-Democracy in the former Austria,
Dr. Karl Renner, literally declared fifteen months ago in Innsbruck: “Socialism and communism
pursue the same goals, with only their paths being different; communists prefer to achieve their
goals by force, while Social-Democracy, by means of a peaceful permeation of views, seeks over
time to bring the workers to such a high level that they are capable of taking the social
 93

administration of enterprises into their own hands.” This is quite a strong piece for Dr. Renner,
from whom one is used to various conceptual distortions.

In his book Bolshevism or Social-Democracy?, Dr. Otto Bauer, the second scholarly luminary
of German Social-Democracy in old Austria – and German-Austria’s “Minister of Socialization”
at the time of writing – rendered a devastating judgement upon those same Bolsheviks whom for
the longest time he used to praise within the pages of the Arbeiterzeitung.134 According to Dr.
Bauer, for example, the agricultural communes – that masterpiece of Bolshevist art – have
proven to be a failure. “It is indisputable,” says Dr. Bauer, “that many communes deviated greatly
from the idealized image outlined in the directive; that some of them collapsed very quickly; that
others degenerated capitalistically, engaging in illicit trade on a grand scale, exploiting neighboring
small farmers as their wage laborers.”

But it is not just the communization of the soil which Dr. Otto Bauer repudiates; rather, he rejects
in general the entire Bolshevist approach, finally declaring on page 87 of his book as the last
word on the subject: “The class structure of Western- and Central-European society, its delicate
economic apparatus and its dependence upon international trade relations, demand that the
economic revolution should be carried out in the form of a gradual, planned reorganization.”

What Dr. Bauer here preaches is nothing more and nothing less than the bankruptcy of
Marxism! Where is the social revolution, which was proclaimed towards the end of the Great
War as the objective whose realization was shortly to be brought to fruition? What the repentant
sinner Dr. Bauer is saying here is no longer revolutionary, but reformist; no longer red, but – to
use the language of class-conscious Marxists, sworn to the class struggle – downright yellow! It is
the reformist socialist perspective represented by us which Dr. Renner and Dr. Bauer, made wise
by personal experience, are expressing. Their sentiments are heavily reminiscent of the words in
our party principles: “Not revolution but purposeful, creative reform work alone can overcome
today’s untenable social conditions.”

Since Marxism is socially subversive (social-revolutionary), any departure from these principles
thereby signifies its intellectual breakdown. From the outset it was clear to us National Socialists
that this would have to come about sooner or later. That is why we have always championed the
standpoint of economic reform. In völkisch terms we are and will remain revolutionary; in
economic terms we have always been reformers, and see no reason for revising this position.
 94

Abolition of Unearned Income

through Land Law Reform and Monetary-Reform, and through the
Socialization of Private Monopolies.

With those words from our fundamental principles which we have placed at the head of the
previous chapters, we set ourselves not only in conscious opposition to Marxist communism –
the scientific basis of Social-Democracy and the trends related to it, such as Communism,
Spartacism, and Bolshevism – but also to all so-called bourgeois tendencies, i.e., to those parties
which adhere to today’s economic and social order and are thus, in essence, Mammonistic.

We National Socialists are not communists, for we do not wish to eliminate the private sector
altogether, and we hold all efforts directed towards this to be dangerously childish nonsense
which will inevitably prove disastrous. But we also do not believe that one can cure the ailing
capitalist economic order with good advice, Christian admonitions, and social sticking-plasters,
as the bourgeois parties seem to imagine. The beast of Mammonism, with Jewish spirit in heart
and brain, cannot be mastered with fine exhortations; one has to make use of the whip!

Over the following chapter we discuss the two major reforms which we feel are required – land
reform and monetary-reform – and the methods of socialization which we deem to be necessary.

A. Land Law Reform and Monetary Reform

“The German National Socialist Party views today’s land law and interest-slavery as the
source of the social evils of our age, evils whose elimination it strives for with every
possible means. It is, and always has been, of the view that one must return to the old
Germanic outlook, according to which land and soil can ideally only be the property of
the Volk, while the individual solely possesses that which he has built and earned himself.
This does not mean that the working peasant loses his land, but that usurious land
speculation is done away with.

“The National Socialist Party resolutely rejects the international orientation of the Free-
Land Movement of Silvio Gesell,135 as it would mean the death of our folkdom. The
moneybag cannot be the deciding factor in the acquisition of land, but instead only the
ability to best cultivate the land in the interests of the community. For the Volk the
development of wasteland and wilderness, a centenary of work upon a small spot of land,
creates – a home, and hence an imprescriptible legal title.

“As far as the breaking of interest-slavery is concerned, the National Socialist Party, in
contrast with Marxist socialism, regards supranationally-organized and internationally-
exploitative loan- and finance-capital as the greatest enemy of humanity in general – and
of the German Volk, with their economic enslavement through Versailles and St.
Germain, in particular – and advocates for the complete elimination of interest in both
public and personal credit. Having said this, it is also in agreement with Gottfried Feder
and the ‘League for the Breaking of Interest-Slavery’136 that, for the moment, the German
state’s limitless burden of debt is of paramount national-political importance, and it sees
the conversion of debt certificates into non-interest-bearing securities as the immediate
course of action to be taken. To those small pensioners and interest-recipients who are
unable to earn a living owing to sickness, old age, etc., the state must pay the existing, or
in some cases even higher, proceeds of their security holdings for life. The state is to meet
the monetary requirements of its public welfare responsibilities (maternity benefits, etc.)
 95

out of the surpluses from its revenue-generating state-owned enterprises, as well as from
wealth taxes and income taxes.

“Those costs for soliciting improvements which, due to immediate fiscal burdens, it
cannot cover from existing community services, it is to defray by issuing non-interest-
bearing state treasury bills, following approval from parliament. These state treasury bills
are to be repaid out of the earnings.

“The National Socialist Party likewise perceives the issue of unearned income in relation
to the havoc of the stock market, and holds firm to its old demand for the socialization
(nationalization, or to be precise, provincialization) of the banks and the abolition of
today’s stock exchange operations; in this way opportunities would also be provided for
lowering the cost of private credit.” (Resolution of the Inter-State Representatives’
Congress of German National Socialists at Linz, 13th and 14th August, 1921.)

In a previous chapter (“Labor and Unearned Income”) we looked at the two main types of
unearned income – ground-rent and interest – and their causes as well as their effects. As the
cause behind both we identified on the one hand a constant demand for land, and on the other
a constant demand for money, all while the supply of both remains limited – be it (as in the case
of land) because an increase in land is generally impossible, or (as is the case with metal currency)
because an increase in precious metals is only possible to a limited extent. We also established
that the producer can never attain the full proceeds of his labor. A portion of the disposable
income which is his by rights falls from the outset to those who possess land or money. They are
the recipients of unearned income, the moochers, also known as rentiers or capitalists.

If the producer – whether self-employed or employee – is to receive the full proceeds of his
labor, then unearned income must be abolished entirely. This means: Interest must disappear,
and ground-rent, which cannot be done away with so long as people live together side by side,
must devolve to the community, i.e., to the state or the municipality. This is the big issue waiting
to be resolved.

Marx also recognized the harmfulness of ground-rent. He wished to eliminate it by bringing land
into the possession of the totality. Since, as we have already stressed, the concept of the state
according to our understanding was alien to him, he regarded “society” as the totality’s
representative. Hence why Marxists speak of “social ownership” or “socialization” and call
themselves “socialists” or – in a curious confusion of terminology – “Social-Democrats,”
something which we have already discussed.

Marx, on the other hand, did not recognize the harmfulness of loan interest, and as a Jew he
could not recognize it, either, for to the Jewish soul interest is but a tender little flower. Instead
for Marx the second cause behind producers being deprived of part of their income lay with the
so-called “surplus value,” the recipient of which is the capitalist. This “surplus value” is supposed
to be the source of capital-interest and of all other income within the national economy.
According to Marx these conditions can only be eliminated in a socialist society, which one
arrives at through the expropriation of the expropriators (dispossession of the dispossessors) or,
in other words, through societal upheaval (social revolution). This should – and this is essential
– come about of its own accord, as soon as the present economic conditions, with their
accumulation of property in the hands of a few and the corresponding impoverishment of the
many, have been carried to their extreme. Accordingly, it cannot be the task of the masses to
hinder the trend of capital accumulation; instead they should accelerate it. Marxist socialism
 96

therefore does not combat the growth of capital, but instead merely consoles the masses with
promises of the day of the great revolution! This essentially oriental-fatalistic outlook conceals
within itself a striking contrast between trade-unionist and Marxist thinking, a contradiction
which, curiously enough, is not realized by the Social-Democratic union leaders and by the
masses of union members. The trade-union, regardless of its orientation, is organized will to act,
while Marxism typifies a genuinely oriental sense of kismet, i.e., an apathetic submission to fate.

We have already seen in the previous chapter that prominent Social-Democratic spokesmen
themselves doubt the validity of these views, and how, rather than hoping for a revolution to
someday eventuate, they are instead inclined towards reform. Yet for the time being they doubt
only the correctness of the path, not that of the goal itself, which remains collective property, i.e.,
communism. We, however, have always had doubts about both, and therefore wish to eliminate
the causes of today’s economic conditions; in our view these stem from unearned income, which
itself arises out of ground-rent and loan interest. We seek the means for this in land reform – or,
more precisely, in land law reform and in monetary- or currency-reform.

Land can either be the property of individuals, i.e., private property, or it can belong to the
community in the form of state or municipal property.

The first of these forms prevails – as a consequence of Roman Law – in every civilized country
today. It makes possible the exploitation of those who till the soil by land-rentiers, who, year after
year, without any work of their own, strip away a large part of the workers’ proceeds of labor in
the form of ground-rent.

The second form, common property, can be beneficial to a greater or lesser extent depending
upon how it is administered.

For example, the standard method of administration of the commons (i.e., communal land) in
many Swiss municipalities, in which the rich farmer can graze 100 cows and the poor peasant can
graze only one goat, is unfair. It would be fair if, for every cow and every goat and so on, a
corresponding grazing fee were paid to the owner of the land, the municipality.

The medieval feudal system, which we are already acquainted with, was less unjust than this.

Over time, however, military service for the nobility – which constituted the foundation of the
feudal system – became increasingly lighter, while at the same time, thanks to the increase in the
population, the earnings of the noble landowners grew ever larger, so that their rights were
ultimately no longer in proportion with their duties.

The old Russian form of common land ownership, the so-called “Mir,” was also impractical.137
Here the peasants did not pay any lease fees, but in each community instead the land was
distributed as fairly as possible among all the peasants. As a result fragmentation became
unavoidable, because each peasant had to receive some good and also some bad land to work
upon. And in order to satisfy all the precepts of justice, the land furthermore was redistributed
every couple of years, whereby of course nobody had any advantage in maintaining the land in a
decent, productive condition through drainage, diligent manuring, installing paths and
hedgerows, planting tree crops, etc.; for why should he sow where he would not reap?
 97

Land Law Reform (Land Reform)

The purpose of land reform is to ensure that ground-rent no longer flows to individuals, but to
the community. This can be accomplished either by the state, as the representative of the
community, expropriating all land and soil in some fashion and thereafter leasing it out to
individuals, something which can also occur on a long-term basis (the Erbpacht); or by leaving
land with its current owners and confiscating the ground-rent instead. Let us examine these two
options in greater detail.

With the first option the difficulty lies in the expropriation. Should one expropriate with or
without compensation? Both constitute an injustice; expropriation in exchange for payment
because it is precisely the largest landowners who originally received their land as an endowment
(hereditary fiefs, contributions for military services, etc.), and expropriation without
compensation because it would bring further harm to the smaller landowners, whose land was
purchased with their own hard-earned Groschen. Exemptions, however, would bring every
concept of the law into disarray, and would thereby shake the very foundations of the state. Of
course, all of this always applies only to the bare soil, because anything created through human
activity is of course to be relieved in exchange for payment.

The devotees of the Free-Land/Free-Money Movement [Freiland-Freigeldbewegung] founded

by Silvio Gesell take the view that, in association with monetary reform (Free-Money), all land
should be bought up by the state and leased out to the highest bidders. Payment is made in the
form of government securities, i.e., real-estate relief-certificates, along the lines of the following
example.

𝕾𝕾𝕾𝕾𝕾𝕾𝕾𝕾𝖑𝖑𝖊𝖊
𝖔𝖔𝖔𝖔 𝖆𝖆 𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽-𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰𝕰 𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿-𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮𝕮
(only transferable by notary public)
Series... No. 00 000
Mr...........................................................
or his legal assignee are owed by the German Reich for relinquished property rights the
sum of
𝔐𝔐. 1000 / 𝔒𝔒𝔒𝔒𝔒𝔒 𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗𝔗 𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐𝔐
Interest will always be paid on this amount by the state in order that the holder of this
Transfer-Certificate will realize the above sum in the event of a sale. The rate of interest
will therefore be increased if the market price falls below the nominal value; it is reduced if
the market price rises above the nominal value. Repayment of the debt is fulfilled by
repurchasing at the nominal value price within the scope of the means made available for
this purpose through legislation.
Berlin, dated...............................................
𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿𝕿 𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲 𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲𝕲-𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽𝕽 𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺𝕺.

The price of these certificates should always be kept at the same level (at par) through adjustment
to the current rate of interest. Meaning, if one’s market price is apt to fall, the rate of interest is
therefore increased else it degrades. Initially the state does not derive any profit from these
measures, as lessees only pay it the interest on the allocated transfer sum. Only when the rate of
interest lowers as a result of the simultaneous implementation of monetary-reform does the
ground-rent devolve to the community; it is then to be divided up in some form as an honorary
endowment for mothers, who are the true progenitors of population growth and therefore also
of ground-rent.
 98

The American Henry George, the original founder of land reform, explains in his work Progress
and Prosperity that private ownership of land is the real cause behind the social deficiencies of
the present day. He thereby concludes: “We must make land common property.” “The equal
right of all people to use of the land” is for him “as clear as their equal right to the air” which they
breathe – “it is a right guaranteed by the very fact of their existence.” “Let the landowners have,
if you please, everything the land would give them – in the absence of the rest of society. But rent
is a creation of the whole community, so it necessarily belongs to the whole community.”

Thus, as the last sentence indicates, for George it is not a matter of letting the land as such become
common property, but rather the rent. In the eighth volume of his aforementioned work,
‘Application of the Remedy’, he expresses himself on the subject clearly and impeccably via the
following words:

“I do not propose to purchase or confiscate private property in land.”

“It is not necessary to confiscate the land, we only need to confiscate rent!”

“We already take some rent through taxation.138 We only need to change the process of
taxation a little to take all the rent in its entirety. I therefore propose, as a simple yet
effective solution: ‘The appropriation of rent through taxation!’

“By these means the state becomes the common landlord, without having to call itself
that and without having to assume a single new function. In terms of form, the right of
land ownership would remain just as it is now. No landowner need have his land wrested
from him, nor is it necessary that restrictions be placed upon the amount of land that any
one could inherit. For if rent were collected by the state as taxes, then land – no matter
in whose name it is registered, or in what size parcels it is dispersed – would really become
common property, and every member of the community would enjoy the benefits of its
ownership.

“Since the taxation of rent or the value of land would naturally increase to the extent to
which other taxes are abolished, we can put this proposition into practical form by
formulating it as follows:

“All other taxes are to be abolished, with the exception of those on land values.”

As earlier explanations have demonstrated (such as in the chapter “Changes in Land Law”),
Henry George’s proposition would be nothing new, but instead only a return to the good
institutions of old. As we have seen, medieval armies had to be supplied and equipped by
landowners. Even statesmen, clergymen, etc., did not previously receive a salary. In the German
city of the Middle Ages, the land tax was the citizen’s [Bürger] only tax. But only the freeborn
German who owned land and a home became a citizen.

The German Land-Reformers (Adolf Damaschke)139 put forward the following demands (taken
from their leaflet for the elections to the German National Assembly):

“1. A Homestead Act which provides every German family with the opportunity to
acquire and maintain a residential homestead (a private home with kitchen garden) or,
where appropriate, a commercial homestead (a horticultural or smallholding property);
 99

“2. As the basis for a more equitable taxation, the value of German land after deducting
the cost of the buildings, all the improvements, etc., is to be determined through a
cadastral self-appraisal on the part of the owners. At the same time, this is to constitute
the basis for compensation in the event of expropriation, if such proves itself necessary
to the public interest, e.g. for the establishment of homesteads;

“3. The taxation of ground-rent, i.e., of those proceeds of the land which are generated
without any expenditure of labor or capital. This is to be staggered, while largely sparing
residential homesteads and horticultural and smallholding properties. On the other hand,
unearned appreciation, especially in the value of urban building sites, new transport
facilities, canals, etc., is to be made as thoroughly utilizable by the community as is
possible;

“4. The right of first refusal for the state and municipality on every compulsory sale of
land and ‘rolling’ properties;140

“5. A reform of our mortgage system for the systematic debt relief of sound home
ownership in town and country – to facilitate the influx of capital for every improvement
of an economic and cultural nature, and to prevent the inflow of capital being misused
along with the land;

“6. Public sector utilization of natural resources, such as black coal, brown coal, potash,
ores, petroleum, and water power, as sources of electrical energy;

“7. Public sector supervision of the transportation and insurance industries, as well as of
the distribution of lighting and power.”

Now we can move on to discussing specific proposals. We will initiate this discussion by citing
that section of the resolution of the Linz Inter-State Representatives’ Congress which deals with
the land question. This resolution states:

“The German National Socialist Party views today’s land law and interest-slavery as the
source of the social evils of our age, evils whose elimination it strives for with every
possible means. It is, and always has been, of the view that one must return to the old
Germanic outlook, according to which land and soil can ideally only be the property of
the Volk, while the individual solely possesses that which he has built and earned himself.
This does not mean that the working peasant loses his land, but that usurious land
speculation is done away with.

“The National Socialist Party resolutely rejects the international orientation of the Free-
Land Movement of Silvio Gesell, as it would mean the death of our folkdom. The
moneybag cannot be the deciding factor in the acquisition of land, but instead only the
ability to best cultivate the land in the interests of the community. For the Volk the
development of wasteland and wilderness, a centenary of work upon a small spot of land,
creates – a home, and hence an imprescriptible legal title.”

If we read these words very closely, and allow ourselves to take them all in, then it is apparent
that we have before us a complete programme of land reform. We will begin by addressing the
rejection of the Free-Land Movement of Silvio Gesell. Our resolution rejects it for being
 100

internationalist, and makes reference to the moneybag and to the death of our folkdom. Its
orientation is internationalist because it expressly wishes to lease the land acquired by the state
to the highest bidder, without any restriction in regards to their ethnic origin. Whether Jew or
Zulu-Kaffir is all the same to Silvio Gesell and his people, but not to us. What they are ultimately
aiming for is demonstrated with requisite clarity in Gesell’s own statements from the July 1921
issue of the journal Freiwirtschaft (published by the Freiland-Freigeldverlag, Erfurt). In the essay
“The Minister of Agriculture’s Agrarian Programme: Likewise, a Word about Reparations,”
Silvio Gesell addresses the goals and tasks set out within the budgetary speech of Minister
Warmbold,141 which essentially read as follows:

1. An increase in the resident rural population through denser settlement of existing cultivated
land, and through the acquisition of new cultivated land;

2. A rapid uplift in agricultural production, with the aim of satisfactorily feeding our population
through our own production.

Something about which Silvio Gesell has the following (among other things) to say:

“The idea of feeding ourselves through our ‘own production’ seems unhealthy to us, a
notion stemming from fear of war. It leads easily to the utopian, imperialist concept of
the ‘self-sufficient, closed, national economic territory’, and thereby drives us into new
wars.”

“And our remedy is not self-sufficiency, but world supply through international trade and
free trade.” (Or in other words, English hegemony. – Author’s note).

Within the same essay, Gesell again advocates for so-called “reparations,” something which he
has also done on other occasions, i.e., for those extortions perpetrated upon the German Reich
– demoralized and disarmed through an insane pacifism – by its enemies.

As a monetary reformer Silvio Gesell is admirable; however, we cannot warm to the pacifist
world-brotherhood-enthusiast of the same name, a man afflicted by delusions about the ‘human
race’.

The fundamental objection which we have against this type of land reform does not stem from
economic concerns. Ultimately, we consider Gesell’s proposals to be mistaken because they are
too purely, theoretically economical, and because they completely overlook the imponderables
in human life. If we carried out this reform in accordance with his wishes, then lessees would
take the place of the current owners. What would thereby be gained? The soil is not only there
to produce foodstuffs, but instead has a higher, more moral purpose: land must be homeland
[Heimat], i.e., the people must have grown together along with it! This the lessee never can do.

We can tax the land, extract everything possible from it, but it must still be a homeland. This
means we have to make it possible that every German – and only they, i.e., only those who are
of German blood – can become an owner. Not must become an owner, for compulsion is even
less appropriate here than it is anywhere else, but can. Ideally the community – be it state or
municipality – should indeed be the owner of all land and soil, but in actuality it is the individual
who should more or less call it his own. When a thing is loved only by its owner then it becomes
for him an eternally-flowing spring of the purest joy, a source of the most profound experience.
 101

Only through possession of land will the soulless German of the present become the German
man of yore once again!

In this respect the overly sober, theoretical outlook of the Free-Land Movement leaves us
completely dissatisfied. It does not recognize the vast difference between emotions and reason.
To it the poetry of the forest village and the empty bustle of the department store are as one!
Hence why it should be flatly rejected by all people with souls.

Let us now move on to Henry George. “The single tax is that upon land values.” Can this
principle be applied, in all its strictness, to our present-day conditions? Keep in mind that state
and municipal expenditure run into the hundreds of millions. These huge sums would have to
be raised from the naked soil alone, i.e., from agricultural land, built-up land, and fallow land.
According to Henry George, this tax would be “non-shiftable”; the landowner would have to bear
it himself. This would make sense enough with owners of fallow land, i.e., undeveloped or
uncultivated land. There the tax would indeed be non-shiftable. However, the situation is not
quite the same when it comes to the ownership of agricultural land or a commercial enterprise.
Here this tax is only unshiftable when there are no protective tariffs, when the relevant products
are subject to the full pressure of global competition – i.e., under conditions of pronounced free
trade. However, there are many arguments to be made against this, because it could also ruin
agriculture and industry. Finally, the owner of built-up land – the homeowner, essentially – will
certainly not be impeded by George’s “single tax.” Since he has no international competition to
fear, he will calmly pass the tax on to the tenant, especially if the presence of a local homeowner’s
association protects him from undercutting. Under certain circumstances, therefore, there would
be an unwarranted advantage to the homeowner. However, if the tax could not be passed on in
this case either, then what would happen? Then the land would not be built up, whereby nothing
would be gained.

Another argument against George’s “single tax” is the fact that certain taxes have an educational
effect and should be retained for this reason alone. Such taxes include, for example, those on
luxury goods.142

When it comes to the acquisition of ground-rent, there is also one very important factor which
must not be overlooked: the indebtedness of the land.

Finally, it is important to consider whether appropriating ground-rent in its entirety would be

justifiable so long as interest continues to exist. It certainly would not be. For it would not be right
to eliminate one form of unearned income while allowing another to remain in place. It would
not be prudent, either, because money would consequently become even more of a tyrant than
it already is today!

Henry George’s proposition should therefore certainly not be rejected in its entirety; we merely
need to keep in mind that of European conditions he was really only familiar with those of
England, where all rural and urban land belongs to a select few nobles. We will be able to make
reasonable enough use of his proposals, albeit in a somewhat milder form, to thereby fulfil the
following demands:

1. In order to collect as much ground-rent as possible, the entirety of land and soil, i.e.,
all agriculturally-utilized land, fallow land, and building plots – in other words, bare land
without any buildings – is no longer taxed according to income, but instead according to
 102

its sales price (market price), the so-called “fair market value.” This tax is to be staggered
in accordance with the land’s size and designated purpose;

2. Building into the air is not permitted, i.e., the number of allowable stories is restricted;

3. The state and municipality enjoy the right of first refusal on every sale of land, and a
mandatory offer is required to be made by them against each;

4. Nationalization of the selling of real-estate;

5. The state or municipality can at any time purchase land at the value of the duties paid
by the owner;

6. Nationalization of real-estate loans [Realkredit];

7. The setting of a ceiling on debt;

8. In the German People’s State, only Germans may possess land (see also the chapter
“German Law”).

In light of all this, let us take a look at the small state of Serbia, which has notoriously proved
itself perfectly capable of waging war against its largest neighbor, Austria-Hungary. The following
information about it has been taken from the Land Reform Yearbook, 2nd issue, 1915 volume:

“The Homestead Act still in force today originally dates from the year 1873. Residences
with a yard of 1 morgen, and which further comprise land of up to 5 morgen, are immune
from any foreclosure, except for that which arises as a result of tax arrears. Indebtedness
is only possible up to 50% of the fair market value, and only through a state-owned
mortgage bank.”

If we now compare the proposals which we have just outlined with demands 2 to 5 from the
“League of German Land-Reformers” (for our take on their points 6 and 7, see the later section
“Socialization of Private Monopolies”; for our take on their 1st demand, see the later chapter
“German Law”), we can see that both are essentially equivalent, by and large. Only, the demands
we have laid down are stricter, in some respects. Above all, we believe that the determination of
land values by the state is a preferable arrangement to self-appraisal on the part of the owners,
and that the state or municipality’s right of first refusal must be prescribed on every sale of land,
not merely on compulsory sales. In our opinion mandatory offers, the nationalization of real-
estate loans, and the establishment of a debt-ceiling are all absolutely essential. On the other
hand, we do not consider taxation on value appreciation – something to which the pure Land-
Reformers attach so much importance – to be necessary. The reasons are clear enough. If we
tax land according to its “fair market value,” then anyone who has paid an excessively high price
will come off badly in the taxation. As a result he will be careful not to pay any more for land
than is absolutely necessary. And the general public is sufficiently protected against being
swindled by means of the right of first refusal, mandatory offers, and also via the right of
expropriation specified in our point no. 5.

Let us now consider the impact of our demands. Our first demand requires the taxation of all
land according to its “fair market value,” i.e., according to the relative sales price. This means
that rural land situated far away from traffic routes is taxed lower than land located near a village,
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town, railway, road, or waterway. It further means that urban land in commercial districts is taxed
higher than that in outer residential areas. Finally, it also means that fallow land – whether
building plots or arable farmland – is taxed at the same rate as land which has been cultivated or
built upon. Additionally, the tax is to be staggered. Assuming an average level of ground-rent, i.e.,
around 4% of the “fair market value,” then small properties – cottagers, dwarf peasants, allotment
gardeners, cooperative building societies, and the like – will have to pay around 1 to 2%; middle-
sized estates around 2 to 3%; large properties, 4%; and the largest properties, 4 to 6% and beyond.
What does this mean? That the large and largest estates will have to sell part of their land because
they can no longer survive competitively. The foundations for a planned internal settlement, a
Homestead Act, and the acquisition of public land are all therefore provided for, since points 3,
4, and 5 of our demands protect us from such properties being appropriated for private land
speculation.

Please note, however, that we tax only the ground-rent, i.e., only the bare soil. What the land-
owner – whether allotment gardener or large estate-owner – gets out of it through labor remains
untaxed.

The same rule which applies to rural land also applies to building plots. The higher their value,
the higher the ground-rent, and the higher therefore the level of taxation. Since we draw no
distinction between utilized and fallow land, soon enough there will no longer be any fallow land.
Either residential houses will be built, or fields and gardens will arise out of areas of wasted earth.

What is the purpose of our second demand? Nothing more than ensuring that the price of urban
land does not skyrocket, so that value appreciation is kept within reasonable limits. The price of
building plots is dependent upon their potential use. The more storeys permitted means the
more apartments can be accommodated, which in turn means a much higher base price. If we
limit this potential, therefore, then we can lower base prices in general. Urban land prices will
still nonetheless be higher, especially in the city’s interior, than land on the periphery of the city
precincts. But, as we will have enough housing outside them, nobody will be forced to live within
the unhealthy city centers. Instead, businesses and offices will become increasingly prevalent
there until they finally replace the apartments completely, and the people there will set up their
homes where they belong: in the free nature of God, where there are forests and meadows,
blooming gardens, blue skies, and sunshine! Thus we are dealing with a preventative measure.
We wish to break up the big city into small settlements!

We have already touched upon our third, fourth, and fifth demands in the context of our
examination of the first. A more detailed discussion thus seems somewhat superfluous. The aim
of these demands is the complete elimination of private land speculation, i.e., the paralyzation of
land-usury. The same is true of points 6 and 7. The banks should become currency exchange
offices again, and should keep their unclean hands away from holy Mother Earth.

We cover the eighth and final demand in the chapter “German Law.” For the time being, the
only thing which needs to be said is that by “Germans” we mean only those with German blood.
In a true German People’s State, all other people fall under the jurisdiction of the law on resident
aliens [Ausländerrecht]!

In order to counter any misunderstandings, all that remains is to say a few words about the so-
called land reform in Czechia, namely the law of 16th April, 1919, on the expropriation of the
large estates, and its amendment of 11th July, 1919, on the allocation of expropriated land. We
touched upon these already at the end of the chapter “Changes in Land Law.” This law, as its
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§10 makes clear for all those who understand how to read Czech legislation, only serves to partly
bring the land and soil of the German settlement area in the Sudetenland into the hands of the
Czech state (the Grenzwald),143 and to partly distribute this land to the privileged members of the
Czech majority population – the Legionaries and the like.144 This law was passed by the so-called
Revolutionary Assembly, i.e., a committee of Czech parties which met for a year and a half.
There can be no doubt about the attitude of our movement towards this shoddy concoction, as
demonstrated within the Supplement to the Guiding Principles reproduced under the chapter
“Documents of National Socialism.” Any expropriation and distribution of land within the Czech
state can only count on our approval once the German territories possess complete self-
autonomy, with expropriated land [in those territories] devolving solely to the Germans.

Pure Land-Reformers subscribe to the idea that ground-rent is the source of all present-day social
evils; its total or partial confiscation for the benefit of the general public is, for them, sufficient
enough to remedy all harm. We, on the other hand, share the view of the Free-Economists (Silvio
Gesell) that interest also constitutes a form of unearned income, and deduce from this that a
second course of action is still required: the breaking of interest-slavery. This shall be brought
about through monetary- or currency-reform.

Monetary-Reform (Currency-Reform)
By way of an introduction, we refer readers to the second part of the Resolution of the Inter-
State Representatives’ Congress of German National Socialists at Linz (13th and 14th August,
1921).

The first question which we must ask ourselves: Is money necessary, what is it, and what purpose
does it serve? Money is a medium of exchange and mediates the trade of goods. It is absolutely
indispensable in a national economy based upon the division of labor. In the past, however, there
were periods when goods were exchanged for other goods directly (barter-economy) without the
intercession of money. Yet in those days the necessities of life were simpler, and there were also
fewer people producing as much as possible simply for themselves.

So, money is a medium of exchange. As such it should be as similar as possible to the goods
whose exchange it mediates. This means therefore that it must not possess much of an advantage
over them, if any. The principal characteristic of goods is their perishability. Moreover, their
storage induces costs. (Of course, there are also non-perishable goods, such as precious stones
and the like. These possess only scarcity value, however, and are not relevant in this context.) If
the medium of exchange has an advantage over them, then it is clear that it will soon come to
dominate the commodity market, changing from the market’s key to its lock.145

Such is how things are with metal currency. It does not spoil and there are also no costs involved
in storing it; on the contrary, the owner even receives interest for it. Such money therefore does
not make itself generally accessible, as goods do. Instead it lies dormant until the highest possible
sums have been extorted. Instead of promoting the circulation of goods, it inhibits it.

If money is to satisfy all of our requirements, then it must accordingly:

1. in no way be tied to non-perishable materials, and must
2. circulate continuously. Every true currency must take both of these requirements into
consideration. But it must also still be:
3. what is implied by its name, i.e., continuous, immutable, because if something is “current” that
means that it is “ongoing.”146
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In checking today’s currencies against these three requirements, we must inevitably conclude that
they in no way measure up to them. Above all, they are based upon metal currency, which is
“legal tender” even if only paper money is generally in circulation. Depending upon whether the
“legal metal currency” consists of gold, or silver, or both, this is referred to either as a gold, silver,
or bimetallic standard.

There was once a time when it was understandable that money should be produced from
precious metals. Above all, one did not require too much money then, because barter was still
being practised, money was easy to manufacture and straightforward to use, and, most
importantly – if we consider the conditions in medieval Europe, for example – states were small.
Every major city was a state in and of itself. Thus money was needed that – if minted in
Nuremburg, for instance – was also valid in Augsburg, because that city was viewed as a foreign
country. Moreover, the letterpress was not invented until later; art printing has only really been
in vogue for a century. It was for all these reasons, therefore, that in the past only metal currency
could exist. So long as America remained undiscovered, the metal used in money was silver; with
the discovery of America and its gold prospects gold appeared alongside it, only to eventually
displace it entirely. Silver deposits were rare. This explains for us the shortage of money in the
Middle Ages, and with it the high purchase value of money or the low price of goods.

Today’s economy requires the circulation of large volumes of money. This fact led to the issuance
of paper money. The overriding question which consequently emerged was: Is paper money real
money, or does it need to be backed by precious metal? This question was not without
foundation. Money fashioned from precious metals, whether gold or silver, had certainly worked
well enough at one time, because the materials which made up money were rare and therefore
could not be multiplied at will. This did not supply it with that “intrinsic value” which some claim
to have discovered in silver or even in gold, but that the result was a certain stability of value is
incontrovertible. Such value was the crux of the whole thing; people sought to confer it upon
paper money via coverage, i.e., by storing a given quantity of precious metal as backing. The idea
in and of itself was not incorrect. The only question that remains is the scale of the coverage, and
the issue of whether precious metals are currently still necessary for this.

Ultimately, the one thing which is supposed to be achieved via “coverage” is that the amount of
paper money in circulation is kept within certain limits, thus preventing it from escalating
uncontrollably. The supply of money and the supply of goods should balance one another so
that no arbitrary price fluctuations can occur. That and nothing else is the purpose of coverage.
But given that the supply of goods stands in causal connection with labor performance, so does
the amount of money in circulation depend upon it also, meaning that it cannot therefore be
multiplied arbitrarily any more than labor performance can.

Looking at it from this angle, we draw the conclusion that it is quite satisfactory for money to be
made from paper, and that it can be covered just as well – if not better – by labor performance
than it can by precious metals.

By way of these observations we have elucidated the first and the last of the three demands which
we made several paragraphs earlier. That leaves us with the second, which was: Money must be
in continuous circulation.

How then can its continuous circulation be accomplished? Interest is supposed to be sufficient
for this task. The intention is for it to serve as an enticement, a means of drawing money into the
market. Admittedly, this enticement does also have its drawbacks, in that the promise of interest
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rates has turned money into a means of saving, thereby withdrawing it from circulation. Money
which can be employed as a means of saving (in today’s sense – we will discuss other possible
methods of saving in due course) is no longer fully suitable as a medium of exchange, is no longer
the market’s key – but its lock.

Above all, we maintain that interest has failed to fulfil the only task which was intended for it,
namely to keep money in continuous circulation with the lure of effortless profit, despite the fact
that it worked upon the worst – and yet also the most powerful – quality of man, his selfishness.
On the contrary, it makes every product more expensive, and robs producers of a large part of
the proceeds of their labor. The entire national economy groans under its pressure.

Let us consider an obvious example. The businessman must deduct from the proceeds of his
products: the interest on land and capital, expenditure on raw materials, despatch and production
costs, and, finally, his earnings, i.e., his pay. Only that which is left over after all of these things
are deducted is distributed among his workforce as wages and salaries. A struggle now develops
between the two parties, a dispute over the share in wages and company profits. “Higher profits!”
or “Higher wages!” are their respective battlecries! But what both are able to wrest from one
another in the trade-union conflict, or concede by way of contract, is out of all proportion to the
mammoth burden imposed both by financial interest and the interest on land (ground-rent).
Here we see before us the modern form of slavery, interest-slavery. Its influence on the national
economy is, of course, not so immediately obvious at first glance, generally speaking. But we can
discern it plainly and distinctly enough when we consider the monstrous indebtedness of states
and municipalities. This is also where the absurdity of the situation comes to light most clearly.
Suppose, for example, that an internal bond is issued. This means that the state or municipality
borrows money from its citizens in return for a promise of interest. But what, according to the
prevailing view of things, is the state, what is the municipality, other than the totality of the
citizens? Thus things actually look like this: The totality of the citizenry borrows from itself a
sum of money, and awards itself interest for it in return. By what means is this interest raised?
Through taxes, which again are paid by the whole of the citizenry. To that end they also have to
maintain the expensive apparatus which the raising of taxes entails. Is this not stupidity? And yet
there is a very well-considered method behind it all. The reality of the situation is actually as
follows: Taxes may be raised by all citizens; but only a part of them borrows the money, and so
an internal loan constitutes nothing more than the indirect enrichment of a segment of the
citizenry at the expense of the whole via the expensive apparatus of tax collection.

Thus we see here an obvious example of how interest-slavery is maintained by one part of the
citizenry over the rest through the means of loan-capital. If, however, it is foreign capital which is
drawn upon by way of a bond, the result is the enslavement of the entire Volk and the state to
foreigners. In taking a look at the agents of this loan-capital, we will find that they are always the
three hundred of Abraham’s Seed whom Walter Rathenau once spoke of in an unguarded
moment.147

Interest-slavery therefore means nothing other than the enslavement of all productive peoples
[Völker] under the rule of Judaism. “You will consume every nation,” as it says in the Old
Testament.

Hence why interest must be eliminated. This is not merely the best guarantee for the continuous
circulation of currency, but it is also the basic precondition for free production, for ensuring
people the full proceeds of their labor.
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However, interest is only made possible by money that can be imputed with so-called “intrinsic
value.” Therefore, we must above all do away with the delusion that only metal currency can be
of full value, that every other form of currency needs to be backed by precious metals.

Is currency really dependent upon the materials which make up money? We say no! Instead we
maintain that money is not made what it is through currency materials – gold, silver – but through
the state, and through the accomplishments of the citizens which stand behind it. Only labor, in
our view, makes money into money – whatever materials it may consist of. Even gleaming gold
is capable of nothing without labor. Labor, and only labor, is its coverage too. If, for example, we
wish to undertake work on behalf of the state – the building of roads, railways, or the like – then,
as Feder suggests, this means that notes may simply be printed in lieu of the issuing of bonds.

Banknote proliferation! We can hear the objections already: Complaints about inundation
(inflation), about an assignat-economy;148 that we are witnessing indications of an ongoing currency
depreciation in every state already. Flooding the country with banknotes, i.e., increasing the
supply of currency without a simultaneous increase in the supply of goods, would of course lead
to a reduction in the purchasing power of money or to an escalation in the price of goods (which
is the same thing). The supply of money and of goods, and therefore also the amount of money
in circulation and the actual level of labor output [Arbeitsleistung] available, are – as we have
already detailed earlier – all in a causal relationship with one another. What this money actually
looks like – by which we mean, of course, paper money – is thereby quite unimportant. It is thus
a self-deception to assume that only an increase in so-called notes, but not also an increase in
other (fixed, interest-bearing) government bonds, would be harmful. In terms of pricing, whether
one or the other floods the market is thoroughly immaterial. Did not prices surge when war
bonds, and other loan bonds before them, were issued? The only real difference lies in the fact
that the state must also pay interest on the bonds at a fixed rate, which it could spare itself if it
printed equivalent notes for the proposed expenditure – provided, of course, that it should serve
to enable certain services.

“Assignat-economy!”, someone may object! Assignats were the forerunners of today’s paper
money. They were issued during the French Revolution (1789), and quickly declined in value.
Those who like to draw attention to them forget one major thing, however; namely that assignats
were “covered.” They represented allocations of land. The entirety of France’s soil thus stood
behind them as coverage, and yet it was no more capable of preventing their depreciation than
is the gold which stands behind today’s paper-money-economy. “Yes,” say the incorrigible, “that
is simply due to the fact that today’s paper money is not fully covered.” Well, it never was – as
we know – and even if it were, the national economy would inevitably waste away – without labor.
Herein lies the fallacy that money can create something out of itself by virtue of some inherent
property, the “intrinsic value,” as though it were a kind of perpetual motion machine. The entire
doctrine of metal currency and of paper money backed by metal is based upon this fallacy. It
leads inevitably to Mammonism, i.e., to the inherent overestimation of money. Mammonism
elevates money – which is supposed to be nothing more than a servant – into an idol!

To complete the picture, what do certain states like Switzerland, for example, get out of their
high-value currency? A lack of sales and unemployment. These are also the destiny of nations
with much less-valuable currencies, which, although they can indeed produce and export, are
also unable to purchase raw materials. Thus with one as with the other there is a lack of work, a
breakdown in the national economy, finally leading to chaos with both, and all for the sake of an
absurd delusion which expresses itself in the worship of the golden calf. Through the power of
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the mania for gold, Ahasuerus,149 the ruler of the world, brandishes the whip over the trembling
slaves who believe themselves free simply because they are permitted to babble about freedom!

And what did currency get out of all this mania over gold? Is that why it remained stable? Did
that make it what its name implies, i.e., consistent? Was it spared from fluctuations? On all these
grounds, money has been tied to precious metals, particularly to gold. All of today’s currencies
are based upon the principle that gold remains immutable in value, that its price does not change.
Accordingly, a kilogram of gold bullion would always have to cost 3,276 Kronen, 2,790 Marks,
3,440 Franks, and so on; at any rate, its price in these various states would always have to remain
within these fixed proportions. Nowadays, however, gold has made a fool of its worshippers by
being offered at every price possible, prices which have long since ceased to be in any fixed
relationship with one another. In a nutshell, gold has shown that it is a commodity that, exactly
like other commodities, is subject to the law of supply and demand. As such, its divine
resemblance has therefore come to an end.

So, with all that said, monetary- or currency-reform needs to strive after two things: 1. The
abolition of interest-slavery, and 2. Currency-stability.

Both of these demands require, as their prerequisites, money’s disassociation from metal and its
continuous circulation.

But what should the currency standard be if we choose to dispense with precious metals? Once
again, we refer to our remarks at the beginning of this section. There we stated that the supply of
money has to keep balance with the supply of goods, that the amount of money in circulation
accordingly stands in causal connection with labor performance, and that labor therefore
provides the best coverage. Let us now draw upon these remarks once more. In accordance with
them, we find the currency standard in all those things which are endogenous to the nation, which
owe their origins to labor or which are brought to light through it as mineral resources, raw
materials, structures and the like, things which are multiplied by the labor-power of the citizens
and which are diminished through the value-destruction inherent in the ravages of time!

This is the basis of monetary-reform, and the course which we are henceforth to pursue.

Two men have made a name for themselves in this field: Silvio Gesell and, more recently,
Gottfried Feder. Each attacks the other, yet they do so quite wrongly in our opinion, as no
contradictions actually exist between their two views since the end-goal of each is quite different.
For while Feder’s particular emphasis lies with the breaking of interest-slavery, for Gesell the
stability of currency remains the most important issue. The elimination of interest is for Gesell
only of secondary concern. In his view it will come to pass as soon as every state has carried out
its own monetary-reform. Feder does not want to wait that long, but instead seeks to do away with
the burden of interest-slavery in a single blow. He tackles it where it seems most monstrous and
where its impact is most obvious – in the indebtedness of public and private corporations. He
leaves banknotes undisturbed, and not without good reason; for the moment that fixed-interest
securities become interest-free – that is, the monopoly on interest is eliminated – such a supply
of money eventuates that the rate of interest must decline more and more in the rest of the
economy, too, until interest finally disappears altogether.

We will now take a more detailed look at both proposals.

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Silvio Gesell proposes the introduction of a form of money which he calls “Free-Money.” It is
comprised of banknotes whose value declines by a certain amount (e.g. one-thousandth) from
week to week – depreciation. As a result, one has to pay a surcharge corresponding to the
depreciation. This can be done in two ways. Either the surcharge is derived from a weekly table
attached to the banknote, or it is rendered by affixing stamps. Money of the first type is
represented in Figure 1., money of the second type by Figure 2.

Our kindred spirit Gottfried Feder, on the other hand, proposes the following recommendations
(set out in his Manifesto for the Breaking of Slavery to Interest):

Ҥ1. With the abolition of the obligation to pay interest, war bond certificates, as well as
all other debt instruments of the state, particularly railroad bonds and additionally the
debentures of all self-governing bodies, are declared to be legal tender at face value.

Ҥ2. For all other fixed-interest securities: covered bonds, industrial obligations,
mortgages, etc., the repayment obligation takes the place of the obligation to pay interest;
therewith, after 20 or 25 years, depending on the level of interest, the borrowed capital is
repaid and the debt extinguished.

Ҥ3. All real-estate debts, mortgages, etc., are paid off in instalments as before, in
accordance with the encumbrances recorded in the land register. House and land assets
deleveraged in this fashion become partially the property of the state or of the self-
governing body. In this way, the state is placed into a position where it is able to determine
and lower rental fees.
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Ҥ4. The entire monetary system is subordinated to the central state treasury. (Or, as per
Gesell – the Reich Currency Office). All private banks, likewise the giro banks,150 savings
banks, and credit unions, are to be affiliated as branch offices.

Ҥ5. All credit on real-estate is awarded only through the state bank. Personal and
commercial loans are entrusted to private bankers under concession from the state. This
concession is granted based upon consideration of need, with a proscription on the
establishment of branch offices in certain districts. The scale of charges is set by the state.

Ҥ6. Dividends are redeemed in the same fashion as securities bearing a fixed rate of
interest – in annual instalments of 5%. Surplus profits are in part paid out to shareholders
as compensation for ‘risked’ capital (in contrast to fixed-interest securities and gilt-edged
securities), while the remaining surplus is, by independent right of the workforce, either
distributed for social purposes or applied to lowering the price of products.

Ҥ7. For all persons who on physical grounds (advanced age, illness, physical or mental
unfitness for work, extreme youth) are not in a position to earn their own living, the
interest proceeds from existing capital assets will continue to be paid, at present or
possibly even at increased levels, as an annuity for life [Leibrente] in return for the
delivery of securities.
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Ҥ8. In the interest of reducing the existing inflation with means of payment, a general,
sharply graduated confiscation of assets is undertaken, which is rendered in war bonds or
other debt instruments of the Reich or the states. These papers are to be pulped.

Ҥ9. It must be made clear to the Volk by means of the most intensive public
enlightenment that money is not and must not be anything other than a ‘token of
performed work’; that while every highly-developed economy does admittedly need
money as a medium of exchange, this is also the end of its function, and under no
circumstances can money be granted a supernatural power via interest to reproduce itself
to the detriment of productive labor.”

Our main emphasis is on §§1, 2, and 4. In §1 Feder calls for discontinuing the servicing of
interest payments on all fixed-interest debt certificates of the Reich, federal states, and all self-
governing bodies. The debt instruments are to be carried on to the owners in the form of interest-
free bank deposits.

The costs for new innovations, such as the harnessing of water power, the building of railways,
canals, and the like, are – insofar as the funds cannot be raised directly via taxes – to be met by
issuing state treasury bills. These bills are then redeemed out of the earnings generated by the
new facilities.

What is Gesell aiming for with his Free-Money? Firstly, let us note that it has no metal backing,
i.e., it is completely devoid of any coverage in the sense that is customary today. Furthermore,
this money is unsuitable for accumulating interest, for it bears no interest when placed into a
savings bank [Sparkasse]. The diminishing value with which it is endowed, and which resembles
a kind of negative interest, forces it into continuous circulation and thus turns money back into
what it should be – a medium of exchange.

This is one goal of Gesell’s proposed reforms. The other goal culminates in the stability of the
currency. It is not price levels in and of themselves which have a pernicious effect upon the
national economy, but rather the fluctuation of prices, whereby their abrupt drop is far more
harmful than their rapid elevation, no matter how unpleasant this may be and no matter how
many budgets it may throw off balance. People nowadays like to talk about the “reduction of
prices”; it has become practically the watchword of certain common-or-garden economists. But
let us consider the inevitable consequences of a forced price reduction: The vendor would have
to dispose of his stock of merchandise at a loss, meaning he would no longer bother making any
new orders in which the same fate might end up befalling him again; for the manufacturer things
would be no different. The consequences of this would be shutdowns and economic crises on a
massive scale. The bill, as always, would have to be paid by the broad masses of the working
people. Unemployment would beckon. That same phenomenon would occur which we can
currently observe in states with high-value currencies: a stagnation in sales due to a lack of buyers,
resulting in the closure of factories and in unemployment. The brief delight over cheap sales
would be followed all too soon by protracted suffering.

In addition, there is yet another factor which demonstrates even more clearly to us the downright
terrible consequences which result from a drop in prices. Economic life is founded upon a
myriad of monetary contracts between debtors and creditors. If prices fall, all contracts will
consequently change to the detriment of the debtor, because falling prices lead to an increase in
the purchasing power of money. This means that the debtor, who once received bad money,
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now has to make his repayments with good money, without any corresponding increase to his
income. Quite the opposite, in fact: his income actually diminishes.

But the biggest debtor, however, is the state. For it, a cut in prices – that is, the famous price
reduction – would have absolutely devastating consequences. The nominal value of government
debt would remain unchanged, along with the burden of interest and its corresponding level of
taxation. But since the taxpayers would now be earning less money, the result would be nothing
less than an unprecedented tightening of the screws of taxation in favor of public creditors, i.e.,
ultimately in favor of the recipients of unearned income!

Also encompassed within the field of price reduction is a return to the gold standard, a topic
which has been discussed so often recently and which would be tantamount to a return to pre-
War prices. Aspirations such as these are dictated solely by their utility to loan-capital.

Now, one could perhaps conclude from what we have described so far that the opposite state of
affairs, i.e., an increase in prices (or its equivalent, currency depreciation), would be accompanied
by beneficial effects. Needless to say, this is not the case either, because a rise in prices would
again signify an increase in the cost of living, the devaluation of small assets, elevated public
spending, and, in association with this, an enlargement of the tax burden. Once again, the only
beneficiaries from this would be big loan-capital.

Neither a rise nor a fall in prices is therefore desirable. Instead, the aim of any sound monetary
policy should be currency-stability, i.e., stability in domestic commodity prices and a stable
exchange rate vis-à-vis foreign countries. The fundamental requirement for this is that the greatest
of monopolies, the monopoly over money, must lie in the hands of the state rather than in the
hands of private central banks with government guarantees. In place of today’s State (Reich)
Banks, therefore, a State Currency Office would have to be granted responsibility for continually
adjusting the supply of money and goods to one another. If the supply of goods is greater, then
money is to be issued; if the opposite is the case, then money must be withdrawn. A
corresponding regulation of imports and exports helps ensure that exchange rates remain fixed.
This is the content of the so-called “absolute currency.”151

Now, metallic currency – and the gold standard in particular – are admittedly supposed to
provide this desired stability. We have already explained that they do not do this, and why.

Thus, the things which Gesell is aiming for are: the continuous circulation of money, and
currency-stability. His Free-Money is interest-free. This does not mean, however, that with its
introduction interest as such will automatically disappear. Rather, Gesell assumes that the general
rate of interest will gradually begin to fall, triggered by the increased circulation rate of money
stemming from its steadily declining value. This is easy enough to understand when we remind
ourselves how money, when a loss of value is imminent, is forced to put itself into use. It will
therefore be disseminated even under less favourable circumstances, because it cannot afford to
wait around for more advantageous conditions to occur. Furthermore, the stability of commodity
prices, and the accompanying dearth in economic crises, will facilitate a resulting rise in
prosperity. But the more money that there is in existence, the more there is to be circulated.
According to Gesell’s conception, the rate of interest can only fall to zero once Free-Money is
introduced in every nation, since until then capital has the opportunity to emigrate. Therefore,
his proposed reforms will only take full effect when they have been implemented on an
international basis.
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Gesell’s proposals – like everything new – have triggered a number of debates, both for and
against. The chief difficulty in their implementation is decidedly technical. Consider what it
would actually mean to exchange all the money in circulation every year – and all that in a period
of only a few days, due to the exchange having to take place between the 25th and the 31st of
December. A further inconvenience is involved in affixing the surcharge stamps to the banknotes.
Anyone who has ever been a part of a Rasínist note-stamping exercise152 – like those of us in the
Sudetenland – has had more than their fill of that. Yet Free-Money along the lines of model 2
[see fig. 2, above] would bestow it upon us permanently. If one instead introduces Free-Money
along the lines of model 1, however, then yet another difficulty arises – namely that of perpetual
calculation. Even an intelligent person is often faced with the greatest of hurdles in the process;
so how would things stand for the many for whom the use of a postal cheque is already sufficient
enough to induce headaches?

When faced with this harsh reality, which appears rather different from the perfection depicted
in theory, one has to ask themselves whether complications of this sort are really worthwhile.

Additionally, there is one further consideration: The poor would be the sole casualties of
monetary depreciation. They would have to make haste to lodge their paltry savings somewhere
as quickly as possible in order not to suffer any harm. The inevitable consequence of this would
be an eternal mad rush, as well as the Mammonistic contamination of even those parts of our
Volk who have hitherto kept clear of the pursuit of money.

Is all of this absolutely necessary? Gesell, with his stamp scrip [Schwundgeld], wishes to prevent
the accumulation (hoarding) of banknotes, and believes that this is the only way of ensuring their
continuous circulation. We do not share his concerns.

On the contrary, we believe that the abolition of interest alone is enough to prevent hoarding and
to keep money in circulation. Those who store away their money at home are at a disadvantage,
because there is no benefit to them in doing so. In any case, the hoarding of money does no
harm, because it does not increase the quantity of money in circulation and therefore has no
impact upon the determination of prices. Feder is absolutely right when he describes money as
a “token of performed work,” as every commodity requires labor for its production.

The first objection which we can anticipate being raised against Feder’s proposals involves
reference to the futile interest prohibitions of earlier periods. This comparison falls short,
however, insofar as these prohibitions were not universal. As is well known, they did not emanate
from the state but from the church, and applied only to Christians and not to Jews. Yet it was
precisely the Jews who for the longest time held the monopoly over monetary transactions. A
universal prohibition on interest, backed by the penalties customary in those days, would
certainly have eliminated the charging of interest. The only question is whether this would have
had any purpose in view of the fact that money was not yet a medium of exchange.

A second misgiving, which Gesell also harbors, concerns the emigration of capital. That too is
unfounded. First and foremost, not all capital can emigrate. That which can do so will migrate to
states with a higher rate of interest even without interest being abolished. But what must the
consequences of such emigration be? A greater accumulation of capital in one place and, as a
result, a greater supply of money – and hence also a fall in the rate of interest. After a period of
unrest, an equilibrium would come about on its own.
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The main issue for Feder, however, continues primarily to be not the private sector but the state
economy. The principal objection raised against interest-free money is that it would snuff out the
instinct for saving. In connection with this, there is also talk of purported harm to small
pensioners. Note what we have already said on this subject under the previous section “Interest.”
Incidentally, in point 7 of his proposals, Feder puts forward a satisfactory solution to this issue.
Sufficient money will be available for this proposal the moment the state is liberated from the
bondage of interest. But we also wish to repudiate the much more widespread allegation that we
are opponents of the savings economy in general. Quite the contrary! We acknowledge that we
are outspoken opponents of that economic blundering and disorganization which is
commonplace in some countries today. But that is also why we are a long way off from embracing
the notion that money is the only thing which can be saved. The correct method of saving instead
lies in generating more value – i.e., products of every kind – than is consumed, in order to have
a reserve in times of need. It is precisely the overestimation of money which is the primary
obstacle to a proper savings economy; otherwise it would not have been possible that, in 1914
for example, in the midst of the imminent threat of war, grain could have been supplied to France
from the German Reich.

The abolition of interest-slavery can be carried out quite satisfactorily within a single state. Should
the result be nothing more than a reorganization of state finances, as (for example) Gesell
assumes would be the case, then – in view of the current condition of the national monetary-
economy – its success could certainly still not be denied. Gesell’s proposals, incidentally, would
only be completely effective after being implemented on a universal foundation.

We reiterate: In our view there are no causative contradictions between Gesell’s and Feder’s
proposals. Above all, therefore, the abolition of interest-slavery should be carried out in
accordance with Feder’s ideal. It too is conditional upon the establishment of a State Currency
Office, i.e., upon a state monopoly over money and upon the disassociation of money from
metal. This State Currency Office would initially have to work towards the stabilization of
domestic currency, i.e., towards maintaining a fixed ratio between the amount of money in
circulation and the supply of goods. Following from that, it would need to work towards the
promotion of universal currency-reform. The introduction of stamp scrip could be waived
completely.

But at the same time as this monetary-reform is being implemented – and this is most important
– land reform must also be carried out, for if land reform on its own is a half-measure, then
monetary-reform without land reform would be a disaster. The lower the rate of interest falls, the
higher ground-rent rises; should the rate of interest drop to zero, then ground-rent will climb
indefinitely. The moment that interest disappears, therefore, ground-rent must also have fully
and completely passed over into public hands.

B. Socialization of Private Monopolies

“The private economy can never be wholly or violently abolished, yet all forms of social property
should exist alongside it and be increasingly expanded. We advocate unconditionally for all large-
scale capitalist enterprises which constitute private monopolies to be transferred into the
possession of the state, province (völkisch self-governing bodies), or municipality.”

With this passage from the Guiding Principles, the movement’s position on the controversial
issue of socialization is made quite clear.

What is socialization, in our view? In contrast to Marxists of all varieties (communists and Social-
Democrats of the 2nd and 2½ Internationals), socialization for us means only the transfer of
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something into the ownership of the state, province (territory, federated state, völkisch self-
governing body), or municipality. The nebulous concept of society is in general alien to us, we
who stand upon the soil of folkdom. It would therefore be more accurate for us to speak of
“nationalization” rather than “socialization,” i.e., the transfer of something into the ownership of
our Volk.

We do not regard cooperative businesses as being already nationalized. On the other hand,
simply transferring something into the ownership of the state (or province, or municipality) does
not yet mean, even to our eyes, that it has been nationalized either. Rather, it only becomes so
when its employees, whether intellectual or physical workers, are granted profit-sharing and the
right to codetermination (see the following chapter).

What, then, should be socialized or nationalized?

The parties founded upon Marxism demand the transformation of the entire private sector into
a social economy, i.e., communism. The Programme of the Social-Democratic Workers’ Party
in Austria (adopted in Vienna in 1901) says on this: “The supersession of individual production
also makes individual ownership all the more superfluous and harmful, while simultaneously
creating the spiritual and material conditions necessary for new forms of cooperative production
on the basis of the social ownership of the means of production. At the same time, the proletariat
becomes conscious that it must promote and accelerate this development, that the transformation
of the means of labor into the collective property of the entire Volk must be the goal, and the
conquest of political power the means of its struggle for the liberation of the working-class.” The
Programme of the Social-Democratic Party of Germany (adopted at Erfurt in 1891) expresses
itself on this topic as follows: “The private ownership of the means of production... has today
become the means of expropriating peasants, artisans, and small traders, and of putting the non-
workers – capitalists, large landowners – into possession of the product of the workers. Only the
transformation of the capitalist private ownership of the means of production – land and soil, pits
and mines, raw materials, tools, machines, means of transportation – into social property, and
the transformation of the production of goods into socialist production carried on by and for
society, can cause large-scale enterprise and the constantly growing productivity of social labor to
change for the hitherto exploited classes from a source of misery and oppression into a source
of the highest welfare and most universal perfection.”

The aforementioned passage from the Vienna Social-Democratic programme unequivocally

suggests that Social-Democracy strives for the socialization of everything – even the smallest
property – and that its goal, therefore, is communism. Incidentally, one of the most important
leaders of German-Austrian Social-Democracy, Dr. Friedrich Adler, can educate us on this
further. In a speech which he gave at the first general meeting of the “Red Guard,” on 21st
November, 1918, in the gymnasium of the Vienna collegiate barracks [Stiftskaserne], he said
verbatim:

“All of us here surely have the same goal: That the entire means of production should
pass into the ownership of the whole of society, should cease to be private property. This
was the essential point of the Communist Manifesto which Karl Marx and Friedrich
Engels published in 1847; it is the essential point of the Social-Democratic programmes
in Germany and in Austria. It is only a question of whether one describes themselves as
a ‘Communist,’ as Marx and Engels did in the ‘40s, or a ‘Social-Democrat,’ as Bebel and
Liebknecht have done since the ‘70s. The differences which exist today lie not in the end
goal, but in the perspectives on how much of that end goal can be achieved immediately.”
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(See also the quoted statements from those two scholarly luminaries, Dr. Renner and Dr. Bauer,
in the chapter “Economic Reform or Revolution?”).

The Erfurt Programme could still leave us in doubt over this point, since the uninitiated person
might only be able to discern the socialization of large enterprises from it, although it is admittedly
noteworthy how the large-scale enterprises are given precedence.

Dr. Friedrich Adler’s words, which we quoted above, and Bebel’s comments in his book Woman
and Socialism (part 4, chapter 20, section 2: “The Expropriation of the Expropriators”), leave no
room for ambiguity on this subject, however. To crown it all, we still have to allow Reich-German
party-saint Kautsky to have his say on this issue. In his pamphlet On the Day After the Social
Revolution (Berlin, 1911, Vorwärts-Verlag) he summarizes the goal of Social-Democracy in the
following words:

“Communism in material production, anarchism in the intellectual; this is the type of the
socialist mode of production which will arise out of the rule of the proletariat, or, in other
words, out of the social revolution by the logic of economic facts, whatever may be the
wishes, intentions, and theories of the proletariat.”

More recently, the Reich-German right-wing (the so-called Majority Socialists, 2nd International)
have launched a new programme in Görlitz. It represents in the main a move away from the
narrow concept of the working-class as defined by Marxism. Instead it makes reference to the
“productive Volk.” The party has also made concessions on the question of socialization. Only
land and soil, mineral resources, and every natural source of power used for energy-production
should be socialized. Furthermore, the socialization of large, centralized economic enterprises is
arguably acknowledged as being necessary, but is not demanded. Similarly, the progressive
transformation of the capitalist system is recognized as being a necessary means for liberating the
Volk from the fetters of capitalist rule.

The party has therefore come closer to our own views on certain issues, something which we
have also sometimes noticed, incidentally, during election campaigns with the 2½ International
– on the land question, for example. But as it continues to cling on to internationalist insanity,
and as it has also not relinquished its commitment to Marxism, one would do well to appreciate
the Görlitz Programme with caution.

In our conception, only those large-scale enterprises which constitute private monopolies should
be transferred into public ownership, i.e., primarily those which deal with the extraction of natural
resources, coal, water power, and the like; then the transportation system; and finally also the
insurance industry and the advertising (marketing) sector. The socialization of ground-rent
through land reform, as well as the elimination of interest, make up the remainder of our
socialization measures. In our opinion, everything else is not only not ripe for socialization, it is
simply not suitable for it.

Now, a question immediately arises in response to this, and that is: What should be done with
the other branches of industry? We will expand upon this question in greater detail in the
following chapter. For the time being, it is enough to say that these companies are to be converted
from private, individual operations into cooperative enterprises by means of the profit-sharing of
all those who work physically and intellectually within them, i.e., of every blue-collar and white-
collar worker in their employ. This refers only to large-scale enterprises. Of course, we also
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recommend cooperative organization for small businesses – both commercial and agricultural –
in their own interest, because our party represents not only physical and intellectual workers, but
all honest labor, something which in today’s criminal era is synonymous – more than ever before
– with economic vulnerability.

In contrast with the Marxists, we therefore reject every form of levelling, every tendency to “lump
everything into the same boat.” In economic life too we wish to reflect the German tendency
towards diversity. Publicly-owned enterprises (i.e., state, provincial, or municipal companies),
privately-owned cooperative enterprises, and privately-owned individual enterprises, should all
coexist and thrive together, side-by-side.

One question which is often asked of us is still yet to be answered – namely, how those of us in
a multinational state such as (for example) Czechoslovakia or Poland approach the issue of
nationalization or provincialization (municipalization is generally not taken into consideration).
The answer to this is elucidated in Resolution II of the Supplement to the Guiding Principles for
the Czechoslovakian State’s Sphere of Influence (under the chapter “Documents of National
Socialism”). We thus reject nationalization within racially-blended states on principle. We are
only open to provincialization within them if this is understood to mean the transfer of something
into the possession of völkisch self-governing bodies (a district, Gau, or territory on the basis of
a purely national area of settlement). Consequently, the requisite precondition for this must
consist of the granting of völkisch self-government (national autonomy). Multinational states
which have not properly resolved the nationalities question [Nationalitätenfrage] are therefore
viewed by us not only as obstacles to völkisch development, but also as obstacles to socio-
economic progress. Accordingly, the unified völkisch state constitutes our highest national goal
on economic grounds, too.
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Cooperatives and Profit-sharing.

Works Councils.
“We see the guiding principles for future progress in the purposeful conversion of all others
(large-scale capitalist enterprises) into cooperative property by steadily increasing the profit-
sharing of all those who work within them, whether physically or intellectually.” (Guiding
Principles of the Nat.-Soc. Party).

This sentence is indicative of how, for us, the cooperative enterprise represents a picture of the
future. Above all, those large-scale enterprises which do not constitute private monopolies, and
which are thus unsuitable for socialization or for nationalization (i.e., for being transferred into
the ownership of the state, province, or municipality), are to be converted from private individual
companies into cooperative enterprises by way of the profit-sharing of all those who work
physically or intellectually within them, i.e., of every blue-collar and white-collar worker in their
employ. Of course, we also recommend – as was already stated in the preceding chapter – the
cooperative form of operation for small businesses as well, whether commercial or agricultural,
because our movement not only represents the manual and intellectual workforce, but all honest
labor. As has already been explained, it commits itself to the class standpoint of productive labor
because it knows only two classes: productive workers on the one hand, and the beneficiaries of
unearned income on the other. These it sees represented within loan-(finance-)capital; hence the
reason for its hostility towards interest, which constitutes loan-capital’s most important
foundation.

Earlier we made reference to profit-sharing for blue-collar and white-collar workers. In our
opinion this should absolutely be the rule not only in private, individual companies, but also in
cooperative and corporate enterprises. Its chief purpose is to bond the worker (laborers and
salaried employees) closer with his company and to interest him personally in its prosperity, a
cause which cannot simply be dismissed out of hand from the standpoint of improving
responsibility and the enthusiasm for work. Only in this way is the wage-slave [Arbeitssklave]
made into a co-worker. It is worth pointing out here once again that in the Middle Ages, during
the heyday of the guilds, masters and journeymen often worked for “a half or a third of the
Pfennigs,” i.e., the journeyman received a half or a third of the profit. Profit-sharing can be
expanded to the effect that, by escalating it in accordance with a determined ratio, every
enterprise can be painlessly converted into a cooperative. We believe that herein lie the “guiding
principles for future progress.”

Admittedly, there is one thing which must not be lost sight of when we speak of profit-sharing,
namely that it also makes possible a share in any potential loss.

Profit-sharing also has a history in the New Germany. In 1847, Thünen on his estate in
Mecklenburg153 was the first to attempt providing his workers with a share of his net profits, and
since then a great variety of different kinds of “profit-sharing” have been tested. In some
important ventures it still thrives successfully, while in the majority of them it has broken down.
The causes of failure are manifold. More often than not what was implemented was not actually
a case of genuine profit-sharing at all, but instead merely a granting of attendance bonuses,
particularly in situations where piecework was not practicable. Some entrepreneurs also
distributed a portion of their annual net profits, for the most part quite arbitrarily. The intent was
to dissuade their workers from engaging in wage disputes and related operational disruptions,
especially during periods of propitious business conditions, thereby encouraging them into
heightened productivity in order that they might produce windfall profits. It was hoped that these
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bestowments, distributed to the workers from among net earnings, would motivate them to make
more efficient use of their working hours, to be more frugal with their work materials, and to be
much more conscientious overall, thereby ensuring that such bonuses in the end should pay for
themselves. Moreover, it was expected that these bestowments would encourage the workers to
disaffiliate from the trade-unions. Hence no opportunity was missed in employing profit-sharing
as the lowest possible weapon against the bothersome workers’ associations. Yet, when boom
years were followed by a decline in business, all pledges and enticements consequently became
null and void, for the distributed profit then amounted to scarcely more than a hill of beans, and
as a result all such attempts at “profit-sharing” came to an inglorious end.

The “sliding pay scales” presently in widespread use are scarcely much better. A portion of the
wage, the basic wage, is fixed; the other part is determined from month to month on the basis of
price increases, through negotiations between employers and employees. In these cases it is not
the proceeds of labor which are decisive in determining wages, but a certain aptitude and tenacity
for bargaining. Yet what is even more detrimental is that such a wage policy harms the character
of the workers. The eternal desire for money, without the basis of an established settlement, ends
up fomenting self-interest, poisoning creativity, and breeding greed after wealth – i.e., the spirit
of capitalism – upon a wide scale.

These failings, which can by no means be blamed upon profit-sharing itself, but are instead
merely the fault of it being misinterpreted and incorrectly applied, are ultimately the reason for
why this good cause is today viewed with such doubt. This is all the more dangerous given that
extreme scepticism [Zweifelsucht] already constitutes one of our greatest vices. It is therefore
advisable that we familiarize ourselves with the verdict of a man who carried out profit-sharing
within his own company. That man is the Reich-German industrialist Gustav Müller, who
described his experiences as follows:

“I began trialling profit-sharing in my business more than twenty years ago. My procedure
was that I earned an annual salary of 6,000 Marks for my own activities, paid the workers
their customary local wages, and shared the remaining profit with my workforce in such
a way that 50% of the net earnings was distributed among them. This attempt failed.
Although it did indeed result in a more satisfied mood among the staff overall, it
nevertheless failed to produce ethical service in return. What was offered was treated like
a gift with no reciprocal obligations, given from a person who no longer knows what to
do with his large sums of money. Corresponding instructions were of no use. And as I
eventually had the experience of seeing one of my foremen start his own business in my
closest neighborhood with the profits I had paid out to him, thus establishing a highly
unfair competition for me, I scrapped this system after having maintained it for several
years – particularly as the aforementioned case was actually repeated once again, in a
similar fashion.

“Several years later I decided to make a second attempt. I resumed 50% profit-sharing as
before, but rearranged the payout of the annual profits to once every two years. And
during this period I actually made payment of the funds conditional upon more
honorable conduct. The results obtained in this way were better. The coercion of
conscience worked. All participants were more or less wary of actions which could cause
them to lose their share of the profits. Loyalty to the company grew; staff turnover became
less frequent.
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“But then, some years ago, I was faced with the task of raising funds for the renovation
of my company – which had become necessary in the meantime – and with it the pressure
to utilize the surpluses which the enterprise had raised. I dropped the payout obligation
made after the familiar two-year proof-of-worthiness period, and established the right to
incorporate profit shares into the company’s building-capital and operating-capital against
five percent interest for a further ten years.

“This third form of profit-sharing now appears to me to be the most suitable for ensuring
a confluence of interests, because it links employees with the weal and woe of the
company in a natural fashion. Employees henceforth become co-owners, and a natural
increase in their diligence and conscientiousness occurs as a result. At the same time, the
more that the oldest and most trustworthy members of the workforce are involved in co-
management and administration, the better the company runs.

“However, for the sake of completeness, the system should not only require employees
to share in the profits, but also in the losses. I have refrained from doing so until now, as
so far in twenty-six years of practice as an entrepreneur I have not recorded any loss-
making years. But this will not be the case everywhere.

“Profit-sharing is of no benefit if it is not supported by a spirit of social conscientiousness

and a willingness for self-sacrifice. It is of no benefit if what the right hand gives, the left
hand simply takes away again. It serves nothing so long as the operating surpluses are
negligible. It serves nothing if the employees are allocated significantly less than an honest
half of the annual profits. And it is of little use if the shares are paid out immediately in
cash. But it is of tremendous benefit if the shares constitute much larger sums, the
disbursement of which involves an approximately decade-long, interest-bearing
incorporation of the payoff amounts into building- and operating-capital, and only after
several years of proof-of-worthiness first. With this reform, in just a few years the
workforce of my own company was elevated into joint-ownership of the business to an
amount of around 30,000 Marks, equivalent to just under half of its real value. For an
enterprise with 72 employees and not much more than 800,000 Marks in annual turnover
this was, it must be admitted, a notable success.”

As this account suggests, with his profit-sharing scheme Müller at the same time also resolved the
issue of works councils. In our view the two are causally related.

Works councils without profit-sharing can only be regarded as a half-measure, as mere sham
parliaments; as such they have certainly become commonplace in our era of democracy. When
both works councils and profit-sharing are combined, however, they provide us with a truly
democratic economic constitution.

As far as the arrangement of the works councils is concerned, we are of the opinion that
intellectual and physical labor should be on an equal footing. This means that both groups need
to be entitled to equal representation and that neither of the two should be able to outvote the
other, because only their mutual cooperation ensures that their activity will be fruitful. Relations
between workers and white-collar employees should be comradely. It is fundamental to keep in
mind that in the works council both groups should be represented equally, and that proportional
representation must only apply within each of these two groups.

But representation alone is not the sole decisive factor when it comes to works councils; there is
also their field of activity. What kind of functions should the works council fulfill in the economy,
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given that the factory walls hardly constitute the limit of its sphere of influence? Certainly every
enterprise forms a self-contained whole. At the same time, however, because of its dependence
upon the acquisition of raw and auxiliary materials, as well as upon the sale of its products, it is
also a part of the economy as a whole. Measures taken by the works council must therefore not
be the mere expression of a unilaterally-oriented company policy, confined solely to one’s own
enterprise, but must moreover have a living piece of economic policy as their substance. The
works council bears equal responsibility for everything it does vis-à-vis the company and the
community as a totality, and has to bring the more limited interests of the company into harmony
with the general interests of the economy. This requires of its members that they possess a
substantial understanding of the economy’s delicate and sensitive structure. The grass-green
theory of class struggle154 between employers and the employed shrivels into nothing in the face
of the hard, sober reality of the continued existence of different state economies, which are in
competition with one another and which therefore, by necessity, must struggle against one
another.

All of this requires extensive training, which the trade-unions must impart; the unions therefore
are by no means expendable, but are on the contrary provided with new, greater responsibilities
through the existence of the works councils.

The works councils represent the beginning of our economic life’s democratization, which
hitherto has been managed purely independently. They are intended, however, to operate far
beyond this framework, if not in a dominant fashion, then at least in an educational manner.
They may even, perhaps, be the prelude to a healthier form of popular representation, healthier
because it is more appropriate to our Volk. This is representation by estates (councils). It is
destined to augment, if not completely supplant, the parliamentarism of today, which our Volk
have no idea what to do with. We will cover this in the next chapter.
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Parliament or Councils?
“Our pleasant sojourn in Aranjuez is over now.” When one considers the miserable failures of
parliamentary democracy, these words from Schiller’s Don Carlos automatically spring to mind.

How were things in 1918? Absolutism – it was declared at the time – must disappear, democracy
should take its place. The very fact that no one could find a German word to describe what was
desired indicated that the goal was quite unclear and hazy. In essence, the autocracy of the
individual, which had been severely limited by constitutional institutions, was simply replaced by
the far more ruthless rule of the major parties. And even then, sometimes only ostensibly. The
sceptres rolled into the dust, the moneybag took their place; in lieu of dynastic power struggles,
which still here and there had to be reconciled with the public welfare, the naked selfishness of
the parties appeared. The urge to feed at the trough has brought about the most untenable
alliances between parties, in which each has no faith in the other, in which each seeks advantage
over the other. It does not matter to them whether the state whose leadership they have been
entrusted with falls apart as a result, so long as the party’s fortunes prosper.

It is now rather gratifying to see that a very similar verdict is being reached in those circles which
previously were working themselves into a lather in clamouring for the abolition of “absolutism”
and for its replacement by the only real and true democracy, “Western democracy.”

For example, on 11th July, 1920, the Prager Tagblatt – one of those newspapers which, like the
Berliner Tageblatt, the Frankfurter Zeitung, and the like, bears the full measure of guilt for our
Volk’s collapse – published an article under the telling headline, “Crisis of Parliamentary
Democracy.” In this article, the most significant occurrence is identified as being “the complete
failure of parliamentary democracy.” While the rump-state of Austria serves as the example for
this, the author aptly points out that “all newly-born democracies” also suffer from the same
malady. To complete the picture he could easily include all the rest along with them. The
following passages from the cited article are all the more remarkable because the author is neither
a ‘disguised monarchist’ nor a ‘swastiker’:155

“The issue of Europe’s ‘democratization’ played a decisive role in the conflict; it alone
brought about that idealistic alliance of the most diverse range of comrades-in-arms
against the Central Powers, and kept alive in the masses of the warring peoples that great
faith without which material success would hardly have been possible. The longing for
democracy was also the driving force behind social and national opposition within the
former Central Powers. Having now arrived at the desired goal, it has subsequently
become apparent that the fulfilment and realization of the yearned-for ideal is faced with
insurmountable obstacles; parliamentary democracy, with a few exceptions, manifests
almost everywhere as a cautionary caricature of an ideal; it is incapable of even halfway
satisfying the living requirements of states; it magnifies the misfortunes of the period to
an alarming degree; and it behaves altogether as though it only had one function: to
become its own gravedigger.

“Regrettably, it seems that the unfortunate peoples of Central Europe have moved out of
the frying-pan and into the fire. Having just been the victims of romantic fools and
pompous bunglers on the throne, they have now fallen into the hands of mediocre party
windbags and fanatical theoreticians who, incapable of performing productive work in
service of the practical tasks ahead, instead (with the aid of the ballot paper) act out the
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role of the saviour under new, revolutionary auspices – and all to the detriment of the
desperate masses.”

Naturally the author avoids investigating the underlying causes. All the more reason, then, for us
to want to get to the bottom of things ourselves. The cause of the parliamentary system’s failure
lies within itself; it is to be found in the fact that the German, with whom the article is primarily
concerned, is simply not suited for parliamentarism, which is predicated upon posture and empty
verbosity. ‘Parliament’ comes from parlare, i.e., ‘to speak.’ But we Germans have always been
men of action.

Misfortune began when those half-Englishmen on German soil, the liberals (and Social-
Democrats), established German representative assemblies and imbued them with their spirit.
Instead of falling back upon medieval German models, which would have been the most natural
step, we have instead summarily taken on (and misconceived into the bargain) English institutions
which, in order to be effective, require certain precise preconditions. English parliamentarism
was and is only possible upon a foundation of extensive self-government at the municipal and
county (district, territory) level, and only when there are just two parties present (Whigs and
Tories; that is, liberals and conservatives) whose differences – and this is essential – are merely
economic rather than markedly political, even when it comes to views on foreign policy. The
battle cry of one of these parties was “free trade,” that of the other “protective tariffs.” Rulership
was alternately shared between them. Government was thus based on the conspicuous majority
rule of a single party, and not upon the fragile construct of an often downright impossible
“coalition.”

If one looks a little more closely, however, it becomes apparent that English parliamentarism is
not at all a system of party representation in our sense, with differences in questions of worldview
and the like, but is in fact nothing more than the old representation of the estates. In the former
German Reich, and in France before the Revolution, this representation was founded upon three
estates: nobility, Church, and bourgeoisie. In England we see that the first two, the landowning
estates, have amalgamated to form the party of the Tories. Their economic policy – and such is
their only policy – is determined by the interests of landed property; hence their call for protective
tariffs. The Whigs represent the mercantile bourgeoisie of the cities, which explains their demand
for free trade. In general the Englishman concerns himself very little with questions of worldview.

This picture did not change significantly even when a third estate-party joined the others.
Parliament still remained the old representative body of estates, because even this party, the
Labour Party, was based upon the principle of occupational representation – that is,
representation via estates.

But even this simple English parliamentarism has always required a statesmanlike personality of
exceptional talent such as a Gladstone, a Pitt, etc., lest it end up becoming sterile. Since the
appearance of the Labour Party, which has integrated harmoniously into the whole, the
parliamentary machine no longer runs quite so effectively, notwithstanding the fact that the
Englishman – whether high nobility or worker – knows only one goal of foreign and domestic
politics, namely the greatness of England. Even a man of such ruthlessness and undisputed ability
as Lloyd George often struggles to keep it all running smoothly. So how could any of this be
possible with a Volk of such inadequate political ability as the Germans, particularly when the
centuries old Black International, and the newer Red International, have been spreading their
influence among them; when there are undeniable racial disparities between the North and the
South; when there is an ever-growing Jewish influence at play?
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We have already cited a particularly remarkable opinion on the failure of parliamentarism. It is

not alone; the critique sounds from every camp. Every method is pursued in the attempt to
alleviate this malady, from unity parties here to untenable party alliances there. But it is incurable.
The system instead must be transformed completely. Today’s parliamentarism, with its
unicameral structure, requires urgent supplementation by the old German system of
representation via the estates, a system which is far better suited to the nature of our Volk. Of
course, this system will not appear as it did in former times, because the old estates have either
partly changed or have vanished completely. Nobody today, for example, would be able to
sufficiently exemplify the concept of Bürgertum. But there are occupational groups which can
provide us with a suitable basis for estatist representation, a representation whose modern form
of expression is the council system – by which, however, we do not intend to mean the Russian
caricature, because the concept of a council dictatorship is as untenable as any dictatorship, i.e.,
tyranny. But the council concept [Rätegedanke] itself is good, and it will be realized in the most
diverse range of forms within political, intellectual, and economic life! But here, too, one needs
to be on guard against one-sidedness and overestimation. There are no panaceas; every illness
requires different remedies. Life is manifold, and colorful and manifold are therefore also its
manifestations.

Thus we do not believe that the council system alone is able to heal the damage done to the
suffering body of Volk and state. But it is incontestably capable of renewing some of life’s
manifestations, namely those within the economic sphere. Every occupation consolidates its
members. The members as a collective then exert influence through their representatives upon
the enterprise in which they are employed, as well as upon all enterprises as a whole, i.e., upon
the entire economic life of the state and Volk – that is, upon the national economy!

By no means would this render political parties unnecessary. They would, however, be freed
from a great deal of trivial odds and ends, and would thereby be able to turn to greater tasks,
more cultural and statesmanlike; they would be better able to commit themselves to actual
philosophies; and thus they would also disappoint less. Complaints about the exclusion of this
or that profession, which today are all too justified, would fall away. Only then would our Volk
learn to think politically. Free and unrestrained, liberated from all bonds and impurities, the great
old perspectives would then step forth as champions: cosmopolitanism (internationalism, world-
citizenship) on the one hand, folkdom (nationalism) on the other. They have been competing
against each other for centuries. Ever since the Roman Church first stretched its arm over
German lands, the völkisch development of our state and economic life began to be stripped
away. Roman Law and capitalism are only the natural and necessary consequences of a pre-
existing root-cause, which is the de-Germanization of our national life [Volkslebens].

The council concept has been invoked in order that we might pick up once again where the
thread of our development broke off centuries before. It should absolutely be enshrined in the
constitution of the German state. This requirement is included within our Guiding Principles.
“Creation of second parliamentary chambers on the basis of occupational representation,” they
say. Accordingly, parliament would therefore consist of one chamber, into which the political
parties send their representatives, and a second, into which the occupational associations send
theirs.

In his work For a House of Estates, Dr. Paul Schrekker156 has sketched out a plan for just such a
chamber which we shall now briefly consider. In his conception, elections should be decided
upon the basis of a simple majority (i.e., without proportional representation) according to a
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system of occupational stratification. The entire state territory should comprise only one
constituency, and those who do not work themselves, such as shareholders, should be excluded
from the electoral process.

The decision as to which of the two chambers of parliament is to play the greater role in state life
can easily be left to future developments. The German is instinctively drawn towards
occupational representation even in the formation of political parties. This is most apparent in
the Sudetenland. There, for example, there is a party of the rural folk (the Farmers’ League), a
National Socialist Workers’ Party, and, as of more recent times, a Small Traders’ Party. These
are decidedly more natural entities than the “people’s” parties, which ultimately do not actually
represent the entire people, but only certain groups. One should never wish to seem more than
one really is. The simple fact that the occupational parties * empirically possess fewer sources of
friction with one another than do the so-called people’s parties should give us pause for thought
to some extent. This can be explained by the fact that the people’s parties are centralist, i.e., that
in their innermost being they are essentially non-German entities.

Naturally, the overall structure of all the representative bodies must be implemented from the
ground up. Alongside the chambers, we need a government which counsels and governs in
coordination with them. German lands should be led and administered, but not ruled! The
leadership concept [Führergedanke], which once found its expression within our German
kingship before (blinded by false glory) it degenerated into Roman imperial rule, shall rise again!

It is in this context that we shall now discuss that question which is today debated with so much
clamor and so little understanding: “Free State (republic) or Monarchy?” The Germanic states
and the old German Kingdom were by their nature republics more than they were monarchies.
Even the medieval German Kaiserreich in its early days could still be described as an aristocratic
republic: the prince-electors chose (elected) the head of state from among the nobility. It was
only later, as the Roman-centralist concept of rulership [Herrschaftsgedanke] became more and
more entrenched, eventually culminating in the absolute principality, that the form of state which
is today called “monarchy” first appeared. If one chooses to describe a true People’s State with
a royal leadership as a monarchy, then that is all right by us; it could just as well be called a
republic. It is not the name which matters, but the content. We conceive the crown to be a
symbol; but we reject, however, the concepts of rulership and divine right. The Führer may well
be called King, that is immaterial; what is essential is that he takes his position by the grace of the
Volk!

Is England a monarchy or a republic? To settle this question would be rather difficult. We can
see from this that one must be wary of appearances, and that state institutions cannot easily be
imitated. At any rate, at the moment one can see in the new republics – which were born under
a tremendous torrent of verbiage – more incompetence, weakness, fawning obsequiousness to
everything foreign, and more corruption at work, than ever existed before, even within the worst
monarchies. The achievements of the revolution – of which the less one sees, the more they
seem to be talked about – have practically dwindled down to nothing more than a few benefits
for a rabble of economic and political war-profiteers. But it does not necessarily follow from this
that the Free State must serve as a sanctuary for all sorts of vermin, that the republic by definition
has to be a playground for alien kaftan-wearers and a plaything of the moneyed powers. But if it
is set up that way, then that is of course what it will be!

*
The National Socialist Workers’ Party is not a purely occupational party, but nor is it a people’s party in the sense
of the term as it is misused so often today.
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Democracy in the modern sense, i.e., as a system of party misrule, is to be vigorously condemned,
because it is not rule by the people – as it should be, in accordance with its name. If, however,
one limits the political parties’ sphere of influence by making room for occupational
representation, thus also making it impossible for money power to rule and – in accordance with
its nature – to dominate everything, then we Germans will have found the appropriate form of
government for us, one in which we can grow and flourish in accordance with our distinctive
nature. That, ultimately, is what really matters. In this context, each of our proposals
complements the other, regardless of whether they concern the renewal of our cultural,
economic, or political life. Each on its own, however, remains incomplete. Let us now take a
look at the next issue which shall occupy us, that of the law. Today Roman Law rules over us;
German Law shall take its place!
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German Law.
German Law! In order to trace its roots, we must go back to the bygone days of our ancestors.
Justice then was served under gnarled, ancient oaks. A memory of it lives on in the word
“Schöppen,”157 and in the form of trial by jury. No learned judge issued legal verdicts in
accordance with codified articles; rather, they were determined by laymen. Ancient wisdom was
passed down from father to son until it was finally recorded. This was tribal law, as the names
Sachsenspiegel and Schwabenspiegel suggest, and it was therefore diverse – like the old German
Reich in general, which under the Saxon kings was a federal state of German tribes. Alongside
this law, however, the Church always had its own law. The more its influence grew, the more the
centralist ideal also began to spread, until it eventually triumphed under the Kaisers of the
Hohenstaufen dynasty. Roman Law prevailed along with it. The imperial chancellery set the
example, and the cities followed suit. Germans flocked across the Alps in droves in order to
study law at the University of Bologna. When the movement known by the name of ‘Humanism’
was eventually instituted in Germany with the aim of reviving the human sciences of the ancients
(i.e., the Greeks and the Romans), the victory of Roman Law was also ensured.

Of course, none of this occurred entirely without resistance. The scholar felt ashamed of the
German language and made use of Latin instead. Indeed, even German names had to submit to
being translated into Latin or Greek. Thus a “Schwarzend” became a “Melanchthon,” a “Weber”
became a “Textor,” and so on.158 The result was an increasingly pervasive alienation between the
Volk and the scholars, who, like the nobility of old, segregated themselves into their own caste.

These circumstances, as well as the fact that the pursuit of legal assistance was becoming a costly
affair, motivated the Volk’s antipathy against this imposition. The simple man of the people felt
lost before the learned judge. But there was also something else. The rigid conception of property
ownership within Roman Law was alien to the German outlook. Forests, meadows, game, and
fish were once common property. Memories of older, better times were passed down from father
to son. Then everything became manorial, and the peasant was deprived of his rights. In turn, a
judicial Code of High Justice characterized by torture and executions prevailed within the cities.
The Church introduced witch trials and courts of inquisition, with the state obediently carrying
out its dirty work. In short, everything was completely different to how it had once been. For a
long time in Westphalia, meanwhile, where a true, free, Saxon peasantry still resided, the old
legal traditions known under the name of “Holy Fehme”159 were preserved. They ruled in
accordance with ancient custom, and knew how to deal with transgressors!

In the first part of this book we recorded a number of observations which yielded insight into the
legal perspectives of our ancestors. If we wish to see these views gain acceptance once again, then
we shall have to ensure they do so in forms adapted to today’s conditions, because centuries of
political and economic development cannot, of course, simply be undone. This is especially true
in regards to land law. Here the attempted solution must be of a form which does not conflict
too strongly with prevailing views.

Generally speaking, we suggest advancing the following rough principles, which can provide us
with a framework – and that is all it should be – for a German people’s law160 and a German
constitutional law.

1. The German People’s State comprises the entire area of German settlement within
Europe. Its task is to preserve the political freedom of the German Volk and to safeguard
their cultural and economic development. Ethnic Germans living abroad
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[Auslandsdeutschtum] fall under its protection. Its system of government is to be decided

by referendum.

2. Citizens of the German People’s State can only be those of German blood (Aryans).
Those with foreign blood (Jews, etc.) fall under legislation relating to foreigners, and are
subject to a separate system of taxation for aliens. Their immigration requires the
approval of both the state government and the local municipality.

3. In case of doubt, a German bloodline up to the third degree (great-grandparents on

the paternal and maternal side) must be proven.

4. Children from mixed marriages follow the “worse hand.”161 For example, if one of the
parents is Jewish, then their child is also considered a Jew. Baptism makes no difference.
With illegitimate children, the child’s paternity is to be ascertained.

5. Land and soil may only be possessed and acquired by citizens.

6. Every citizen is subject to compulsory military service. Those who are unfit for armed
service must, during the period of their conscription, carry out work in service of the
people’s welfare.

7. Every state resident has a duty to work.

8. Land and soil are fundamentally common property. Every citizen has the right to be
allotted at least as much land as is necessary to establish a residential homestead (500 –
1,000m2). For more on the regulation of the distribution of property, the payment of
levies, etc., see the section “Land Law Reform.”

9. Money is a public utility. Its issue, and the regulation of its traffic, are the sole
responsibility of the state. For more, see under the section “Monetary-Reform.”

10. The press is a public utility. Its advertising is subject to oversight by the municipality
or by the state.

11. Transportation and the insurance industry are public utilities.

12. The municipality is the foundation of the state. Further organization is structured by
district, region (county, province), and by tribal association. Their administrative bodies
are elected. From the district up, the state is represented within each by a public official.
Municipal, district, and regional representation are based upon a unicameral system (an
economic chamber), while tribal and parliamentary representation [Volksvertretung] are
based upon a bicameral system (economic and political chambers).

13. The educational system is generally subordinate to the self-governing bodies, from
the municipality through to the tribal association. It is regulated by them in accordance
with uniform guiding principles. Vigorous attention shall be paid to the cultivation of
physical fitness through gymnastics, games, and hiking, as well as to the promotion of
local and tribal history.

14. Civil servants are appointed by the self-governing bodies.

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Naturally these principles lay no claim to being exhaustive. As has already been stated, they serve
no other purpose than to provide us with a general framework.
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The German People’s State.

The historically significant constitutional declaration delivered by the party to the Vienna
Landhaus162 on 21st October, 1918, concluded with the words: “Long live free, social Pan-
Germany!” (See “Documents of National Socialism”). This free, social Pan-Germany is the
German People’s State of the future, a future which will be all the closer the sooner that our Volk
are able to liberate themselves from the barrage of international-pacifist rhetoric and from every
foreign – predominantly Jewish – influence to which they are presently subject, and to find their
way back to the German spirit. We hope that we have marked out the path towards this future
clearly enough. Its route leads through intellectual, spiritual, and economic-social renewal, as well
as through physical improvement. It is the same path which Prussia-Germany successfully trod
after the defeat at Jena. Whether the path is stonier or thornier today does not matter, if only
one has the firm will to walk it! To awaken and to consistently shape this will is but one of the
tasks of National Socialism.

In the previous chapter we spoke of the German People’s State and of its function. German Law,
whose most essential features we attempted to outline there, must form its foundation. How,
then, should its structure be designed?

In view of the foregoing, one thing is immediately clear to us: A German People’s State cannot
be established upon the principles of Western democracy; those principles are merely lies and
deceit for the benefit of Jewish Mammonism, which uses them to dominate and exploit nations.
German democracy – if we wish to continue to use that expression – cannot mean parliamentary
rule. But rule by the people [Volksherrschaft], which is what the word democracy means, in turn
also cannot be taken seriously as a concept, because to wish to rule over oneself is an absurdity.
We will therefore more accurately redefine the term to mean ‘service to the totality’, i.e., ‘service
for the benefit of the Volk’. Just as Frederick the Great – and he truly was great, inasmuch as he
also understood the difficult art of renunciation – openly aspired to be the first servant of the
state, so do we all wish to be nothing more than servants of the Volk, whose welfare is dear to
our hearts.

There must be leaders [Führer], and there must be those who are led. Of course, those who like
to imagine themselves as Führer are in reality far from really being one, for leaders cannot
appoint themselves, nor can they be appointed; instead, their election only confirms the fact of
their existence. The right Führer is born. Something indefinable emanates from him, wins him
people’s hearts, provides him with the trust of the masses; they feel the divine spark that glows
within him. That inner fire, which drives him relentlessly forward – unconcerned about his own
personal well-being – also transfers into them. They follow because they must follow!

The concept of leadership [Führergedanke] – as opposed to the concept of rulership, which in

general is based only upon the crudest use of force (see Soviet Russia) – should now reassert
itself once more within the German People’s State! Whether this Führer is to be called a
“People’s King” or a “President” (could he not use the German title “Herzog”?) is basically
irrelevant; the only important thing is that he is a personality who places all of his energy into the
service of the people’s welfare, and that his only aspiration is to be the servant of his Volk.

Yet the Führer cannot do everything alone, even if he were a personality of the most outstanding
influence a hundred times over. He needs advisors, i.e., a government as well as a representative
assembly. Commensurate with our explanations in the previous chapters, and in light of the
miserable failures of the “parliamentary system” within German lands, the fact that this cannot
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be the form of parliamentarism which has become so commonplace today, that it cannot be
derived from relationships between political parties, should not require any additional
justification. The absolute parliamentary rule of today is a necessary transition; parliamentarism,
which was once so terribly overrated and which has absolutely nothing to do with German
democracy, will simply have to remedy itself. Admittedly this will involve sacrifices, but since
when have such sacrifices not been needed in order to achieve forward progress?

What, then, should take parliamentarism’s place? Within the chapter “Parliament or Councils”
we have already emphasized the need for the existence of two chambers, one political and one
economic, and there expressed the view that – in accordance with the disposition of our Volk –
occupational representation would presumably soon begin to play the greater role. One chamber
would be based upon political parties, the other upon occupational associations (trade-unions,
cooperatives). In any event, this arrangement would already constitute a significant improvement,
in that it would alleviate many sources of friction and would awaken within us the awareness that
we are members of a collective totality, one with which we are inextricably bound, for better or
for worse. In view of the foregoing, it is thus quite clear that only Germans may sit in a German
parliament, and that those of foreign origin are thereby excluded. This fact alone would help
eliminate a large part of that mutual incitement which has become so commonplace today.

Our fellow-thinker from Munich, Dr. Tafel,163 makes much more far-reaching proposals. * Since
for us the party was never an end in itself, but merely a means to an end, and since National
Socialism is not at all a party in the sense of winning votes for seats in parliament, we can safely
make his views our own – even though, sooner or later, the political parties of today may perish.

For the German Volk (by which he means only those of German blood) Tafel wants to establish
two different structures: One occupational, and one political. Both start at the lowest level, the
Ort.164 If the occupational structure at its highest level represents the unity of the Reich as an
economic entity, then the political structure in turn takes into account its different tribal
characteristics. As an economic power the German Reich would thus be a single entity, while
politically it would be a federal state – and one founded not upon the federal states of today
(which are the end result of some rather unhappy accidents throughout our history) but upon the
natural basis of our Volk, the tribes. A pleasant idea for sure!

The occupational structure begins in the municipality. Every working German member of a trade
group (agriculture, transportation, public education, etc.), regardless of whether they are an
employer or an employee, bands together in “Local Associations” and directly elects their
executive committee, the “Local Council,” by means of the secret ballot. Each Local Council
appoints from among its members one or more representatives for the “District Council,” who
in turn have a seat in the “Gau Council.” The “Provincial Council” arises out of the “Gau
Council,” and finally from the Provincial Councils emerges the “Supreme Council” of the trade
groups.

At the apex of the occupational pyramid is the “Reich Economic Chamber”

[Reichswirtschaftskammer]. Within it, each trade group is represented by one vote.

In order that the Economic Chamber does not degenerate and seize all power for itself, and
because we are ultimately not just producers and consumers but also citizens, family men, and
civilized beings whose needs are spiritual as well as economic – in short, because the state is not

*
Dr. Paul Tafel: The New Germany: A Council-State upon a National Foundation. Deutscher Volksverlag, Munich.
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merely a department store (as that nomadic race from the Orient, who dominate us today
through Walter Rathenau and allies, would have us believe) – it is essential that a “Political
Chamber” or “Peoples’ Chamber” exist alongside it as a similarly arranged institution. According
to Tafel, however, political parties should not send representatives to this Chamber in line with
the current practice; instead it also needs to be built from the ground up. The “Primary Electoral
Division” [Urwählergemeinde] is the nucleus of this political structure. It encompasses every
resident of an urban district or rural community, regardless of age or sex, provided that they are
of German ancestry and that they pay some form of tax, no matter how small, to the state or to
the municipality.

Above the Primary Electoral Divisions are the “District Councils,” to which the Divisions send
their emissaries; above these are the “Regional Councils” (province, territory); and finally, at their
peak, there is the “Reich People’s Chamber” [Reichsvolkskammer].

Alongside these two chambers, which are not intended to be parliaments, i.e., places of rhetoric,
but places of work, there is also the government. It should not merely be the executive organ of
the collective will of both chambers, but should also be their colleague and their guide. This
would be most evident in the drafting of laws. Today the government is typically called upon by
parliament to submit a draft law on a particular issue. Under Tafel’s system, precisely the
opposite would be the case: instead the government requests a report from one or both
chambers, produces a final draft, and then submits it to the head of state for approval. The Volk
thus actually make their own laws, something which is almost never the case in parliamentary
democracy.

In order from the outset to prevent a thirst for power from emerging within the representative
bodies, the head of state would be entitled to a right of rejection against all decisions made by the
chambers. In order to also stave off any potential abuses of leadership here, in the sense of
hegemonic power aspirations, a limitation of this right through use of the “plebiscite”
(referendum) would be essential – namely, via public opinion polls or a popular vote on
proposed legislation. In view of the foregoing, what the head of state is to be called is probably
rather unimportant, for the state we have just outlined is a republic, i.e., a People’s State in the
old Germanic sense, even if a “King” is at its head. This could not, of course, be a King chosen
by “divine right,” but only by the “grace of the Volk,” elected through a popular vote. It is not
the individual bearing it, but the crown itself which is the symbol of the future German Reich, a
Reich unified in all of its diversity.

And now, a few words about the purpose and scope of activity of the economic and political
structures. The trade group for the entire national territory would by its very nature be a self-
governing body, whose purpose would be to elevate the production and distribution of goods to
the highest possibly level. It is to be in equal measure a charitable association, cooperative society,
trade guild (fraternity), and cartel. Its subdivisions would likewise be allocated certain specific
tasks – the regulation of professional training, working facilities, and the like. The bottom-most
group, the local chapter, is of particular importance. It is to primarily serve an educational
purpose. In its regular meetings it would bear the responsibility of keeping its members informed
about the state of their own and foreign economies, about all improvements and so on, and it
would also be responsible for awakening and maintaining its members’ awareness of their shared,
common bonds. Certainly, it is true that there would be conflicts at first; soon, however, a sense
of cohesion would prevail.
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The Primary Electoral Division would also primarily be responsible for educational work. Of
course, its work would be of a political and, above all, cultural nature.

Tafel’s German council-state seems to us a very pleasant idea. Were today’s German Reich built
upon these principles, it would soon begin to exert an irresistible attraction upon all outposts. Of
course, this would require a change in the current system of fawning servility towards everything
foreign, and above all, the elimination of Jewish influence – an absolute imperative in the new
German Reich.
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The Tasks of Municipal Policy.

1. Housing, Public Health, and Social Welfare.
State and municipality expend huge sums upon treatment of the sick. And yet this work is only
partially successful. Endemic diseases, infant and child mortality – these decimate thousands.
The root causes of these distressing phenomena are the desperate housing situation and the
dearth of air, light, and cleanliness.165

a) Housing.
Systematic assistance in the spirit of land reform, via extensive support for the construction of
small apartments, for the garden-city movement, and for all endeavours directed towards both
by charitable associations.

In addition, the acquisition of real estate and the right to allocate it as Erbpacht is essential, as is
the municipality’s comprehensive right of expropriation and right of first refusal. Furthermore,
the elimination of socially-harmful land-usury by means of appropriate taxation (a land tax
determined by the “fair market value”), and by means of the development of building regulations
intended to make the construction of tenement blocks166 impossible; the establishment of urban
housing authorities and accommodation offices, the classification of dwellings into classes and
their regular evaluation; tax concessions for small apartments.

b) Public Health and Social Welfare.

Meticulous cleaning of public streets and squares and supervised cleaning of the courtyards and
interiors of houses; sanitation. The planting of public gardens and parks. A prohibition on the
construction of factories within municipal boundaries. Construction of public baths, playgrounds,
and sports facilities. The promotion of all athletic and gymnastic endeavours.

The implementation of these demands will be conducive to the raising of a healthy and strong
generation for whom life seems worth living, a generation who wish to work simply for the sake
of producing something and who are in possession of their own homes.

Even with these measures, however, not every illness and malady will have been eliminated.
Therefore we also demand: The construction of hospitals, clinics, birthing centers, sanatoriums,
maternity homes, nurseries, bachelors’ hostels, and kindergartens by cities and by districts; city
ownership of emergency services and the funeral industry, and the gradation of fees in all of these
institutions on the basis of income, with their services to be completely free of charge to those
without means. Free disinfection for infectious diseases. The establishment of municipal health
authorities, the installation of school bathrooms, the employment of school doctors and school
dentists. The combating of alcoholism and other national epidemics, particularly tuberculosis
and venereal diseases.

2. Orphan and Poor Relief.

This forms a supplement to social welfare. Its overriding principle is that orphans and the poor
should never be degraded to the level of beggars. From this standpoint, we therefore demand:

That the poor are to be treated in the most conscientious, personable manner. In orphan and
poor relief efforts, the service performed by men and women should be active and voluntary.
The best way to aid the destitute is to help them to earn their own livelihood once again. When
it comes to caring for orphans, the municipality must keep in mind that it fills the role of parent.
 135

Special aid for all foster children and wards. Welfare for those with partial disabilities and for
travelling journeymen.167

3. Nutrition.
To implement a proper nutritional policy, the following are required:

Urban nurseries, dairies, and drying facilities for vegetables and potatoes; storehouses, orchards,
slaughterhouses, and refrigeration facilities. Contracts with agricultural cooperatives for supplies
of milk, fat, meat, and potatoes; livestock and fatstock to be raised in separate facilities and
enterprises, or sourced from the countryside. Urban fishponds. Strict enforcement measures by
market police.168 Promotion of the consumer sector. The construction of municipal warming
rooms, soup kitchens, feeding stations, and housekeeping schools.

4. Transportation, Heating, and Lighting.

The clearance of tenement blocks and their replacement by small, residential houses with
attached gardens will substantially alter the image of the small town: it will expand it. This will
necessitate the establishment of affordable means of transportation – such as rapid transit
systems, tramways, and the like – which should all be city property.

This will also necessitate the building and maintenance of good roads and footpaths, along with
their illumination. Gas and electricity are to be placed at the service of the community as a whole.
Our own woods and coal mines, or appropriate contracts for wood and coal for public and
domestic use, form the necessary complement.

5. School and Educational Issues.

The object of our labors is the Einheitsschule.169 It must be designed in such a way that anyone
of physical or intellectual ability, any talented individual, is afforded the opportunity of higher
education. The school board should be a professional body. Through the creation of new
vacancies within secondary schools, those who are gifted yet disadvantaged are to be provided
with a path to higher education. Scholarships are to be granted to the parents of such students.
For the children of those on a low income, learning materials and – if necessary – breakfast and
other meals are to be provided free of charge within every school. School fees are to be waived
in every school where attendance is a legal requirement. Teachers must be capable of supervising
each student and of developing each child’s talents to the highest possible level. Kindergartens,
crèches, and schools for the learning disabled170 are to be set up in the larger municipalities. The
children’s state of health is to be monitored by a school doctor. Girls should be educated in
domestic science during their last two years of schooling. Personal care is to be promoted via
swimming, gymnastics, sports, and play. Technical colleges are to be established for those
professions which are predominantly relevant within the school system.

Avid attention should also be paid to the education of adults. The performing arts, in particular
plays and films, are not to be placed at the service of sordid money-making pursuits aimed at
exploiting peoples’ baser instincts, but are instead to serve the purpose of national education.
They should therefore be the property of the municipality, which has to furnish any potential
leasing agreements with the necessary provisos. The holding of lectures and concerts at low
admission prices, the construction of public libraries and reading rooms; the preservation and
protection of all historic, artistic, and natural monuments, particularly the traditional cityscape.
Every effort along these lines, in particular the creation of charitable institutions and associations
for the improvement of popular education, is to be vigorously promoted.
 136

6. Animal Welfare.
The municipality can do a lot in this area by engaging an animal rescue vehicle, setting up public
drinking troughs for horses and dogs, establishing a veterinary hospital, taking vigorous action
against animal cruelty, and properly educating our youth. One should not forget that animal
abusers above all have a predisposition towards criminality. In this sense, animal welfare is also
human welfare.

7. Völkisch Protective Work.

This is a part of our educational endeavours and is of particular importance. The German
municipality should also be a bastion of völkisch protective work,171 and should support, by all
available means, every effort made by organizations in service of this purpose.

8. Municipal Employees.
Their remuneration, promotion, vacations, and all other privileges are to be set proportionate to
those of similar groups of state employees. They are to be granted free rights of assembly and
association; their elected trustees are to be afforded official recognition, and are to be consulted
on the handling of all relevant matters.

9. Trade and Commercial Workers.

When awarding contracts for municipal works and supplies, locally-based tradespersons are to
be consulted first. In doing so, the payment of their wages is to be contractually stipulated;
contracts are to be determined by associations of employers and employees, provided that these
negotiations also guarantee the equal treatment of all employees’ associations. Public
employment agencies are to be established, the leadership of which is to be composed upon a
parity basis and is to be elected on the basis of proportional representation. Mediation panels
are to be set up.

10. Taxes.
Every demand which has been raised so far costs money. Referencing the costs involved has
always been the most convenient means for getting out of things, a way of rejecting unpleasant
demands. The present system of taxation is completely unsuitable for raising the funds which we
need to carry out the specified tasks. New paths must be trod, new sources must be tapped.

The municipality is essentially the creator of ground-rent. It is therefore only fair that it should
also be the recipient of it. Consequently, the primary source of taxation must be the land tax –
assessed according to the fair market value.

11. Publicly-Owned Enterprises (Municipal Socialism).

Yet this source of taxation would not be sufficient on its own. The remaining revenue is to come
from our own public enterprises which, if properly administered, can nonetheless still be run
inexpensively. Extensive municipalization (socialization) must be the rule.

The scope of municipal socialism includes: Possession of land and soil (gardens, pastures),
woodlands, fishponds; slaughterhouses, refrigeration and freezer plants; dehydration and drying
facilities; storehouses; dairies, breweries, bakeries, canneries; eating houses; transportation
authorities; gasworks and power companies; sanatoriums and nursing homes; savings banks, etc.
Profit-sharing for workers and employees in municipal enterprises.

As can be seen, the field is rich enough. May it be cultivated properly!

 137

Conclusion.
Our meditations have now reached their end. We would like to voice the hope that we did not
promise too much within the Foreword.

We are of the conviction that our Volk can only recover and attain renewed international
standing under the banner of German Socialism, that socialism which we have referred to simply
as “the German essence.”

Why do we not also use the word “German” when denoting that which is so thoroughly German;
why did we choose for it the foreign words “National” and “Socialism?” Otto Dickel in his book
The Resurrection of the West names the same thing the “German Working-Community.” There
are good reasons why we have not adopted his nomenclature as our own. Anyone who seeks to
inspire the masses – and we both want to and have to – must not be constantly showing up in
new garb, because otherwise he engenders suspicion. The masses are already thoroughly
committed to the terms “Nationalism” and “Socialism.” In May 1918, when our movement in
old Austria added these terms to its original name “German Workers’ Party” in order to make
its ambitions clear from the outset, all the pros and cons were carefully considered. If the Reich
Party Conference at the time opted for the designation “National Socialist,” the primary reason
lay in the aspiration to be understood on all sides. In the former Austria, the term “National”
never meant anything other than “völkisch and “anti-Jewish.” The first political association of a
German-völkisch orientation which arose under Schönerer was called the “German-National
Association for Austria.” The word “völkisch” had practically fallen into disrepute, at least within
the labor movement, as a consequence of the avowedly “yellow” workers’ associations. And on
this account, too, we also had to call ourselves “Socialist,” for otherwise those masses who had
passed through the Marxist school would never have properly understood our endeavours. It
may seem unfortunate, but the fact is that a word drilled in over decades often says more than an
entire programme.

Once more, we refer back to that maxim which we drew from Oswald Spengler’s Prussianism
and Socialism.

It reads: “Only socialism in some form can be of true value within Germany.”

The Marxists constantly maintain that there is only one form of socialism, the Marxist, and that
everything else is mere fraud and deception. Since, however, there are multiple Marxist
tendencies, each of which denies the right of the others to be socialist, it has been difficult for
them to uphold this claim. Indeed, socialism has always existed, both before Marxism and
alongside it. It was understood to mean – and does mean – endeavours aimed at making the life
and work of the individual serviceable to the whole, at making him the bearer of the collective
will. In turn, the community takes on the responsibility of administering to the needs of the
individual, of supporting him morally, spiritually, and economically. This can occur either out of
purely materialistic considerations; as a consequence of the precepts of Christian charity; or,
finally, on völkisch grounds. Depending on the circumstances, one is dealing here either with
Judeo-Marxist, Christian, or National Socialism.

As far as we are concerned, it is this distinguishing feature which is most important, not how
extensively the process of socialization is pursued. For socialization is not an end in and of itself;
it cannot be, if socialism is to be a Weltanschauung. But it is precisely those who claim that it
does constitute such a thing who, in turn, see the essence of socialism only in the socialization of
 138

all the means of labor, and who deny every other orientation the right to call themselves socialists
– namely, the Marxists. They represent only one of socialism’s orientations, the avowedly Jewish
one. Hence the purely crude, sensuous outlook, whose emphasis is placed solely upon
economics; hence the truly Jewish intolerance against those who think differently, while
demanding the most far-reaching tolerance for themselves; hence the eternal whipping up of the
basest impulses and passions. The weakness of Christian Socialism, meanwhile, lies in the fact
that it addresses itself towards compassion for the poor, at invoking charity towards them. How
little use that is, is demonstrated by, among other things, the Church’s repeated prohibitions
against interest. It is not compassion which matters in this world, but justice. Yet this is something
which cannot be achieved by the humble servant, but only by the strong, upright man; the
Christian churches, meanwhile, are incapable of nurturing this disposition.

All non-socialist parties are in large part based upon “individualism,” i.e., upon the demand for
as much unrestricted freedom and independence for the individual as is possible. Economically
this is expressed through Manchester Liberalism and, as a further consequence, through
Mammonism. The most ruthless elitists,172 plagued by no pangs of conscience, are the target; the
weaker man is trampled underfoot. Since the Jew is most ruthless, he is suited to it best. All non-
socialist, anti-Jewish tendencies, therefore, unwittingly aid in Jewry’s rise to world domination.

What we must strive for is the education of every segment of our entire Volk on subordination
to the needs of the community, the strongest form of willpower when combined with a
simultaneous elimination of all personal self-interest. The selflessness and magnanimity of a
Hindenburg, for example – a man who, with all his loyalty to King and Kaiser, placed himself at
the disposal of his misled Volk and the adventurers and bandit-politicians who governed them –
is a fine example for Germans. Through such men our Volk shall recover once more; once again
they will be led to greatness!

Subordination in service to the community, however, should not and must not stifle individuality,
for a Volk needs personalities – and an enslaved Volk such as ours needs them even moreso
than do others. Every individual must be willing to leap exultantly into the spears if the welfare
of Pan-Germany demands it. No compulsion, no prison should frighten him. The spirit of
heroism must dwell within us once again, even if all of Israel, with its retinue of ethically-creative
degenerate half-bloods, clamours against this barbaric lapse of taste! Jewry simply wishes to suck
the marrow from our bones, to be able to rule over us undisturbed. We are to be its humble
servants!

The struggle with everything racially-foreign must be fought to its end if the German Volk are to
rise once more. But to lead them out of the misery of the present day, that is the task of National
Socialism; the free man within a free Volk, the free Volk upon free soil, that is the goal which we
set for them!

Hear its message, gather around its banners, fight for it, and its victory will also be yours!
 139

Sources.
A. Damaschke: Land Reform.
-----------------------: History of the National Economy.
Dr. R Danneberg: The Social-Democratic Programme.
Ing. G. Feder: Manifesto for Breaking the Interest-Slavery of Money.
---------------------: The Coming Tax Strike.
Th. Fritsch: The Handbook of the Jewish Question.
S. Gesell: The Natural Economic Order.
H. George: Progress and Poverty.
H. Claß (Einhart): German History.
Dr. P. Lensch: Social-Democracy: Its Aim and its Achievements.
O. Spengler: Prussianism and Socialism.
H. Ford: The International Jew: The World’s Foremost Problem.
Dr. P. Tafel: The New Germany: A Council-State upon a National Foundation.
___________________________________________________________________________
National Socialist Books and Writings.
Ferdinand Burschofsky: Contributions on the History of the German National Labor Movement in
Austria. Two volumes.
Ferdinand Ertl: Over the Hurdles. Out of stock.
-----------------------: The True German Shame. (Polemical pamphlet). Out of stock.
-----------------------: The Future Remuneration of Salaried Employees. Publishing House of the Trade-Union
of German Railway Workers, Vienna 6, Matrosengasse 9.
Ing.173 Gottfried Feder: Manifesto for Breaking the Interest-Slavery of Money. Publishing House Jos. C.
Huber, Diessen vor München.
-------------------------------: State Bankruptcy, Salvation. Publishing House Jos. C. Huber, Diessen vor
München.
-------------------------------: The Coming Tax Strike. Publishing House Jos. C. Huber, Diessen vor München.
Ing. Rudolf Jung: Land- and Monetary-Reform. Out of stock.
--------------------------: Socialization. 2nd Edition.
--------------------------: The Tasks of Municipal Policy. Out of stock.
--------------------------: Guiding Principles of the German National Trade-Union Movement. Out of stock.
--------------------------: From Bismarck’s Reich to the Swamp of Erzbergerism. Out of stock.
--------------------------: Memorandum of the German Workers’ Party, 1915. Out of stock.
--------------------------: National Conflict within Social-Democracy. Out of stock.
--------------------------: Revolutionary or Reformist Socialism?
Hans Krebs: Catechism of the German Labor Movement.
-------------------: Social-Democracy Today. Out of stock.
-------------------: Might and Right.
Dr. W. Riehl: Our Ultimate Goal. 3rd Edition.
---------------------: Our German Workers’ Youth Movement.
Dr. A. Schilling: A Critical Study of Marxism and Social-Democracy.
------------------------: Problems of the Labor Movement.
------------------------: The Social-Democrats as Umlerner.174 Out of stock.
------------------------: Introduction to the National Socialist Municipal Programme. Out of stock.
------------------------: The Intellectual Worker and Socialism. Out of stock.
------------------------: Social-Democratic Words and Deeds.
------------------------: The Theoretical Foundations of National Socialism.
Theodor Wollschack: Why I Left the Social-Democratic Party.

The books and writings of Burschofsky, Jung, Krebs, Riehl, Schilling, and Wollschack can be obtained
from the Neue Zeit Publishing House, Troppau Heidrichpark 10, or from the National Socialist
Printing and Publishing Company, Aussig, Teplitzerstraße 20.
 140

The National Socialist Movement.

National Socialist Party of the German Volk.
Inter-State Chancellery: Vienna 1, Stefansplatz 5. Executive Chairman: Dr. Walter Riehl.

Party Groups.
1. Sudeten-German Group (Czechoslovakia).
Title: German National Socialist Workers’ Party. 1st Party Chairman: Parliamentarian Hans Knirsch,
Dux. 2nd Party Chairman: Parliamentarian Ing. Rudolf Jung, Troppau.
Its parliamentary association in the Prague People’s Assembly includes the following members: Ing.
Rudolf Jung, Hans Knirsch, Josef Patzel, Hugo Simm, Leo Wenzel, and the Senators: Adam Fahrner,
Franz Jesser. The parliamentary chairman is: Ing. Rudolf Jung.
Party Headquarters: Aussig, Teplitzerstraße 20 (for Bohemia); Troppau, Heidrichpark 10 (for Moravia
and Silesia).
Party Newspapers: Volk und Gemeinde; theoretical monthly, Troppau. Der Tag; Dux. Neue Zeit;
Troppau. Die Wahrheit; Moravian Ostrau. Kühlandler Volkswille; Neutitschein. Deutsches Volksblatt;
Moravian Schönberg. Volkswehr; Gablonz. Deutscher Volksfreund; Bodenbach. Deutsche
Arbeiterzeitung; Aussig. Deutsche Volksstimme; Dux. Deutscher Volksbote; Karlsbad.
Party Publishers: Neue Zeit Publishing House, Troppau, Heidrichpark 10. National Socialist Printing
and Publishing Company, Aussig, Teplitzerstraße 20.

2. Austrian Group.
Title: National Socialist Party of German-Austria. Chairman: Dr. Walter Riehl, Vienna. Headquarters:
Vienna 1, Stefansplatz 5. The party has representatives in the Salzburg and Carinthian Landtags.
Party Newspapers: Deutsche Arbeiterpresse; Vienna. Volksruf; Salzburg.

3. Reich-German Group.
Title: National Socialist German Workers’ Party. Chairman: Adolf Hitler, Munich.
Headquarters: Munich, Corneliusstraße 12.
Party Newspaper: Der Völkische Beobachter; Munich.

4. Polish Group.
Title: German National Socialist Workers’ Party. Chairman: Oskar Kotschi, Bielitz (Eastern Silesia) P.O.
Box 23.
_________________________________________________________________________________

Völkisch Trade-Union Movement.

(Politically Neutral).
Umbrella Organizations.
1. Sudeten-German Movement.
Reich Association of German Trade-Unions, Prague II, Krakauergasse 11.

2. Austrian Movement.
Reich Confederation of German Employees’ Associations, Vienna 6, Matrosengasse 9.

3. Reich-German Movement.
German Trade-Union Confederation, Berlin-Wilmersdorf, Kaisersalle 25.
 141

TRANSLATOR’S NOTES
 142

Foreword to the Second Edition.

1. Following the end of WWI, the redrawing of Europe’s boundaries and the emergence of newly-constituted
nations such as Czechoslovakia, Poland, Yugoslavia, etc. left many ethnically-mixed ‘border territories’ in an
uncertain condition, with multiple states making territorial claims upon them. US President Woodrow Wilson had
been a vocal advocate of the principle of ‘self-determination’, and this ideal motivated the inclusion of several
protocols in the Treaty of Versailles and the Treaty of Saint Germain which promised a number of disputed regions
the right to determine their own national affiliation. As a result, between 1920-21 several plebiscites were held under
the supervision of the Inter-Allied Plebiscite Commission, in order to settle the issue of sovereignty in the regions
of East Prussia, Schleswig, Upper Silesia, Carinthia, and eastern West Prussia. East Prussia, West Prussia, and the
majority of Upper Silesia all voted to join with Germany. The northern (majority-Danish) region of Schleswig voted
to merge with Denmark; the southern (majority-German) region voted to merge with Germany. In Carinthia, where
the choice was between joining with Yugoslavia or with Austria, a majority voted for union with the latter. Votes were
also held in northern Tyrol and in Salzburg, although not under the auspices of the Plebiscite Commission (meaning
they did not have any legal, binding effect upon the status quo). In both areas the German-majority residents voted
overwhelmingly in favor of the Austrian Republic becoming a part of Germany, something forbidden under the
Treaty of Versailles.

German Volk and Reich.

2. The word “Kleinstaaterei” does not have a direct English equivalent; a literal translation would be something like
“small-statery.” In German the word is generally used to describe political conditions in which there are an excessive
number of small, sovereign states within a given territory. It is most commonly applied to the Holy Roman Empire
and to the period immediately after its dissolution, and is usually applied pejoratively. Jung employs the term to
decry the division which existed among the German people as a result of their political fragmentation.

3. In German, “Volksadel,” sometimes translated into English as “people’s nobility.” The “folk-nobility” or “people’s
nobility” were those members of the aristocratic classes whose origins lay in the old tribal nobility of the pre-Roman
era. They had originally constituted a kind of military leadership among the German tribes, and their status as
nobility had been conferred primarily as a consequence of their martial abilities. The term was sometimes
repurposed by völkisch writers to describe a new nobility who, it was argued, would naturally emerge from among
the Volk as a consequence of their innate leadership qualities.

Changes in Land Law.

4. The “Markgenossenschaft” was a form of feudal agricultural cooperative, the size of which could encompass
anything from a single village to a number of homesteads and villages, including the territory immediately
surrounding them. Within the borders of the Markgenossenschaft there were areas of demarcated land which,
under the local legal code, were regarded as being held in common use; resident members of the community had
the collective right to gather wood, to hunt, or to graze livestock on this communal land.
The Markgenossenschaft’s legal code also stipulated how the land could be used, i.e., at which times of year the
trees could be felled, how often individual members’ animals could graze, and so on.
The Markgenossenchaft’s members would also gather to elect judges, to decide local matters democratically, or to
elect a representative to manage their dealings with other communities. The institution of
the Markgenossenschaft gradually gave way under pressure from feudal lords, with communal land encroached
upon and then taken over as the peasant communities ended up in bondage. Remnants of
the Markgenossenschaft still survive today – there are still “Markwald” in some regions of Germany, areas of
community woodland which are owned and managed collectively by local communities and which residents can use
for agricultural purposes.

5. A “Hufe” was a small parcel of agricultural land which existed primarily during the feudal area, defined as a plot
large enough to be tilled by, and large enough to feed, a single family. Because of varying soil yield qualities, the size
of a Hufe varied from region to region; as Jung states, they were generally between 30-40 morgen in size, with 1
morgen itself ranging from ½ to 2½ acres depending, again, upon the particular region. Hufen formed an important
part of the economy during the period of the Holy Roman Empire – the state would offer them free to peasants as
an incentive to settle around newly-established villages or in the territories opened up by the colonization drive to
the East. The Hufen became such a commonplace within the economy that the word Hufe itself eventually came to
be a part of the system of measurement, denoting any piece of land around 30 morgen in size.

6. “Edelinge” was a term from the Middle Ages used to denote those members of the nobility whose noble title had
been inherited dynastically over the generations. The Edelinge were distinguished from nobles whose titles had been
conferred more recently, allowing their families to rise out of the peasant or burgher class. The Edelinge constituted
the precursors to the later High Nobility, and made up much of the governing structure of the feudal system.
 143

7. Grundholden were peasants who managed their own property, but who still had to pay an annual tithe of some
kind to their manorial lord. Generally the land they managed was not owned outright by them, but was instead a
parcel of land provided by the lord on a hereditary or fixed-term basis; their ownership rights were thus inferior to
those of the lord’s, who they had to provide tribute to via tithing and corvée labor. Despite this, the freedom to
manage their ‘own’ land provided them with more wealth and mobility than landless peasants, and they were
permitted to acquire and dispose of some property of their own. They were also allowed to manage their own affairs
to a certain extent, hence the existence of the Grundhold-court [Grundholdengericht], their own self-run judicial
system.

8. The German word for knight, “Ritter,” is directly related to the German word for rider, “Reiter.” Both originally
grew from the same root-word.

9. “Urban air makes one free” – In German, “Stadtluft macht frei.” An expression with its roots in the Middle Ages,
describing certain legal conditions within German cities. As the cities rose in size, power, and importance during the
Middle Ages, they attempted to attract individuals from agrarian regions with the promise of citizenship. Serfs who
moved to a city and who dwelt there for a year and a day were automatically declared free citizens of the city and
afforded its protections under the law. Freed men and escaped serfs began flowing into the cities in large numbers
as a result, knowing that so long as they avoided being identified, claimed, and taken back by a feudal lord or by his
representatives, they could escape from the bondage and servitude of feudal society. Peasants thus transitioned into
burghers, with many members of the growing urban-oriented merchant classes being former members of the agrarian
peasantry. “Stadtluft macht frei” later also inspired the expression “Arbeit macht frei” (“work makes one free”),
which extolled the virtues of labor. That expression was consequently adopted by völkisch groups, who felt that it
summed up völkisch attitudes about work being a duty rather than a blessing contingent upon the ups and downs of
the capitalist economic system. It was later made infamous through its association with the Dachau and Auschwitz
concentration camps.

10. Jung is not the first author to claim that the Holy Roman Empire in fact constituted hundreds, or even thousands
(in this case 1,786!) of separate member-states. Whether it truly did or not depends on how one defines a ‘state’.
This was a period when national borders and nationalities were not so clearly-defined as they are now, a period
when many territories had elements of sovereignty but lacked those features which we associate with modern
statehood today (codified laws, a clearly-defined public authority, diplomatic representatives, established borders,
etc.). If one counts as states all the various principalities, bishoprics, duchies, kingdoms, city-states, quasi-
independent estates of the Imperial Knights, and those territories associated with the Empire but not formally a part
of it, then the constituent membership of the First Reich does indeed number above 1,000, although the number
actually represented in the Imperial Diet was much smaller.

11. The word actually used here in the original text is “Welschland.” Welsche is an archaic German word meaning
‘foreign’ or ‘foreigners’. For ancient Germans, any foreign territory was technically Welschland, but for historical
reasons the word primarily came to be associated with the Celts and with certain Roman territories – and hence,
over the centuries, with Italy in particular. The term is occasionally also used in German writing to describe
Lombardy (the French-speaking region of Switzerland), but it is most likely, based on the context here (mention of
Roman Law, and cultural use of the word in Austrian territories to describe Italians), that Jung is referring specifically
to Italy.

12. The Breidenbracher Grund was a judicial district in the German state of Hesse, encompassing all of the district
of Breidenbach and some additional surrounding districts.

13. Jan Hus (b.1372 – d.1415) was a Czech religious reformer responsible for the Bohemian Reformation. He was
a forerunner to Martin Luther, and initiated a kind of proto-Protestantism within Bohemia which was treated as
heresy by the Catholic Church. The teachings of Hus also fostered ethnic tension; Hus’s followers denounced the
Germans in Bohemia as “intruders,” preached against them (German Bohemians at that point were mostly still
Catholic), and forced them from their towns and cities during the Hussite Wars (1419-1434). Hussitism and its
legacy consequently became closely tied to the historical emergence of the Czech national identity, and later served
as an inspiration to many Czech political groups after the foundation of the First Czechoslovak Republic. Jung’s
reference to “unadulterated Hussitism, like everything in the Czech state” is essentially a reference to Czech ethnic-
nationalism, but tempered by Jung’s own anti-Czech prejudices. He tended to use the words “Hussite” or
“Hussitism” to describe every perceived negative quality of the Czechs, particularly their “arrogance” and
“chauvinism.” In his 1938 book on the Czechs, Die Tschechen, Jung would write: “That is the difference between
Czech and German nationalism. One is tolerant, generous, open-minded to the point of indulgence; the other
intolerant, petty, spiteful, narrow-minded, just like the chauvinist Hus, who brought years of misery and hardship to
 144

the Germans of Bohemia from which they were never able to recover.” It was a frequent charge of the DNSAP and
of other Sudeten-German nationalist groups that the Czechoslovakian state maltreated its German minority, and
that the “Hussite” political system and its reforms deliberately disadvantaged them in favour of the Czech majority.

Social Economy in the Middle Ages.

14. The Sachsenspiegel was the preeminent book of law in the Holy Roman Empire, written by Eike of Repgow
between 1220 and 1235. It codified laws relating to property, trade, criminal matters, the legal rights of the peasants,
and the structure of the nobility and their specific feudal obligations.

15. The term “Blue Monday” (“Blaue Montag”) derives from the fact that churches would ornament themselves
with blue or purple cloth on the fast-days of Lent, during which craftsmen and journeymen would not work. Over
time craftsmen and journeymen also began taking off every Monday, giving themselves a weekly three-day-weekend.
Because they were already known for not working on the “blue” days of Lent, the term “Blue Monday” came about
as the name for the extra day off which craftsmen took each week.

16. “Bathing money” (“Badegeld”) was a small benefit added on to workers’ salaries during the Middle Ages,
intended to cover the cost of an occasional visit to the public baths. In an era in which people did not have regular
access to running water, bathing was regarded as medicinal and as the source of numerous health benefits. The
Badegeld could thus be regarded as an early, prototypical form of company-provided health insurance.

17. The Guest Court (“Gastgericht”) was a medieval institution employed for legal disputes in which one of the
parties was a ‘foreigner’, usually a merchant from another town or region. The court’s verdicts were deliberately
prompt, in order that travelling merchants involved in a legal dispute would not have their business disrupted by
being kept in town for a long, drawn-out case.

18. “Staple duty” or “stacking duty” (“Stapelpflicht”) was an obligation imposed upon merchants passing through a
town or city (usually ports) located along a trade route. The duty required merchants to unpack all their wares and
display them for sale to the local populace for a set period of time (usually three days), even if that city or town was
not their intended end-destination. In some locations merchants could pay a toll to avoid the duty. As part of the
staple duty the town or city also imposed its “handling right” (“Umschlagsrecht”), a protectionist measure which
obligated merchants to reload their unpacked merchandise onto ships or carts owned by local transport companies
before moving onwards to their next destination.

19. Bakers especially were subject to rigorous scrutiny in terms of medieval quality control, since bread was a staple
food in daily diets and unscrupulous bakers could easily lighten their wares. Bread and other goods were weighed
by inspectors, with products which came out underweight resulting in at best a fine or, at worst, a harsh form of
corporal punishment. As Jung relates, for bakers the law often stipulated that they be locked in a cage and then
dunked into the river using a device specifically designed for the purpose.

20. In the medieval era, education was primarily the domain of the Church, whose schools offered teaching in the
‘seven liberal arts’: grammar, rhetoric, dialectic, arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy. By contrast, the
knightly orders offered their charges education in the far more physically-oriented knightly arts, known as the ‘seven
perfections’: horse riding, swimming, shooting (with bow, handbow, and crossbow), climbing, jousting, fighting
(wrestling and swordsmanship), and courtly manners (including dancing and chess-playing). Young nobles would
typically receive training in the seven liberal arts from age 7 to 14, while those who were sent away from their families
to become knights would continue on with learning the seven perfections until age 21.

21. Jung is talking about syphilis, which was brought to Europe by sailors returning from the New World. Every
country in which there was a syphilis outbreak blamed the disease upon their national rivals, naming it accordingly.

22. “Emphyteusis” (“Erbleihe” in German) was a form of contractual possession originating in the Roman era, in
which a land-owner would lease his property to another in perpetuity; the lease would apply not only to the lease-
holder, but to all their descendants, although neither they nor their descendants had the right to sell their lease to
any other family. Emphyteusis was a key feature of feudal property relations and would usually be handled in one
of two ways within German lands: as an Erbpacht or as a Zeitpacht. An Erbpacht was a hereditable leased plot over
which peasants and their descendants had full right of use, so long as they made continued payment to the owner
via goods, labor, or currency. A Zeitpacht was a more commercial arrangement, in that it constituted a plot which
was leased to peasants only on a temporary, fixed-term (i.e., non-hereditary) basis.
 145

23. “Half-frees” (“Halbfreien”) in the Middle Ages were people whose legal status was in an intermediate position
between that of free citizens and the enslaved; usually they were the children of slaves. There could often be multiple
divisions of the ‘half-free’ status depending on the area and the time-period, with varying levels of rights for each.
Half-frees might be allowed certain limited rights in terms of property- and weapons-ownership, but they were still
considered bound to a particular lord, and were obligated to perform longer or more strenuous tasks than full
citizens.

24. “Market protection” (“Marktschutz”) was a form of protectionism. In return for the payment of market
protection duties, the local government would favor local merchants and producers by placing higher taxes upon
goods and services from other regions.

25. Henry George (b.1839 – d.1897), an American economist and advocate of land reform. George’s ideas were
influential within Germany and played a significant role in the development of völkisch anti-capitalism. Jung
discusses George in greater detail in the chapter “Abolition of Unearned Income through Land Law Reform and
Monetary-Reform, and through the Socialization of Private Monopolies.”

26. In German: “Am Golde hängt, nach Golde drängt doch alles.” I am not sure why Jung ascribes this to “the
Babylonians,” as it seems to be a paraphrased line from Goethe’s Faust: “Nach Golde drangt / Am Golde hängt /
Doch alles.” (In English translations of Faust this line is sometimes rendered, “Gold’s all they care about, gold’s
wanted everywhere...”) It is possible that the expression is much older, and that Goethe merely incorporated an
already well-known saying into his play, but I could find no evidence that it originated with the Babylonians.

27. From Luke 6:35.

28. A “natural economy” (“Naturalwirtschaft”) is one in which money is not used as a medium of exchange. Instead
communities produce almost everything which they use themselves (aka ‘subsistence farming’ or ‘self-sufficiency’),
with any additional products or resources procured solely through the bartering of goods and services.

29. “Lombard banking” was the name given to a form of the moneychanging industry which emerged in Lombardy,
Italy, during the Middle Ages. The modern financial term “Lombard credit,” which Jung is referencing, derives its
name from this old institution.

30. “Bastard child” – The word which Jung uses here in the original German is “Wechselbalg,” the German word
for “changeling” (a misshapen substitute child swapped for a real, human one by malevolent fairies). In German-
Austria, however, this word also came to be used as a (fairly derogatory) term for illegitimate children, whether those
born out of wedlock or those resulting from a cuckolding. I eventually settled on the latter definition for the English
translation, as it seemed more appropriate than “changeling” given the context.

The Transition to a Pure Monetary-Economy and to Factory-Production Enterprises.

31. “Chair-brigand” is a direct translation of the German word “Stuhlräuber.” The inference is that those who make
their money through interest are bandits who rob others from the comfort of their own chairs, rather than by
waylaying them upon horseback.

32. The actual phrase here in German is “ein Treppenwitz der Weltgeschichte,” which literally translates to “a
staircase-joke of world history.” This phrase is probably derived from the title of an 1882 book by William Lewis
Hertselt. It incorporates (in German) the French expression “l’esprit d’escalier” (staircase-joke, Treppenwitz),
meaning a joke or response one thinks of in response to being insulted, but far too late for it to be of any use (in
other words, the perfect response only comes to you later, after you have left the room and are already on the
staircase). This is obviously not really possible to translate into English, which does not have an equivalent
expression, so I went with the more prosaic “irony of world-history.”

33. “War begets economy, economy war” – in German, “Krieg erzeugt Wirtschaft, Wirtschaft Krieg.” A quote which
appears to be derived from Johann Plenge’s 1919 book, Der Krieg und die Volkswirtschaft (War and National
Economy). Plenge was a German academic and a fairly prominent social-democratic intellectual. He was associated
with a loose faction within the Social-Democratic Party who enthusiastically supported Germany’s involvement in
the Great War, and who saw nationalism and the state as a better basis for establishing socialism than class. Plenge’s
ideas were influential upon the early National Socialist movement.

34. “No penny, no pater noster” (in German, “kein Kreuzer, kein Schweizer”) is a proverb which essentially means
that nothing can be obtained without payment. It derives from the pre-Reformation era; at that time the people
 146

would provide a paid tribute to Rome, and would ostensibly receive the Pope’s holy protection (“pater noster” refers
to the Lord’s Prayer) in return. It should be noted that this is not an entirely direct translation – a Kreuzer was a unit
of currency, while Schweizer is the German word for “Swiss,” as well as the word for a sacristan or other religious
official (derived from the fact that sacristan garments were similar to those of the Swiss Guards). “No penny, no
pater noster” is a common translation of the proverb in English, as Schweizer when translated directly does not
really make any sense without additional context being provided.

35. The word Jung uses here is Frauenzimmer, which can be slightly derogatory. Depending upon regional
variations, it can mean anything from a bachelorette, to a slightly louche, single woman, to a “strumpet” or “scarlet
lady.” Translating the word as “wench” or “hussy” or the like did not seem appropriate, given the rest of the
paragraph, so I chose the more neutral “single woman.”

36. A reference to the Great Military Orphanage, constructed in Potsdam between 1722 and 1724. The concept
behind the orphanage was that its wards would receive education from the institution (hence why Jung calls them
“pupils”) in return for serving in the orphanage’s workshops; the justification was that this would provide them with
training for a future trade. In 1745, during the reign of Frederick the Great, the Prussian King gave his court jeweller
– a Jewish entrepreneur named Veitel Ephraim – permission to use the orphanage’s children in his silk enterprises,
particularly in his lace-making factory.

37. A “Reichstagsabschied” or “Reichstags-Abschied” is a formal, concluding document published at the final annual
recess of a diet or other parliamentary body, which clarifies the year’s legal resolutions.

Materialism and Mammonism.

38. “Folk-comrade” (“Volksgenosse” in German) is a commonly-used term within völkisch writing, and an important
one. The word dates from the late 1700s, and was initially employed in the same fashion as the phrase “comrade-
in-arms,” i.e., as a way of denoting members of a united social community. It was later picked up by members of
the völkisch movement, and used by them to describe members of a community whose unifying bonds were derived
from shared ties of blood and culture – in essence, a racial community. National Socialists would use “folk-comrade”
in the same fashion as socialists or communists might use the word “comrade” (“Genosse”), but the word was not
limited to just describing one’s fellow countrymen. Occasionally in National Socialist texts one sees the Jewish
community described as “jüdische Volksgenossen,” for instance.

39. The German word used here is “Menschheitsbrei,” which literally translates to something like “humanity-
porridge” or “humanity-slurry.” Menschheitsbrei was a völkisch term describing a cosmopolitan ‘mishmash’ of world
races.

40. Jung includes the German word for “trust” in parentheses here (“Treuhandverband”) because he also uses the
English word “trust” in this sentence, as well as several other times throughout his book.

41. The Vacuum Oil Company, an enterprise founded in New York in 1866 and bought out by Standard Oil in
1879. In 1911-12 the US government used the Sherman Antitrust Act to break up Standard Oil, accusing it of
monopolistic and anti-competitive practises. Vacuum Oil thus became independent again, until it remerged with
Standard Oil once more in 1931. An iteration of the company continues today as ExxonMobil.

42. “Michel” or “the German Michel” (“der deutsche Michel”) is a kind of German national folk personification,
similar to how John Bull and Uncle Sam are the personified depictions of the United Kingdom and the United
States. Michel in illustrations and political cartoons is usually depicted as wearing a floppy sleeping cap, and his
clothing and behaviors typically mirror those of the traditional German peasantry.

43. By “central office” (“die Zentralen”) Jung means the state.

44. For those interested, I have provided a list of the original German names of the various banking groups listed in
this section:
General Commercial Bank - Allgemeine Verkehrsbank.
Anglo-Austrian Bank - Anglo-Osterreichische Bank.
Vienna Bank Association - Wiener Bankverein.
Land Credit Institution - Bodenkreditanstalt.
Credit Institution - Kreditanstalt.
State Bank - Länderbank.
Lower Austrian Discount Company - Niederösterreichischer Eskomptegesellschaft.
 147

Union Bank - Unionbank.

Mercury Bank - Merkurbank.
General Deposit Bank - Allgemeine Depositenbank.

The Jewish Spirit. The Jewish Pursuit of World Supremacy.

45. In the original German text Jung inaccurately cites Genesis 22:17 as the source of this passage, a mistake which
remains unfixed in the 1923 3rd edition of his book. Theodor Fritsch’s Handbuch der Judenfrage, from which Jung
seems to have sourced his biblical quotations, gives the correct citation of Genesis 26:3, so this is probably a
transcription error on Jung’s part. I have fixed the error for the English translation.

46. A reference to a number of speeches Bismarck made to the Prussian Landtag in 1847 against Jewish
emancipation. Later Bismarck backed down on his earlier stance, providing some concessions to liberal opponents
by introducing, in 1869, a ‘Law Concerning the Equality of the Denominations’ which theoretically provided Jews
with an equal legal footing in the German Confederation (although individual German states often found a way
around it). Moritz von Mohl (b.1802 – d.1888) was an economist and liberal-left anti-Semitic politician. He famously
made an anti-Jewish speech at the revolutionary Frankfurt National Assembly in 1848, arguing that Jews were “an
alien element... pernicious to the German people” and therefore unassimilable. His speech was supposedly greeted
with loud hisses and was swiftly shouted down, with delegates voting on a proposal of legal equality for all
denominations.

47. “Jacob” in Hebrew means “he who grasps the heel,” which is also a Hebrew idiom for “he who deceives.” Jacob
is regarded as a Patriarch of the Israelites, the inheritor of the legacy of Isaac (his father) and Abraham (his
grandfather). According to legend, he was the father of the twelve sons who founded the Twelve Tribes of Israel,
and thus the progenitor of the Jewish people.

48. “Tarnopolian morality” (“Tarnopoler Moral”) was an Austrian expression for swindling. Tarnopol, now called
Ternopil and part of modern Ukraine, was well-known among the former populations of Austria-Hungary for its
large Jewish population. To have “Tarnopolian morality” was thus to have “Jewish morality,” i.e., to be dishonest
and a cheat.

49. This particular passage from II Samuel describes the punishment which David wrought against “all the cities of
the children of Ammon” after defeating them at the siege of Rabbah. Most modern biblical translations render the
text as David putting the vanquished Ammonites to work under iron tools, or at the brick-kiln, rather than suggesting
(as Jung’s translation does) that David instead used these tools as murder instruments in an act of mass slaughter. I
am providing mention of both interpretations here for the sake of objectivity, although (and I am not a biblical
scholar by any means) the impression I gained while researching this chapter was that the text’s original meaning in
Hebrew was probably that intimated by Jung – genocide.

50. “Ziu” was the Old High German name for the Germanic god Týr.

51. “Zebaoth” is a Hebrew term and an attribute of the name Yahweh, or YHWH. In Hebrew biblical texts, God’s
name is sometimes rendered as “YHWH Zebaoth” or “Yahweh Zebaoth.” Martin Luther’s original German
translation of the scripture apparently made frequent use of the term, such as by referring to God as “Herr Zebaoth”
(Lord Zebaoth).

52. Around the early 1900s, the Viennese operetta – a famous cultural institution – became increasingly
commercialized and ‘international’. As a result, there was an influx of Jewish composers and librettists into the field,
resulting in what nationalists dismissively called “Schundoperette” or “trash-operetta” – operettas which were
claimed to be lower-quality, more vulgar, and less artistically-accomplished. An equivalent expression today would
be “junk media” or “trash TV” or something similar.

53. Both quotes cited here appear to be taken from Theodor Fritsch’s Handbuch der Judenfrage. Rutilius Claudius
Namatianus was a Roman poet who lived during the 5th century. His poem De Reditu Suo, which Fritsch’s original
quote was taken from, describes Namatianus’s voyage from Rome to Gaul in 417AD and offers various descriptions
of the ethnic and religious groups he meets along the way. An encounter with a Jewish inn-keeper, depicted as “a
whining Jew” who manages a filthy establishment and who voices bitter complaints over the costs involved in
providing drinking water to the author’s party, leads the author to make several negative observations about the Jews
as a whole. As well as criticizing the alleged power of the Jewish “plague,” Namatianus also derides circumcision and
mocks Jewish veneration of the Sabbath: “Every seventh day is damned to lazy sloth, a feeble image of their tired
god!” I could not discover who “Manâwi al-Manlid” is. Fritsch in his books writes the name as “Manâwi al-Maulid,”
 148

yet both the 2nd and 3rd editions of Jung’s book render it “al-Manlid.” In either case, I could not ascertain whether
the quote is accurate, and do not know enough about Islam and its history to be able to determine who its alleged
author might be.

54. The online edition of the Bava Metzia which I compared this quote against contains the phrase, “You are called
men, but the Goyim (peoples of the world) are not men,” in s.144b; it does not contain the end section of Jung’s
quote referring to Goyim as cattle. Whether this was excised from the English translation I consulted, or whether it
was maliciously added to the source from which Jung derived the quote, I cannot say.

55. I could not find a quotation within the Sanhedrin to match the one which Jung provides here. However, there
are a number which match it in spirit within s.57a of the Sanhedrin – there are several paragraphs debating the exact
ethical circumstances under which it is or is not permissible to kill, rob, or underpay Gentiles: “If a Gentile murders
another Gentile, or a Gentile murders a Jew, he is liable. If a Jew murders a Gentile, he is exempt... With regard to
robbery, the term permitted is relevant, as it is permitted for a Jew to rob a Gentile... [But] the Gemara challenges:
...Since they are not apt to grant forgiveness, robbing a Gentile of even a miniscule amount is considered full-fledged
robbery, and not merely similar to robbery.”

56. Again, I could not find a quote in the Avodah Zara which was close enough to match that given here by Jung.
There is one which is similar, however: “With regard to the Gentiles and the shepherds of small domesticated
animals, we do not raise them from a pit but we do not actively lower them into a pit either. It may be inferred from
here that one may not cause the death of a Gentile slave.” Another passage in the Sanhedrin (s.57a) clarifies that
those “shepherds of small domesticated animals” to be given equal treatment to Gentiles are those which are
“typically robbers.”

57. This quotation appears more or less accurate to the online version of the Sanhedrin which I compared it against.
There are some differences between Jung’s rendition and the English translation which I consulted, but they are
minor – the text still effectively states that the Gentile is not considered a “neighbor,” making his wife fair game for
adultery.

58. The “Kol-Nidre Prayer” is a declaration which Jews recite in synagogue as a way of commencing the evening
ceremonies on Yom Kippur. The Kol-Nidre is included within the Schulchan Aruch, the “Code of Jewish Law.”
The text of the Kol-Nidre as Jung outlines it here is entirely accurate. The Jewish defence of the Kol-Nidre is that
the vows, obligations, oaths etc. etc. which it makes reference to are purely personal oaths between a man and God,
not between man and state, or between one man and another. This is intended to ensure that Jews do not sin when
they make a vow to God which cannot in the end be fulfilled. This explanation was not seen as convincing for much
of European history, with the Jews’ perceived duplicitousness leading to their attaining a special legal status (i.e., they
could not be called as witnesses against Christians), and to the enforcement of specific oaths which Jews were
required to take in the event that they were called to court.

59. This is one segment of a larger aphorism which was fairly well-known within the völkisch movement, taken from
Luther’s 1543 tract On the Jews and their Lies. In full, “Trau keinem Fuchs auf weiter Heid / Auch keinem Juden
bei seinem Eid / Glaub keinem Papst auf sein Gewissen / Wirst sonst von allen Drein beschissen,” – “Trust no fox
on the wide heath, and no Jew with his oath, believe no Pope on his conscience, else you will be screwed by all
three!” Luther had something of a sense of humor. There are numerous variations on the saying; sometimes it is a
wolf rather than a fox, sometimes it is a “wild” heath rather than a “wide” heath, etc. One of these variants (“Trau
keinem Fuchs auf grüner Heid und keinem Juden bei seinem Eid” – “Trust no fox on his green heath, and no Jew
upon his oath”) has since become somewhat infamous as the title of an anti-Semitic children’s book produced during
the National Socialist era. The book was first published in 1936, written and illustrated by 18-year-old kindergarten
teacher Elvira Bauer, a great admirer of Julius Streicher. It is similar in tone and style to Ernst Hiemer’s 1938
children’s book Der Giftpilz (The Poisonous Mushroom).

60. Theodor Mommsen (b.1817 – d.1903) was a renowned German historian, writer, and Liberal National
politician, as well as an opponent of exclusionary conceptions of German identity: Mommsen believed national
minorities (including the Jews) could and should become Germans through assimilation. The quote Jung is
referencing here comes from the fifth volume of Mommsen’s most acclaimed work, The History of Rome: “The
Jew is effectively indifferent towards the state: he is just as reluctant to give up his national characteristics as he is
quick to disguise them under any nationality. Even in the ancient world Judaism was an effective ferment of
cosmopolitanism and national decomposition.” The phrase “ferment of decomposition” was subsequently adopted
and popularized by völkisch nationalists as a means of describing the apparent nature and societal impact of the
Jews, which is somewhat ironic considering how opposed Mommsen was to the völkisch worldview. Mommsen was
a nationalist himself, but a liberal one. He agreed that Jews were culturally different to Germans and accepted the
 149

idea that their faith and traditional folkways had a naturally subversive effect upon German society, but he also
argued that this in some ways made them a useful force, in that through undermining Germany they also undermined
the old, traditionalist loyalties and structures which were holding back German progress (he claimed that the Jews
had also played the same role in ancient Rome). Mommsen at the same time still believed, however, that the ideal
resolution to the ‘Jewish question’ was the same as it was for all minority ethnic groups – that their Jewish identity
would be discarded or would naturally dissipate as they assimilated, and that they would inevitably become ‘true’
Germans in terms of both culture and citizenship.

61. A play on Mommsen’s description of the Jews as the “ferment of decomposition” (see note 60, above). Leavening
agents such as sourdough (“Sauerteig”) are used when baking bread in order to ‘raise’ the bread mixture via
fermentation, creating gas bubbles which make bread soft, fluffy, and palatable. Using too much leaven, or allowing
the fermentation process to continue overlong, results in bread with an unpleasant, acidic taste. Jung is drawing the
inference from Mommsen’s own choice of description that too many Jews, like too much leaven, must have an
unpleasantly “decomposing” effect on the societies which their presence is supposed to be improving. The German
word Jung uses here for “decomposing,” “zersetzen,” could also be translated as “undermining,” “subversive,” or
“corrosive.” Jung may also be making indirect reference to several passages from the New Testament, such as Mark
8:15 and Matthew 16:6, where Jesus uses a similar yeast/leaven analogy to warn his followers against the “corrosive”
influence of the Pharisees.

62. “Täglichs Anzeiger” translates to something like “Daily Gazette.”

63. A reference to members of various minority ‘dissident’ Christian groups which did not belong to any specific
organized church or denomination.

64. The ‘Free Religious Movement’ was a general term encompassing a number of humanistic, liberal-oriented
Christian tendencies which had separated from mainstream Catholicism and Protestantism. They were technically
‘dissidents’, but were distinguished from the majority of dissidents through their emphasis upon free-thinking,
tolerance, and progressivism.

65. The Brotherhood (“der Brüdergemeinde”) was a name shared by a number of different Evangelical religious
groups.

66. It was commonly believed by anti-Semites that Marx had at one point changed his name from ‘Chaim
Mordechai’ to the more German-sounding ‘Karl Marx’ in order for his ideas to be better received by the public.
Anti-Semitic legend likewise holds that ‘Feist Lasal’ was Ferdinand Lassalle’s original birth-name, before he similarly
altered it to something which sounded more pleasingly German. ‘Mordechai’ was in fact the original family name of
the Marx family (Marx’s grandfather and various other antecedents were rabbis), although it seems to have been
changed before Marx was born. I could not find any actual evidence that the theory regarding Lassalle’s name is
true, although it turns up frequently within anti-Semitic texts. “Feist” is a German word meaning “portly” or
“gluttonous,” which perhaps partly explains the theory’s popularity.

67. In comparing Jung’s text with German and English editions of the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, this
paragraph actually seems to be a quote from the sixth Protocol, not the first.

Democracy, International, and Collapse.

68. The “leadership-concept” (“Führergedanke”) was a philosophical notion among nationalists and völkisch
idealists. The idea behind it was that leadership is natural and essential, and that a strong, unifying Führer will emerge
organically from among the people, chosen by providence, not necessarily selected via artificial methods like
elections. For National Socialists, the Führergedanke is not an elitist concept, but one closely bound up with the
idea of the masses, which is why Jung compares it with the populist Peoples’ Kings (“Volkskönige”) of Germany’s
past – the Volkskönige were those kings and other aristocratic leaders who were answerable to (and whose decisions
ultimately had to be ratified by) representative bodies like the Thing. Both ideas are founded on the idea of mutual
acclamation – that the masses have their needs and desires reflected in the actions of the Führer (who serves as an
extension of the peoples’ will), and in turn the Führer’s authority is legitimised by being based upon the popular
acceptance and support of the broad masses of the people. It was argued by the National Socialists that this was an
essentially democratic idea, and that it was in fact more democratic than rule by a parliament made up of political
parties, divided against each other, and all reflecting only minority economic or social interests. Throughout his
book Jung contrasts the Führergedanke several times with its proposed antithesis, the “rulership-concept” or
“concept of rulership” (“Herrschaftsgedanke”), which is presented as being a far more authoritarian notion – to be
‘ruled’ is very different to being ‘led’.
 150

69. The German word for “House of Estates” is Ständehaus. Stand is the German word for estate, as in the old
‘estates of the realm’ of the Middle Ages, and it also served as the German word for ‘corporation’ in the political
(i.e., corporatist) sense of that term. Thus a ‘corporate state’ in German is ein Ständestaat, the ‘corporatist concept’
is die ständische Idee, and so on.

70. The pamphlet mentioned here is another publication by Jung; its German title is Wie es kam (Erzberger). By
“Einhart 1914-1919” Jung means a work by the Pan-German leader Heinrich Claß, who under the pseudonym
‘Einhart’ had published a well-known history of Germany (Deutsche Geschichte) in 1909. In 1919 Claß put out a
new volume of his history under the title Das deutsche Volk im Weltkrieg, 1914-1919 (The German Volk in the
World War, 1914-1919). Originally this volume was sold separately from his earlier Deutsche Geschichte, and a
number of editions featured just the author’s pseudonym and “1914-1919” on the cover.

71. The first London Conference took place over 1-7 March, 1921; it involved negotiations between Germany and
the Entente Powers over Germany’s reparations payments following the end of WWI. The conditions put forth by
the Entente were incredibly harsh, and the negotiations broke down. Germany recalled its ambassadors from
London, France, and Brussels in protest, and not long afterwards France sent troops into the German Ruhr to
forcibly extract in resources what the Germans would not ‘freely’ give them. The confidential report which the
German Foreign Minister, Dr. Walter Simons, gave to the Reichstag and to the Committee for Foreign Affairs (the
“Confidential Committee,” as Jung calls it) on 11 March was leaked to the press and published the following day.
The Majority Social-Democrats (MSPD) were not part of the government coalition at that time, but as they were the
largest party in the Reichstag the government’s existence was contingent upon their support.

72. Karl Lueger (b.1844 – d.1910) was the Christian Social mayor of Vienna from 1897 until his death in 1910.
Lueger was a populist and an anti-Semite; he was incredibly popular with the Viennese, and his political style and
his anti-Jewish sentiments were an inspiration to Hitler when the latter entered politics. Lueger was not popular with
Pan-Germans and Social-Democrats in Austria, however, who he openly discriminated against. As Jung intimates
here, Lueger disallowed members of Pan-German and Social-Democratic organizations from being employed within
Vienna’s city administration, instead favoring members of his own Christian Social Party. Lueger’s campaigns to
enforce Catholic religious ideals in education also led to attempts to fire Social-Democratic and Pan-German
teachers en masse (both of these parties tended towards anti-Catholic sentiments), and on several occasions he
enforced bans which forbade Social-Democratic and Pan-German symbols from being worn or displayed in public,
while still permitting those of the Christian Socials. Jung compares this state of affairs to that of early Weimar
Germany and German-Austria, where the Social-Democrats had played a central role in state-building and where
there was consequently an impression that their party-members were being heavily favored in terms of government
appointments.

73. A reference to US President Woodrow Wilson, evoking the classical image of Venus rising from the waves
(although here the waves have been replaced by a “Dollarflut,” a flood or tide of dollars). The description of Wilson
as a “European” is probably Jung’s way of distinguishing him racially from Leon Trotsky (“Trotsky-Bronstein”) and
Karl Radek (“Radek-Sobelsohn”).

74. A reference to the concept of the “three internationals,” which appears occasionally within National Socialist
ideological writing. The “Red International” is Marxism, including Bolshevism. The “Golden International” is
capitalism. The “Black International” is Catholicism. These were described as the three great international forces
undermining the national cohesion of German society; two of them were seen as having an especially Jewish basis.
While the black-red-gold flag of the 1848 revolution was originally considered a nationalist symbol and was flown
by National Socialists in Austria-Hungary during the very earliest years of the movement, its adoption by the Weimar
Republic saw it become a symbol of German disgrace. After this change in sentiment, it did not go unremarked
upon that the colors of the German Republic’s flag were the same as those of the three internationals – this was
taken to be symbolic of the fact that they now ruled Germany.

75. Werner Sombart, a prominent German social scientist during the early 1900s who is today most well known for
devising the concept of ‘late-stage capitalism’. Sombart was a Marxist for much of his career, but an idiosyncratic
one. By the 1930s he had converted to National Socialism, with his most prominent National Socialist work being
his 1934 book Deutscher Sozialismus (German Socialism).

76. Heinrich Ströbel (Jung mistakenly writes the name as “Strobel”) was a member of the Independent Social-
Democrats (USPD), and served as co-Prime Minister in the 1918/1919 Prussian revolutionary government
(alongside the MSPD’s Paul Hirsch) immediately after the November Revolution.
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77. Rudolf Mosse, a German-Jewish newspaper and advertising magnate with ties to the left-liberal German
Democratic Party.

78. “Cultural fertilizer” (in German, “Kulturdünger”) was a racial-nationalist term used to describe Germans who
settled abroad in large numbers; the implication was that the inherently superior qualities of the German race and
culture would act as a kind of ‘fertilizer’ for beneficial, civilized qualities within the societies in which they settled.
The term was often used in a negative sense, implying that it was a travesty that so many millions of the Volk had
been forced by economic insecurity to emigrate abroad, thus ‘fertilizing’ the countries of foreign peoples, rather than
their own Fatherland, with the positive qualities of the German race.

79. Bismarck spoke often about the “imponderables” which in foreign policy were “sometimes more important than
gold or military strength.” The “imponderables” were those factors of foreign policy which it was not possible to
quantify or easily predict – the elements of judgement, intention, emotion, and intuition which influenced the
decisions of statesmen and military leaders.

80. The word used here in German is “Freisinn,” which translates literally to something like “Free-Thought” or
“Free-Sense.” This was the name used in German for what was known in English-speaking nations as “Radicalism,”
a strand of particularly egalitarian, socially-progressive liberalism which was most active in the 18th and 19th centuries.

81. By “Northcliffe-Stern” (or “Lord Northcliffe-Stern,” as Jung refers to him later on in his book) Jung means
British newspaper magnate Alfred Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe. Before and during the Great War, Lord
Northcliffe used his massive control over the British newspaper industry (he owned The Times, the Daily Mail, and
a large swathe of other morning, evening, and Sunday papers) to push a violently anti-German line, and was so
successful at whipping up anti-German sentiment that in 1918 he was appointed Director of Propaganda for the
British government. The reason that Jung and other vӧlkisch writers call him “Northcliffe-Stern” is due to some
(apparently inaccurate) black propaganda spread about Lord Northcliffe by American media figures. The story goes
that pro-German American reporters looked into Lord Northcliffe’s family tree and, mixing him up with another
member of the British aristocracy named Wandsworth (rather than Harmsworth), mistakenly believed that he was
descended from the German-French-Jewish Stern family, a banking dynasty from Frankfurt. Nationalist writers in
Germany and Austria seized upon this spurious claim and began referring to Lord Northcliffe as “Northcliffe-Stern”
in their writings in order to emphasise his allegedly Jewish roots. Lord Northcliffe was an understandably unpopular
figure within völkisch circles, as his publications’ attacks upon the German people had been particularly virulent,
and many in Germany and Austria blamed him for stirring up the War.

82. “Friends of Peace” (“Friedensfreunde” in German) was an early alternative term for the word “pacifist,” before
the latter became the popular name for anti-war and anti-violence ideals. In Jung’s time there had been a fairly active
pacifist organization known as the Austrian Society of Friends of Peace (Österreichische Gesellschaft der
Friedensfreunde), which is what he might be tangentially referring to; the Society had been founded by Bohemian
noblewoman Bertha von Suttner in 1891, but fell somewhat into decline following its founder’s death in 1914 and
the outbreak of the Great War.

83. “Chain-merchants” (“Kettenhändler”) are wholesalers and retailers of ‘chain’ stores. They were bitterly accused
by socialists and nationalists of driving up prices through collusion, and were regarded as being disproportionately
Jewish.

At the Gates to the Future.

84. The peace debate in Germany and Austria during the War involved debating the terms under which peace might
be sought with the Entente. Nationalists advocated peace only through total victory, a “victorious peace” or
“Siegfriede,” which earned them the quasi-derogatory label “Siegfriedler.” The Siegfriedler were particularly
opposed to the concept of “renunciatory peace” (“Verzichtfriede”), which involved the negotiation of peace terms
on a basis of treating the Entente as equals – and which also implied an unequivocal acceptance of a universal
reduction in armaments, as well as the renunciation of German and Austrian war aims. Pope Benedict XV, who
made numerous attempts to negotiate an end to the War, favoured the Verzichtfriede in his various peace proposals,
hence Jung’s criticism of him at various points in the book.

85. In Spengler’s Prussianism and Socialism, the author distinguishes between the “Ordensgeist” (“Order-spirit”) of
the Germans and the “Wikingergeist” (“Viking-spirit”) of the English. The “Order-spirit” is a reference to the old
knightly Teutonic Order, the founders of the Germanic Prussian state. For Spengler, the rigid code of collective
discipline and collective service which defined this Order (and, consequently, also defined the values of Prussia) was
the essence of both the German national character and of socialism itself. By contrast, the English national character
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was founded upon the “Viking-spirit” of the raiders who had conquered and settled the British Isles. For Spengler
the Wikingergeist was a highly individualistic and materialistic spirit, one which explained both the Englishman’s
preference for free trade and the ‘piracy’ practised by the British Empire via its imperial navy.

86. Max Wundt (b.1879 – d.1963) was an academic who specialized in Greek philosophy. He was the son of
Wilhelm Wundt, a nationalist-oriented liberal who was the primary and most significant founder of early psychology.
With the onset of the Great War, Max Wundt drifted into nationalism and ended up embracing the völkisch
movement. Wundt rejected the legitimacy of the Weimar Republic and at various times developed ties with the
Pan-German Association, the DNVP, and the NSDAP.

87. The expression used here in German is “wie hölzernes Eisen,” i.e., “like wooden iron.” “A square circle” is far
more commonplace a phrase in English, so was chosen for the translation.

88. A reference to the expression “Hintersassen der Nation,” or “tenants of the nation,” written by Jung as
“Hintersassen der Volkes.” This expression was popularized by Austrian Social-Democrat Otto Bauer in particular.
It makes a notable appearance in his 1924 work The Question of Nationalities and Social-Democracy (Die
Nationalitätenfrage und die Sozialdemokratie), but undoubtedly was coined earlier, based on Jung’s reference to it
here. The expression was (as used by Bauer) a way of categorizing the “great mass of the population, whose labor
fed the ruling class,” and yet who were effectively “excluded” from the nation’s shared benefits, and from its collective
sense of identity and belonging, through their exploitation.

89. Alexander Ernst von Peez (b.1824 – d.1912) was a German-Austrian industrialist and liberal politician. Initially
a supporter of free-market economics, he became a proponent of greater regulation and strict tariffs after the stock
market crash of 1873. Von Peez was regarded as an authority on the dangers of British imperialism to continental
Europe; his writings reflected ideas common among German nationalists that Britain was a rapacious, hypocritical
power which preached liberalism while plundering poorer nations with its navy and doling out brutal repression
upon those weaker than itself (i.e., the Boer War).

Introduction (to Part Two).

90. Following the influx of Czech workers into German-majority territories in late 19th century Austria-Hungary,
disgruntled ethnic-German workers – dissatisfied with the internationalism of the Social-Democrats – began forming
‘protective associations’ to advocate for their collective interests. At first these associations served as pressure groups,
intended to provide collective aid to their members against ‘foreign’ competition, but as time passed they began to
coalesce into actual trade unions, forming the main foundation of the völkisch labor movement. The German
Workers’ Party in Austria (Deutschen Arbeiterpartei in Österreich, DAPÖ) was founded in 1903-04 to represent
their interests in the political sphere. As a result, the ‘national’ unions were not official party unions of the DAPÖ,
but they were still very closely tied to the party regardless. DAPÖ members were instrumental in organizing the first
common conference of all the nationalist workers’ associations, held in Leitmeritz, Bohemia on 29 April, 1906. At
this conference Hans Knirsch, one of the DAPÖ’s co-founders and the chairman of its Bohemian party-group, was
elected leader of a central union commission aimed at better organizing and unifying the various national labor
organizations. He was also appointed editor of the Deutscher Gewerkschaftsführer, the central commission’s
newspaper. This close relationship continued after the war, when the DAPÖ changed its name to the German
National Socialist Workers’ Party (Deutsche Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei, DNSAP) – most of the leaders
of the nationalist unions in Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia were also active members of the DNSAP. While it was
advantageous to the völkisch unions to present themselves as ‘politically colorless’, particularly for recruiting and
negotiating purposes, in reality the lines between the DNSAP and the national labor movement could be somewhat
blurred, and the party celebrated the unions’ victories as its own.

The Development of National Socialism.

91. Jung is referencing the National-Social Association (Nationalsozialer Verein, NSV), an organization founded by
Protestant pastor Friedrich Naumann (b.1860 – d.1919) which was active between 1896 and 1903. Naumann, like
many within his NSV, had previously been associated with the proto-NS Christian Social Party (Christlich-Sozialen
Partei) of anti-Semitic preacher Alfred Stöcker, but had left Stöcker’s party over concerns that the party was too
reactionary and Stöcker too beholden to the Junker class. One of Naumann’s co-leaders in the NSV was Adolf
Damaschke, a school-teacher and disciple of Henry George who became a well-known advocate of land reform.
Damaschke founded a German League for Land-Reform (Deutscher Bund für Bodenreform) in 1898, and his
proposals are discussed in some detail throughout Jung’s book. The National Socials were more secular and
progressive than the Christian Socials, mixing a nationalistic dedication to the Kaiser and to German military
expansionism with a social-economic line which was avowedly pro-labor (the NSV raised considerable sums in
support of workers’ strikes, and supported Social-Democratic campaigns against ‘reactionary’ legislation). They thus
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represented a more liberal, non-völkisch form of National Socialism than that embodied by the DAPÖ, DNSAP,
NSDAP, etc. The National Socials were acknowledged as being a related movement by the völkisch National
Socialists, although imperfect ones, as Jung’s remarks indicate. Count Ernst zu Reventlow, a prominent ‘left-Nazi’
member of the NSDAP, offers a more positive assessment of them than Jung in his 1930 book Deutscher
Sozialismus: “At around the same time, the pastor Friedrich Naumann began his political activities and, supported
by an unusual talent for speaking, turned against the rule of industrial capitalism, particularly against the large
employers. With great warmth and skill he stood up for the workers, for their interests and their wishes, and for this
fourth estate’s standing within the state. Naumann and others then founded the ‘National Social Party’. This
accomplishment was completely in the hands of academics, some of whom were of outstanding intelligence. These
leaders correctly recognized the weight and gravity of the social question, including the vital necessity of it being
resolved upon a national foundation. Naumann and his people wanted this resolution without a revolution and with
the monarchy. They proclaimed the ‘social empire’ as their goal, an alliance concluded directly between the empire
and the workers. A concept that was essentially correct, in and of itself, but that could only take shape if the empire,
if the Kaiser himself, found themselves ready for this role and this task, or could be compelled to do so from below.
Naumann was an honest, gifted man, but the politician in him was heavily burdened by his other great talents.”

92. The Mährisch-Trübauer Verband (“Moravian Trübau Association”) was the informal name given to the
Verband der Deutschen Gehilfen und Arbeiter-Vereinigungen Oesterreichs, the League of German Journeymen’s
and Workers’ Associations of Austria, which was founded, as Jung says, by Ludwig Vogel and Ferdinand
Burschofsky in 1898. The Verband was a federation of nationalist workers’ associations which was intended to
provide support, protection, education, and training to German workers in Bohemia-Moravia. Its activities included
the provision of social insurance to its members (including financial support for unemployment, travel, sick leave,
funeral arrangements, etc.), and the advocacy of their interests against those of Czech workers and other ‘imported’
labor. By 1902 the Verband had 136 branches and 17,000 members, but its stability was severely hampered by
internal disputes within its administration. It was also strongly affected by political infighting within the Pan-German
movement, with which the Verband had aligned. The split between the Pan-German ‘Führer’, Georg Ritter von
Schönerer, and his most able and popular deputy, Karl Wolf, was largely caused by Schönerer’s rigid,
uncompromising radicalism, and it effectively ended Schönerer’s leadership over the majority of Austrian Pan-
Germans – and thus also ended Pan-German influence over the national labor movement. The nationalist German
workers’ associations had initially hailed Schönerer as their leader for his pro-worker positions, but the bourgeois
drift of Schönerer, his insistence on authoritarian control over anyone who supported him, and his ugly public battle
with Wolf, eventually led the völkisch workers to reject Pan-German leadership (although not allyship). This caused
the federation of workers’ clubs run directly by Schönerer, the Bund Germania, to radically increase its competition
with the Mährisch-Trübauer Verband. The self-destructive squabbling and competition between the two groups led
to a rapid, devastating decline in both, until the Mährisch-Trübauer Verband effectively dissolved itself in 1902. It
should be noted that I have left the name of the Mährisch-Trübauer Verband untranslated within the text. This is
because most English-language histories which cover the organization do the same, so I have maintained that trend
in order to make researching the Verband easier, in case any readers wish to look into the organization further.

93. “Adding insult to injury” is a very imperfect translation of the original German expression Jung employs here:
“Prügel vor die Füße geworfen,” i.e., “casting a cudgel before the feet.” This expression means, roughly, “causing
harm to someone for one’s own benefit.” The expression is an Austrian one, deriving from an old legend about a
barber located at Wolf in der Au, in Vienna. In the past barbers also doubled as surgeons and medical practitioners,
and this particular barber was supposedly very skilled at healing injuries and setting broken bones. What he was also
good at was conning his clients, many of whom attended a neighboring inn. The barber would supposedly lie in wait
for them at night in a nearby alley, and as they stumbled drunkenly home from the inn he would quickly cast a
cudgel at their feet from his shadowy hiding place, tripping them over onto the sharp stones below. This would cause
injuries and broken bones, which would ensure him fresh business in the morning and a continuously fat
moneypurse. I have translated the expression as “adding insult to injury” because no real English equivalent exists,
and a direct translation would be nonsensical to readers.

94. “Provincialization” (in German, “Verländerung”) is a German-Austrian word used to describe the process of
decentralizing certain administrative or economic tasks, shifting them away from the responsibility of the federal
government to that of the state (provinces, Länder, etc.). The document Jung is quoting from makes this distinction
because the Sudeten and Austrian National Socialists viewed the future Reich as being essentially a federal entity, in
which Austria, the Sudetenland, Bavaria, etc. would still have a measure of self-government, both politically and
economically.

95. The “young guns” Jung is referring to were the university-educated, white-collar workers who started to join the
German Workers’ Party in large numbers from 1909-1910 onwards. Jung himself was one of these, as was Dr.
Walter Riehl, a friend and ally of Jung’s who would later go on to lead the Austrian branch of the DNSAP. Both
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men had years of experience as union organizers (Riehl had in fact previously been a member of the Social-
Democrats) and both were responsible for co-writing the party’s new Iglau Programme in 1913. The influx of the
“young guns” into the party precipitated its shift away from what was basically a more nationalist variation of Social-
Democracy towards a much more intellectually distinct ideology: National Socialism.

96. The ‘Homesteads for Soldiers Act’ was a potential law debated by the press and politicians in both Austria and
Germany during 1915. The idea was to establish a legal basis for settling returning soldiers on their own parcels of
state-provided land as a reward for their military service. Jung, as representative for the German Workers’ Party in
the Moravian Landtag, had drafted his own proposal for the law. His outline appears to have circulated and had a
measure of influence on versions of the act which were discussed and eventually implemented in the Reich and in
local municipalities like Vienna, based on documentation put out by the Society of Austrian Economists during the
War. This is probably why Jung considers this document significant enough to mention here, although he does not
provide a copy of its text – as Jung states, it was only reproduced in the original first edition of his book.

97. The German National Association (Deutscher Nationalverband) was a loose alliance of German-national,
völkisch, and Pan-German parties in the Austrian Reichsrat, of which the DAPÖ was a member.

98. The Guiding Principles of the German-Austrian and Sudeten (Czechoslovakian) Party Group is another name
for the Fundamental Party Principles of the German National Socialist Workers’ Party, aka the Vienna Programme.
The text of this document is translated in full in Appendix A.III.

Documents of National Socialism.

99. In the 3rd edition of Jung’s book, this footnote detailing the amendments to the Guiding Principles of the National
Socialist Party of the German Volk has an extra sentence inserted at its end: “(Resolution of the Inter-State
Representatives’ Congress at Linz, 1921).” The addition of this sentence was intended to clarify that the amendments
were pushed through at the Third Inter-State Representatives’ Congress of the National Socialists of Greater
Germany, held in Linz in 1921. For more information on these amendments, see the footnotes in Appendix A.VII.

100. Historian Elizabeth Wiskemann’s Czechs and Germans (1938) is an excellent source of information regarding
the events which led to the creation of the Czechoslovakian state, and on the ways in which these events impacted
the German minority living in the Sudetenland: “The Germans of Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia preserved their
autonomy and their association with Austria for something like six weeks. Before the end of November the Czechs
began to occupy the German towns, and by Christmas 1918 they had all been handed over. According to the terms
of the Armistice the Czechs were entitled to occupy necessary strategic points; they interpreted this permission as
covering the whole German territory in the Historic Provinces... Reichenberg was occupied by the Czechs on
December 11th and Troppau on December 18th. The Lodgman Government had withdrawn beforehand into
Saxony, and turned up in Vienna on December 17th, never to return to Deutsch-Böhmen... The Böhmerwald and
South Moravian German authorities melted gradually away, the deputy Teufel holding out longest in Zaim... They
[the Sudeten-Germans] were perhaps almost indifferent at first to the Czech occupation, because they believed that
a plebiscite would certainly be held and its verdict obeyed. Indifference now rapidly changed into indignation which
culminated in the tragic journée of March 4th, 1919. Shortly before this, elections were held to the Austrian
Republican Parliament, elections in which the Sudetendeutschen expected to participate. This was made impossible
by the Czech authorities, and the Sudetic-German leaders in consequence summoned protest meetings in all
noteworthy towns on the day upon which the new Parliament assembled in Vienna. The demonstrators do not
appear to have been armed, but the Czechs were nervous and fired on the crowds in several places; at the end of
the day 52 Germans had been killed and 84 wounded, the saddest case being the small town of Kaaden, where 20
people lost their lives.”

Introduction (to Part Three).

101. The “working-community” (“Werkgemeinschaft”) was a concept briefly popularized within the National
Socialist movement by schoolteacher and writer Dr. Otto Dickel (b.1880 – d.1944). Dickel was the leader of the
Deutsche Werkgemeinschaft, a small NS organization active in Bavaria, and was for a very brief period (1921-22) a
fairly popular figure within the National Socialist movement, hence why Jung briefly references his ideas here and
in one or two other places within his book. In Dickel’s conception the Werkgemeinschaft was a kind of catch-all
term for any natural manifestation of the Germanic collectivist spirit (family, tribe, guild, trade-union, the Reich
itself, etc.). It was thus also intended to encompass what was usually meant by the concept “Volksgemeinschaft”
(“people’s community”): a national collectivity which weaved the individual into the Whole through a union of racial-
cultural comradeship, while still preserving those idiosyncrasies arising out of individuals’ natural differences in rank
and skill. For more information on Dickel and his ideas, see Appendix A.X.
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102. “The gymnasts” – in German, “die Turner.” As with student fraternities, gymnastics had long had a strong
political connotation in Germany. The Turner gymnastics exercises which had been popularized in German lands
by creator Friedrich Ludwig Jahn (b.1778 – d.1852) were intended not only for purposes of exercise, but to train
young men in the bodily strength they would need as soldiers – and to help foster a feeling of liberal-national, pan-
German resistance against Napoleonic conquest. Jahn’s Turnerbewegung (“gymnastics movement”) maintained this
liberal-nationalist link for decades. Gymnastics associations took part in the 1813-15 wars and in the 1848 revolution,
and gymnastics were even partially banned within some territories of the German Confederation from 1820-1842
following the assassination of writer August von Kotzebue by a radical student gymnast. The nationalist idealism of
some Turnerbewegung offshoots grew gradually more völkisch in orientation over future decades, as the physical
idealism of gymnastics matched well with völkisch notions about Aryan beauty and physical self-improvement.
Gymnastics and sporting groups could also be used by radicals to camouflage their revolutionary activities. The
DNSAP’s own paramilitary wing, for example, was called the Volkssport – “People’s Sport.” The Volkssport had
from its founding presented itself as a gymnastics and sports association for Sudeten-German youth, part of an
unsuccessful attempt to divert the suspicions of the Czechoslovakian state. After the DNSAP was banned in 1933,
the organization which took its place as the main political representative of Sudeten-German nationalist aspirations
(the Sudetendeutsche Heimatfront, from 1935 the Sudetendeutsche Partei) was headed by Konrad Heiden, the
leader of the Sudeten Turnerbewegung.

Our Commitment to Folkdom.

103. Otto Dickel’s book, Die Auferstehung des Abendlandes: Die abendländische Kultur als Ausfluß des
planetarischen Weltgefühls (in English, The Resurrection of the West: Occidental Culture as the Product of
Planetary World-Feeling), first appeared in 1921 and was extremely well-received within the National Socialist
movement. It was intended both as a National Socialist catechism and as an optimistic counter to Spengler’s The
Decline of the West. For more information on Dickel, see endnote 101 and Appendix A.X.

104. The word here in German is “Vereinsmeier,” a word specifically used to describe people who are passionate
about clubs and organizational life. Vereinsmeierei (clubbiness, an enthusiasm for club life) is often regarded as
being a particularly German characteristic – Germans are frequently described as being “great joiners,” and the
German nation has for centuries been replete with clubs, associations, brotherhoods, federations, etc. of all types,
covering every kind of hobby or past-time or interest group.

105. “Right of domination” – in German, “Herrenrecht.” Alternative translations include the “right to dominate,”
the “right of mastery,” the “rights of lordship,” etc. This term did not originate with the völkisch movement. Hegel
used it, for instance, to describe the ‘legal’ and ‘moral’ right to domination that an unjust class claims over another
when they control the administration of justice. It has also been used to describe the feudal nobility’s ‘right’ to rule
over serfs, based upon their supposed natural superiority.

106. “Beer-hall intellectuals” – The actual word used here in German is “Bierbankspießer,” which literally translates
to something like “stuffed-shirts of the ale-bench” or “ale-bench bourgeoisie.” Bierbankspießer is an insult which
one occasionally sees in writing from the period. It was a derogatory term intended to denote the kind of stuffy,
petit-bourgeois men who would post up at their regular table in an ale-house and drunkenly expound on how to
solve all of Germany’s political problems – yet who would also quietly slip beneath their table and hide as soon as
the opportunity finally arose to actually save their country.

The Concept of Freedom and Defensive Readiness.

107. From the 1814 poem ‘Freiheit die Ich Meine’, by Max von Schenkendorf. Von Schenkendorf was a patriotic
poet whose works were inspired by the 1813-1815 Wars of Liberation, in which he had fought. This poem became
a popular folk melody, and its evocation of freedom and of German patriotism saw it be adopted by various
movements across the political spectrum. Both the Social-Democrats and the National Socialists included it within
their party songbooks, for example.

108. “Defensive readiness” – in German, “Wehrhaftigkeit,” another word which does not have an easy translation
in English. It is variously rendered as “defensive potential”, “defensive readiness”, “defensive capability”,
“defensiveness”, “pugnacity”, “valor”, “militancy”, or “military readiness.” In general it means one’s ability and will
to fight and defend themselves and others with courage, spirit, and skill.

109. An old German maxim associated with the Landesknecht, the pike-bearing mercenary troops widely-used as
military forces in the Holy Roman Empire. The phrase rhymes in German: “Wer Unglück will im Kriege han, der
binde mit dem Deutschen an.”
 156

110. From Goethe’s famous poem ‘Beherzigung (Feiger Gedanken)’. The exact publication date of the poem is
unknown; it is generally considered to have been written sometime after 1765.

111. Ernst Haeckel (b.1834 – d.1919) and Ludwig Büchner (b.1824 – d.1899) were scientists and philosophers who
did much to champion and spread Darwin’s theories within Germany. Haeckel, whose expertise was in zoology,
promoted a form of Lamarckian Darwinism and his work contributed significantly to the development of the theory
of evolution. Büchner advocated Darwinist theory as part of his broader belief in, and advocacy for, a materialist
view of the world and of nature.

112. “The Great Revolution” (“der Großen Revolution”) is a dated term occasionally used in German to refer to
the French Revolution.

113. Friedrich Ludwig Jahn was the founder of the Turnerbewegung, the most popular German gymnastics
movement. He was previously mentioned in endnote 102. Jung here is referring to the fact that Jahn, whose
gymnastics associations doubled as liberal-nationalist political clubs, was an advocate for the creation of a People’s
Army (Volksheer), a military with a more ‘democratic’ basis and a foundation built upon mass conscription rather
than a core standing army. During the 1848 revolution many of Jahn’s followers in the Turnerbewegung were
enthusiastic revolutionists, and they turned their gymnastics clubs into armed, grassroots militia groups for the
purposes of local defence and the maintenance of law and order. Even after the failure of the 1848 revolution, many
in the Turner clubs believed that the militarized sporting and gymnastics associations should form the foundation
for a more decentralized, democratic national German army.

114. The Weimar Republic. Joseph Wirth (b.1879 – d.1956) was a Center Party politician and was Chancellor of
Germany at the time of Jung’s writing. He was especially hated by nationalists for his decision to comply with the
Entente powers’ demands for reparations payments from Germany. Walter Rathenau (b.1867 – d.1922) was a
German-Jewish industrialist and business tycoon who, as an official in the German War Ministry, had been
responsible for supply chains of raw materials during WWI. From May 1921 until his death in 1922 (he was
assassinated by nationalist terrorists) Rathenau was Minister for Reconstruction in the Wirth government.

The Concept of Renewal in National Socialism.

115. “All-Father” (“Allvater” in German) was a word typically associated with Nordic mythology, particularly with
Odin in his role as the father or ruler over the other gods. It was occasionally used in later German writing to describe
the Christian God (i.e., as a synonym for “Lord”, “Herr”), both by völkisch and non-völkisch theologians. Völkisch
writers invoked the word Allvater in three different contexts, depending on their personal beliefs. Wodanists would
use it to refer to Odin, or to some combination of the Nordic gods; for example, Guido von List’s Allvater was a
trinitarian combination of Odin, Vili, and Vé. Other völkisch neopagans rejected the Nordic gods and instead used
the word Allvater to refer to a kind of pantheistic force, a spiritual incarnation of either the universe, the natural
world, or the Germanic racial-soul itself. Finally, there were those like Jung, who did not reject Christianity but did
reject the Old Testament and the Christian religion’s Jewish roots. For them the All-Father was associated with an
Aryan Christ, while Yahweh was viewed as a negative and separate force associated with Judaism, which had
persecuted Christ. There are interesting parallels between this idea and the concept of the ‘demiurge’ in certain
gnostic belief systems.

116. Adolf von Harnack (b.1851 – d.1930) was a Lutheran theologian. The quote is from his 1921 book Marcion:
Das Evangelium vom fremden Gott (Marcion: The Gospel of an Alien God). Harnack had bourgeois-liberal
sensibilities and believed in the application of Christian principles to the resolution of Germany’s social problems.
In Marcion, Harnack explores the ideas of Marcion of Sinope, an early Christian with Gnostic-like views. Marcion
believed that Yahweh was a demiurge, different and lesser in comparison to the higher power which had sent Jesus
to mankind, and he rejected the Old Testament and Yahweh (and thus Judaism) as completely incompatible with
Christian theology. Harnack seems to have shared some of these sentiments, although he still considered himself a
Lutheran Protestant.

117. “German-believing communities” – in German, “deutschgläubige Gemeinden.” The deutschgläubige were a

very loosely-defined collection of movements which had emerged around the turn of the century. Adherents of
‘German-belief’ merged a general rejection of Christian values with a spiritual veneration for pre-Christian Germanic
culture, traditional German folkways, and the German race itself. While some deutschgläubige groups were willing
to accept Jesus as an ‘Aryan’, and mixed elements of Christianity with Nordic religious beliefs, others were strictly
pagan or even pantheistic, and hoped to replace Christianity altogether with a new, purely Germanic faith.
Deutschgläubige groups made up a small, yet fairly noisy and influential, segment of the völkisch movement.
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118. Probably a reference to Hussite religious movements like the Czechoslovak Hussite Church. Hussitism was
regarded by some as a form of Christianity specifically tied to the Czech national-ethnic identity; Jung thus seems
to be stating that if the Czechs were to have their own unifying form of ethnic Christianity, then the Germans in
Czechoslovakia should have the same. See also endnote 13.

119. Jung’s statements in this paragraph relate directly to conditions in the Sudetenland. Among those demanding
the complete enforcement of the separation of church and state (which had been very closely aligned in the former
Austria-Hungary), it was commonplace also to argue for the state seizure of certain properties which had so far been
administered by the Catholic Church. In Czechoslovakia, unconditional support for a strict separation of church
and state (which was part of the programmes of both Social-Democracy and National Socialism – see the last section
of Appendix A.III, for example) thus might have resulted in ecclesiastical properties in German-majority areas being
taken in hand by the central government in Prague, which was dominated by Czechs. Instead of a ‘centralist’
nationalization of church holdings benefiting the Czech state, therefore, Jung’s preference is that such properties
should be redistributed to local parishes based on ratios determined by the ethnic make-up of each particular area.
This would ensure that the separation of church and state would not occur to the detriment of the German minority
in Czechoslovakia.

Labor and Unearned Income.

120. The word used in the original German here is “Raffer,” which is related (via common origins in Old High
German) to the English word “riff-raff.” An Abraffer in German lands was an agricultural worker who followed
closely at the heels of a reaper, gathering up the reaped crops. Raffer as a term evolved from Abraffer, taking on
various meanings such as “to gather,” “to scrounge,” “to rifle,” and “to snatch.” In general, Raffer denotes someone
who takes from others for his own benefit, without contributing anything to their own labor or welfare in return.
“Moocher” is not a perfect translation of this term, but it is appropriate enough in conveying the meaning intended
by Jung. Also considered was “scrounger,” but that lacks the clear, exploitative connotations embodied in the word
“moocher.”

121. “Free rein to the industrious” is a famous aphorism generally ascribed to former German Chancellor Theobald
von Bethmann Hollweg, who apparently coined the slogan in a speech to the Reichstag on 28th August, 1916. The
basic meaning behind it is that a person who has proven themselves capable deserves to be granted the necessary
conditions to freely and fully develop their abilities as far as they can – in this particular context, via means of a fair
wage.

122. Ferdinand Ertl (b.1877 – d.1952) was an Austrian railway official and trade-unionist. Ertl was a National Socialist
from the first days of the movement (he appears to have been one of the founding members of the DAPÖ), and
was for many years highly active within Austrian labor organizations, serving at various times as the chairman of the
German Railway Workers’ Union and as honorary chairman of the German Transport Union. He represented the
more moderate wing of National Socialism, being strongly supportive of reformist, parliamentary tactics and of the
movement’s links to trade-unionism (Vienna tabloid Der Stunde once ‘complimented’ Ertl by describing him as
being “nowhere nearly as aggressive” as Walter Gattermayer, another DNSAP unionist). In November 1925 Ertl
would, through rather convoluted means, become the DNSAP’s first representative in the post-War Austrian
parliament, following the death of Emmy Stradal, a member of the Greater German People’s Party (Großdeutschen
Volkspartei, GdVP). During the previous national elections in 1923, the DNSAP had (under pressure from the
NSDAP) decided to turn down an offer of an electoral alliance from the bourgeois-nationalist GdVP. Austria’s
völkisch trade-unions, however, were nominally independent of the party, and so DNSAP members like Ertl used
their trade-union membership as a loophole in order to sidestep the DNSAP order against electoral participation,
running on a ‘unity’ list with GdVP candidates. Ertl was not elected in 1923, but because Frau Stradal died before
the completion of her term, the next person on the ‘unity’ list – Ertl – consequently took her place in the Nationalrat.

123. “Housing misery” or “housing distress” – in German, “Wohnungselend.” A term commonly used in German
and Austrian writing at the time to refer the social problems caused by the housing shortage and by the severe
overcrowding within many German and Austrian cities. Wohnungselend was seen as a major contributive factor to
problems like the spread of epidemic disease, infant and child mortality, poverty, crime, mob violence, and a feeling
of alienation from the communal ties of Nation and Volk.

124. The word Jung actually uses here is “Märkischen.” Märkische means “of the Brandenburg March,” aka the
“Margraviate of Brandenburg.” The Margraviate of Brandenburg was a territory in the Holy Roman Empire which
in 1618 entered a union with Prussia to become Brandenburg-Prussia. Later, as Prussia’s power overshadowed
Brandenburg’s, the latter became a province of Prussia, with Berlin serving as one of its major cities and as its
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sometime provincial capital. Germans continued to use the term Märkische to refer to this territory well past the
end of the Holy Roman Empire and the beginning of the Second Reich, hence Jung’s use of the term in his book.

125. A “dwarf farmer” (“Zwergbauer”) is a peasant with only one or two hectares of land. The size of a dwarf farmer’s
property would typically not be able to produce enough food on its own to feed his family, meaning that dwarf
farmers would often have to hire out their labor to larger agricultural estates at harvest-time.

126. “Frau Huber” is not a real person. ‘Huber’ and its various regional variations were (and still are) one of the
most common surnames in Austria; the name derives from the word Hufe (see endnote 5) and so usually indicates
a person whose familial origins lie among the peasantry. “Frau Huber” is thus intended to be a symbolic stand-in
for an ordinary middle-class or lower-middle-class Austrian woman, living in a town or village or on a reasonably
successful small farm.

Economic Reform or Revolution?

127. In German, “Zwangsarbeitshaus.” A Zwangsarbeitshaus was a reformatory workhouse for petty criminals,
loafers, vagabonds, prostitutes, and other ‘anti-social’ types. It was thought that forced labor would cure such people
of their tendencies towards criminality and idleness.

128. Jung here is referencing an ideological conflict within the early Social-Democratic movement. The first workers’
party in Germany, the General German Workers’ Association (Allgemeiner Deutscher Arbeiter-Verein, ADAV),
was founded by Ferdinand Lassalle in 1863. Although influenced by Marx, Lassalle’s ideas diverged from his;
Lassalle was more nationally than internationally-oriented, and he believed that it was primarily the state (rather than
the unions) which would bring about a socialist society. Lassalle was also vehemently against any cooperation
between the workers and the liberal bourgeoisie, leading him into a personal friendship with Bismarck and his
movement into a somewhat sympathetic relationship with the ‘reactionary’ government in Prussia. Following
Lassalle’s death, his successors in the ADAV continued this ideological trend, causing disaffected Lassalleans to join
with members of the Federation of German Workers’ Associations (Verband Deutscher Arbeitervereine, VDAV)
in founding the Social-Democratic Workers’ Party of Germany (Sozialdemokratische Arbeiterpartei Deutschlands,
SDAP). Members of the SDAP were known as “Eisenachers” due to the party’s founding conference being in the
town of Eisenach. They represented a position much closer to Marx’s, and they were deeply critical of the Lassallean
VDAV for its perceived nationalism, its overly ‘authoritarian’ veneration of the state, its inadequate approach to
trade-unionism, and its supposed ‘legitimization’ of the Bismarckian system through its behavior in the Reichstag of
the North German Confederation. Despite these differences, the Lassalleans and Eisenachers ended up merging
their organizations at a conference in Gotha in May 1875, creating the forerunner of the modern Social-Democratic
Party of Germany.

129. At the 2nd World Congress of the Communist International in 1920, the Congress ratified its 21 conditions for
membership. In order to join the Third International, socialist parties had to expel all reformist and ‘centrist’
elements from their ranks, and were required to commit themselves totally to revolutionary activity and to the
promotion of proletarian dictatorship.

130. According to Jung this is a quote from Engels’s work on Eugen Dühring, published in English either as Anti-
Dühring or as Socialism: Utopian and Scientific (the latter being a shorter, pamphlet-length reprint of the former).
The exact text Jung supplies here, however, does not appear to match anything in the German editions of either
work. Possibly Jung was working from an inaccurate quotation provided in another text, or from an unusual
translation of Lenin’s State and Revolution, which also refers to and paraphrases Engels’s writing on Dühring. The
essence of Engels’s message as Jung presents it here is correct, however, even if the verbatim quotation does not
appear to be.

131. This and similar slogans (“The tread of the workers’ battalions is echoing,” etc.) appear to have originated
before WWI, but their use was especially widespread during the time of the 1918 Revolution. They were employed
within Social-Democratic publications in order to evoke the power of the workers and their militias.

132. “Yellow socialism” is a pejorative term among Marxists for a false socialism which is viewed as being beneficial
to capitalism and to the bourgeoisie. The term was not a pejorative when it was first coined; its originator was French
trade-unionist Pierre Biétry, who proposed the creation of a ‘yellow’ French Socialism (as opposed to Marxist ‘red’
socialism) which would raise living standards for the French proletariat by creating “national unity” between workers
and employers. Biétry’s Jaune (yellow) movement advocated collective property ownership, property-sharing, and
class collaboration, and the Jaunes distinguished between two forms of capital – “speculative (loan) capital” and
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“working (productive) capital.” Biétry’s yellow socialism could thus be seen as a kind of proto-National Socialism;
for a brief period Biétry even led a political party called the Parti socialiste national.

133. “Social-traitor” (“Sozialverräter”) is a term which appears somewhat frequently within communist writing of the
early 1920s, deployed by Bolsheviks against Social-Democrats and members of the Second International. It was
intended to denote those socialists who, through their preference for reformism, were allegedly bolstering the forces
of capitalism and betraying the cause of the international proletariat.

134. First published in 1886 by Victor Adler (b.1852 – d.1918), the co-founder of Austrian Social-Democracy, the
Arbeiterzeitung (‘Workers’ Newspaper’) was the central organ of the Social-Democratic Workers’ Party of Austria.
From 1895 until 1934 (when the party was banned), the Arbeiterzeitung was published as a daily. Otto Bauer (b.1881
– d.1938) was one of its chief editors and the author of many of its leading articles.

Abolition of Unearned Income through Land Law Reform and Monetary-Reform, and through
the Socialization of Private Monopolies.
135. Silvio Gesell (b.1862 – d.1930) was a German financial theorist who had worked as Minister of Finance in the
Munich Soviet Republic. He is primarily noted for his theories of Freiland (‘free-land’) and Freigeld (‘free-money’),
both of which Jung discusses in some detail, and which attracted a small but devoted following in interwar Germany.
Despite his links to the Munich Soviet, Gesell’s primary motivation was opposition to the dominant financial system,
meaning he was willing to spread his ideas to any circle which would listen. To that end he and his followers were
somewhat active in National Socialist circles in 1920-21, speaking at events organized by the German Socialist Party
and the DNSAP. A resulting debate occurred within the National Socialist movement over the merits of adopting
Gesell’s Freiland-Freigeld-Festwährung (Free-land/Free-money/Fixed-currency) ideology vs. the ‘Breaking of
Interest-Slavery’ ideas propagated by Gottfried Feder. Feder viewed Gesell as a bitter rival, and campaigned strongly
against Gesell in favor of his own ideas being incorporated within National Socialist ideology. Feder was successful
in this regard – at the Third Inter-State Representatives’ Congress of the National Socialists of Greater Germany
(held over 13-14 August, 1921, in Linz, Austria) the delegates voted to reject Gesell’s theories and to adopt Feder’s
principles into National Socialist ideology. It is in the context of these events that Jung compares and contrasts the
theories of Gesell and Feder within this chapter.

136. In January 1920, engineer and self-taught economist Gottfried Feder (b.1883 – d.1941) founded the ‘German
Combat League for the Breaking of the Slavery to Interest’ (Deutscher Kampfbund zur Brechung der
Zinsknechtschaft), intended as a politically neutral organization for disseminating and popularizing his own
economic theories outside the völkisch movement where they were most popular.

137. Also known in Russian as an “Obshchina.” Essentially the Russian equivalent of a Markgenossenschaft (see
endnote 4), a peasant community in which land was held and managed communally by the local residents.

138. If one reads Henry George’s Progress and Poverty, it is more obvious that the “we” meant here is, in fact, the
state.

139. Adolf Damaschke (b.1865 – d.1935) founded the German League for Land-Reform (Deutscher Bund für
Bodenreform, DBB) in 1898, and was a leading member of the liberal, proto-NS National Social Association (see
also endnote 91). Although Damaschke was undoubtedly liberal-leaning, his opposition to finance capitalism and to
‘Mammonism’, and his veneration of German soil through his proposals for land reform, endeared him to members
of the völkisch movement, many of whom regarded him with affection. An example of this can be seen in the 1922
presidential elections in Germany, which were ultimately cancelled due to the disorder created by the assassination
of Foreign Minister Walter Rathenau (the Reichstag amended the constitution to extend President Ebert’s term until
June 1925). Before the elections were cancelled, Damaschke had intended to run as a presidential candidate.
National Socialist publications, particularly those of the DNSAP in Austria and Czechoslovakia, had heralded
Damaschke’s presidential candidacy with enthusiasm, and discussed its possibilities as though he were one of their
own.

140. “Rolling properties” (“walzenden Gütern”) constituted small parcels of land, privately-owned by peasants, which
were part of a larger Erbpacht – a plot of feudal land divided up by a feudal lord and leased to a peasant family on
a hereditary basis. The peasants had right of use to their Erbpacht in return for a tribute provided to the feudal lord,
and they were allowed to inherit the Erbpacht, i.e., pass it on indefinitely to their children, but they could not sell,
trade, or gift it to anyone outside their immediate family. The exception to this were ‘rolling properties’, usually a
field or other small piece of the Erbpacht which did not have to necessarily remain with the larger property and be
inherited, but which could be sold or exchanged alone, without the feudal lord’s permission.
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141. Hermann Warmbold (b.1876 – d.1976) was Prussian Minister of Agriculture from April 1921 to November
1921.

142. “Luxury goods” – the word used here in the original text is “Genußmittel.” The word Genußmittel has a broad
usage in German, referring to foods and drugs which are consumed purely for flavor (i.e., they are non-nutritional),
or because of their stimulating or psychoactive properties. The term Genußmittel encompasses everything from
chocolate and certain delicacies like caviar, to tea, coffee, cocoa, liqueurs, champagne, and even illicit drugs like
hashish, coca, and opium. Sometimes the word is also used to refer to items like perfumes and cosmetics. Jung’s
claim here is that taxes on such goods should be maintained because they have an “educational effect,” i.e., the high
cost discourages their overuse and so acts as a deterrent to indulgence and addiction in the population.

143. The Grenzwald is the German name for the extensive areas of forestland running along the Czech-German
state borders. The nationalization of the Grenzwald on the Czechoslovakian side of the border, conducted as part
of the state’s land reform program, occurred over 1921-22. It was deeply unpopular with the local German
population, who raised a complaint in 1922 to the League of Nations. Historian Elizabeth Wiskemann’s Czechs
and Germans (1938) provides the following details: “The German big landowners had tried to defend their property
by protesting against the disturbing of old traditional German ownership. Of the forest question they spoke with
particular vehemence because they declared that it involved the confiscation of the most ancient Sudeten-German
national territory... In any case the forests, if one thought in racial terms, must be counted as German... The town
of Graslitz announced in July 1922 that: ‘The attack on German home land will meet the united resistance of the
whole German population, since our German people is bound indivisibly to its soil and its woods, and will never
divorce itself from this inheritance’... Where the Czech authorities went wrong was in frequently replacing the
German foresters by Czechs, either immediately or as occasion arose. This meant that Sudeten-Germans who might
have been willing to accept Czechoslovakia fairly happily were rendered inimical... Among the emphatically national
people on both sides there was also a great deal of friction over the décor, as it were, of the frontier districts which
had always attracted many tourists from abroad. The Czechs said this was their country and the traveller should be
made aware of the difference between it and Germany. They tried to insist that hotels and inns should be designated
in Czech as well as in German, and when an opportunity offered they bought up the hotels.”

144. “The Legionaries” is a reference to the Czechoslovakian Legions, military associations made up of Czech and
Slovak volunteers organized by the Entente Powers during WWI. The Russian, Italian, and French governments
sponsored the creation of these forces by playing upon Czech and Slovak nationalism, encouraging Czech and
Slovak volunteers to organize into military battalions directed against Austria-Hungary with promises of national
independence in a post-War Europe. The Legionaries ended up fighting against the Russians after the Bolshevik
Revolution, and also played a significant role in securing disputed territories for the new Czech state after WWI and
in helping to form the new Czech army. The post-War Czechoslovakian government’s land reform program
specifically favoured redistribution to landless Czech citizens and to former Legionaries, and so was heavily resented
by the state’s German minority.

145. This sentence bears similarities to a remark in Silvio Gesell’s The Natural Economic Order (Natürliche
Wirtschaftsordnung), which Jung cites as a source: “You may imagine that money is they key that opens the market
gates. That is not true. Money is the bolt that bars them.” Gesell himself describes this as being a quotation from
Proudhon.

146. A direct translation of the wordplay here would not really work, because Jung is playing off of the etymological
relationship between the German word for currency (“Währung”) and the word “währen,” meaning “to last” or “to
endure.” I have employed the word “current” in place of “währen” as the English equivalent, since it has a similar
meaning to that intended by Jung, and also shares clear root connections to the word “currency” through their
common Latin origins.

147. A reference to Walter Rathenau’s article “Commercial Successors” (‘Geschäftlicher Nachwuchs’), first
published in the Neue Freie Presse of 25th December, 1909. It was subsequently reprinted in Rathenau’s collection
Criticism of the Age (Zur Kritik zur Zeit). The article includes a sentence, alluded to here by Jung, which was
interpreted by members of the völkisch movement as a confession from Rathenau regarding the existence of the
‘Learned Elders of Zion’ and their influence over European economic life: “Three hundred men, each of whom
knows the other, direct the economic fate of the continent and find their successors from among their own circles.”
However, the full context provided by the line’s preceding and following sentences suggests that Rathenau was
actually criticizing concentrated oligarchical power, rather than admitting to being part of a shadowy conspiracy: “In
the most impersonal, most democratic field of work, that of economic management, where every misguided word
can compromise, where every failure can bring ruin, where the sovereign public at a shareholders’ meeting decides
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on appointments and dismissals in accordance with its statutes, an oligarchy has formed in the course of a generation,
as closed off as that of old Venice. Three hundred men, each of whom knows the other, direct the economic fate
of the continent and find their successors from among their own circles. The strange origins of these strange
phenomena, which shine a glimmer of light into the darkness of future social developments, are not to be considered
here. The first question to be answered here is who is involved: is it the offspring of urban background, normal
education, middle-class, in short, the second and third generation of shareholders and managers?”

148. Assignats were a form of paper currency issued during the French Revolution, representing parcels of
confiscated land which had previously been owned by the Catholic Church or by the monarchy. An assignat allegedly
constituted a stake in a portion of land, originally paid to the state’s creditors. It was intended that they be exchanged
(i.e., repaid) for confiscated property at government-run auctions. The state was pledged to destroy them after trading
them in. Originally serving as bonds, in April 1790 they were made legal tender and new assignats were issued. The
state began printing them to cover its expenses, or reissuing those it had been paid instead of destroying them.
Counterfeiters also increased the number in circulation. This, coupled with increasing land speculation, led to a loss
in confidence in the assignats and their rapid depreciation.

149. Ahasuerus (“Ahasver” in German) is the true name of the Wandering Jew in some versions of the Christian
legend.

150. “Giro banks” – in German, “Postscheckkassen.” A financial institution run by the German postal service. Giro
bank branches provide customers with a transaction service, offering them a non-interest-earning account with which
they can conduct payment transfers to other bank accounts.

151. “Absolute currency” (“absoluten Währung”) is a term used by Gesell in his writing as a description for his
‘Free-Money’ (Freigeld) currency.

152. A reference to Alois Rasín, one of the founders of the Czechoslovakian Republic and its first Finance Minister.
When the Czechoslovakian state was first founded it was still using the old, highly inflationary Austro-Hungarian
currency. Rasín instituted a currency reform which involved arranging for all Austro-Hungarian currency circulating
in the country to be affixed with an adhesive stamp; some of these banknotes were compulsorily retained by the
government for use as a forced loan. This helped limit the amount of currency in circulation. The stamped Austro-
Hungarian currency continued to be used as legal tender until April 10, 1919, whereupon it was gradually phased
out in favor of the new Czechoslovak currency, the Koruna.

Cooperatives and Profit-Sharing. Works Councils.

153. Johann Heinrich von Thünen (b.1783 – d.1850) was a German agricultural economist and social reformer.
Thünen’s model of profit-sharing was introduced on his Mecklenburg properties in part to test his own economic
theories, and to put into practice his maxim: “Do not eliminate private capital ownership, but rather turn the coin
over and find ways to make everyone a capitalist.” The model was considered a success – successive profits were
either shared with employees or (at their agreement) reinvested back into farm equipment to further increase
productivity and profitability.

154. Green, as the color of springtime, has traditionally been associated with youth and hope, and therefore also
with inexperience. Jung’s description of the theory of class struggle as being “grass-green” is meant to imply not only
that it is a relatively new theory, but that it is one which is not particularly founded upon the cold facts of lived reality
and sober experience.

Parliament or Councils?
155. The expression Jung actually uses here is “ein Hakenkreuzler.” In German, Hakenkreuz is the word for
“swastika.” A Hakenkreuzler was an epithet (usually employed derogatorily) for adherents of völkisch politics; it is
usually rather inelegantly rendered into English as “swastiker” (i.e. “He is a swastiker”), and sometimes also as
“swastika lads” or “swastika men.” I opted for “swastiker” in the translation, although I dislike the term and find it
inelegant. “Nazi” would flow better with the sentence, but unfortunately it does not quite fit, as a Hakenkreuzler
could be anyone who was völkisch, including those members of the völkisch movement who were opposed to
National Socialism.

156. Dr. Paul Schrecker (Jung has misspelled his name as “Schrekker”) was a lecturer in law and mathematics at the
University of Vienna, who wrote a small number of political and philosophical works under the pseudonym
‘Philodikos’. Schrecker emigrated to France in 1938, probably to escape the takeover of Austria by National Socialist
Germany – judging by the tone of the work which Jung cites here (Fur ein Ständehaus), Schrecker was likely a
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supporter of the Christian Socialist Party and the Austrofascist Ständestaat. Schrecker moved from France to the
USA in 1940, and ended up teaching at the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia.

German Law.
157. The word “Schöppe” or “Schöffe” in Germany and Austria refers to a lay judge who assists professional judges
in making legal decisions in certain cases; their actual level of involvement (and the number of Schöppen involved
in a case) varies depending on the level of the judicial system and on the type of offence. The term Schöppe/Schöffe
dates back to at least the 8th century. Originally local legal cases were decided by the region’s Thing, a council made
up of all men of legal age. As populations grew larger and more socially complex, legal decisions were given over to
the Schöppen, men of good standing (usually property-owners) appointed from the local community to manage legal
administration and to oversee cases. Charlemagne institutionalized the Schöppen by making them appointees of the
crown, thus minimizing the legal influence of local nobles and officials. With the introduction of Roman Law in the
15th century, the traditional role of the Schöppen was in most circumstances phased out in favor of the court system
and the use of professionally qualified lawyers and judges with expertise in a codified legal system.

158. “Schwarzend” translates roughly to “black earth”; “Melanchthon” is its Greek equivalent. Similarly, “Textor”
is the Latinized equivalent to “Weber,” which means “weaver.” The Latinization or Graecization of surnames was
a phenomenon among scholars during the Middle Ages, and later also among humanists during the Renaissance. A
Latin or Greek name in part served as a status symbol; they were also adopted because vernacular names could be
cumbersome to use in discussions carried out in Latin or Greek with researchers from other nations.

159. In English, what Jung refers to as the “Holy Fehme” (“Heiligen Fehme”) were commonly known as the
“Vehmic Courts.” These courts, which derived their legitimacy from the secular power of the Holy Roman Empire,
were treated as a holy and secret fraternal order by initiates, who served as judges. Only initiated members could
attend court trials, along with the accused, and the verdict which the Fehme disseminated to those deemed guilty
was death. During the post-WWI era nationalists revived the term for what became known as Fememorden, i.e.
“Vehmic murders.” Nationalist revolutionaries would hold their own secret Fehme to pass judgement on those they
felt had betrayed them, sentencing them to death; often these were fellow nationalists, but occasionally they were
simply people who knew too much and who were regarded as being insufficiently trustworthy. Somewhere between
300-400 men and women are believed to have been killed in extrajudicial, vigilante-style Fehme murders during the
interwar era. Many of the murderers were romanticized within the nationalist movement and during the era of the
Third Reich.

160. “People’s law” (in German, “Volksrecht”) was a term originally coined to describe local legal traditions in
Rome’s European colonies, and to contrast them against the imposed Roman legal system. Nationalist and völkisch
writers later employed the term in their arguments that the customary local law of pre-capitalist Germany was more
in tune with the nature of the German Volk than Roman Law (i.e., the modern, codified legal order in Germany,
indebted to the legal system of the Roman Empire). Their opinion was that Roman Law was imposed by an
impersonal state and by the entrenched power of the juristic class. By contrast, the Volksrecht flowed directly from
the people themselves, derived from thousands of years of collectively-established grassroots legal custom inspired
by the collective Volksgeist (folk spirit). It was argued that this was essentially a democratic concept, since it made
the Volk as a community the source of law, and was predicated upon the idea that the law should be accessible to
the layman – in other words, that it should not be decided by a wealthy, professional minority and stringently codified
in deliberately inaccessible legal jargon. The term “German Law” (“Deutsches Recht”) in völkisch writing is
essentially synonymous with the concept of Volksrecht.

161. “Worse hand” (in German, “ärgeren Hand”) refers to an old medieval legal principle by which children from
mixed-status marriages (i.e., between a noble and a peasant) would inherit the status of the parent of “worse hand,”
i.e., the parent of lower social standing. Jung is suggesting applying the principle racially, to offspring produced
between Germans and non-Germans.

The German People’s State

162. The “Vienna Landhaus” is another name for the Palais Niederösterreichisches, the building in which the lower
house of the Austrian parliament convened during both the imperial era and that of the First Republic. 21st October,
1918, was the date of the first sitting of the Provisional National Assembly of the new Republic of German-Austria.

163. Dr. Paul Tafel (b.1870 – d.1953) was a German engineer and, as a member of the board of managers of the
Maschinenfabrik Augsburg-Nürnberg (MAN) plants in Nuremberg, a minor industrialist. Tafel was also a member
of the Thule Society, the Pan-German League, and a number of other völkisch organizations, and served as
chairman of the Bavarian Ordnungsblock (an anti-republican association of various patriotic and nationalist
 163

organizations) from its founding in 1920 until 1923. In 1918-1919 Tafel was influential in helping to encourage
Anton Drexler and Karl Harrer to found the Munich German Workers’ Party (he joined the DAP as member
no.670) and was an early source of funding for the party. Although he was directly involved in the DAP/NSDAP
leadership structure during its early years, Tafel appears to have been of a more conservative orientation than many
others in the National Socialist movement; he also stood as a Reichstag candidate for the monarchist/bourgeois-
nationalist German National People’s Party (DNVP) in 1920, and gradually drifted out of the National Socialist
movement after the 1923 putsch. His book The New Germany, which Jung refers to here, advocates for the Weimar
system to be replaced by both “German Socialism” and “German Democracy” – i.e., a nationalist council-state.

164. An old German word meaning “place.” It can also be used to refer to a town, a village, or any other small
community.

The Tasks of Municipal Policy.

165. A note on “The Tasks of Municipal Policy”: in translating this chapter, the somewhat choppy, abrupt nature
of its sentence structures has been preserved from the original German. The chapter does not bear the same
‘conversational’ style as the rest of Jung’s book, and instead reads more like a general array of notes or directives.
Interestingly, this entire chapter was excised completely from the 3rd edition of Jung’s book when it was released in
1923. In the 3rd edition, the chapter “The German People’s State” transitions directly into the book’s “Conclusion.”

166. The German word Jung uses for “tenement blocks” is “Zinskasernen”, which literally translates to “interest
barracks” or “rent barracks” – the implication being that tenement buildings existed purely to extract as much interest
(rent) out of those living in them as possible, at the minimum possible cost in terms of upkeep, comfort, amenities,
etc.

167. Upon completion of their apprenticeship, journeymen were traditionally expected to undertake their
Wanderjahre (“wandering years”), in which they would travel extensively (including by hiking through neighboring
countries) in order to gain life experience and to learn professional skills and practices which were local to other
regions. The duration of the Wanderjahre varied from guild to guild, ranging from one year to several. During their
Wanderjahre journeymen would subsidize their travels by working in the places they stopped, with the local chapter
of their guild assisting them in finding employment. If there was no work available, the guild would afford them a
small allowance to help them continue on with their travels. In either case, they would also be given a token (such
as a stamp or certificate) which could be displayed to workshops in the next town they entered, proving that they
were fulfilling the obligations of the guild and were worthy of employment. Upon finally returning from the
Wanderjahre the journeyman would work for a few more years in a trial period, and then would finally be eligible
for admission to the Master Craftsman’s examination. The practice of the Wanderjahre was in decline during the
time of Jung’s writing, and had almost died out completely by the mid-20th century, although it has experienced a
small revival since the 1980s.

168. The “market police” (“Marktpolizei”) were an inspectorate within German law enforcement specifically
responsible for monitoring businesses and ensuring that legislated pricing guidelines, trading hours, etc., were all
being followed.

169. “Einheitsschule” literally translates to “unity-school,” although its meaning in English is roughly analogous to
that of a “comprehensive school.” The idea of the Einheitsschule was originally conceived by Prussian liberal
reformer Wilhelm von Humboldt (b.1767 – d.1835), and further developed by his colleague Johann Wilhelm
Süvern (b. 1775 – d.1829); both men worked in the Prussian state’s Office for Culture and Public Education, part
of the Interior Ministry. Their proposed Einheitsschule system was inspired by liberal principles of academic
freedom, and was focused on uniting every school in the Reich around the same model of progressive, general
education guided by an established national curriculum. Einheitsschulen were intended to provide all young
Germans, regardless of class or background, with a cursory, well-rounded education in every major field of human
endeavour (foreign languages, drawing, German, mathematics, geography, agriculture, singing, calligraphy, natural
history, etc.), and their proposed structure would have offered pupils a simpler method for advancement as they
progressed through their education (Germany’s school system to this day is commonly regarded as being notoriously
overcomplicated). The concept of the Einheitsschule was popular within the early National Socialist movement,
which aimed to break down class barriers and saw the ‘levelling’ nature of the unity-schools as an ideal method for
achieving this.

170. The word Jung uses here is “Minderbegabte,” which translates literally as “less gifted.” In Jung’s era
Minderbegabt was commonly used to denote individuals of ‘subnormal’ intelligence, i.e., those with mental or
learning disabilities.
 164

171. “Protective work” (“Schutzarbeit”) involved efforts made towards protecting and promoting the German
nationality and its folkways, particularly the German people’s traditional language, culture, and customs. Before the
War, protective associations (Schutzvereine) were particularly active in the borderland regions of Germany and
Austria-Hungary, where Germans were either a minority or were at a perceived risk of being displaced by Slavs.
Some of the most influential protective associations were focused on education, helping to raise funds for schools,
developing teaching materials, and arranging educational public events. Other protective associations were centered
on the labor movement, organizing German workers and artisans in the face of the perceived threat posed by ‘cheap’
Slavic labor. The labor protective associations formed the nucleus of the nationalist trade-unions, out of which the
National Socialist movement (via the German Workers’ Party in Austria) grew.

Conclusion.
172. “Elitists” – The word Jung actually uses here is “Herrenmensch,” which modern historians and academics seem
to universally translate as “master race,” at least when it is used by National Socialists. This translation seems
extremely unlikely to me, at least in this instance, given that Jung is using the term negatively and is applying it to the
Jews – a people who he goes on to describe as “ethically-creative degenerate half-bloods” two paragraphs on. The
term Herrenmensch appears to have been popularized by Nietzsche, and from what I can tell is better translated as
‘aristocratic-man’ or ‘lord-type’ (or ‘master-man/master-type’, although the word ‘master’ carries connotations of
slavery in English which apparently were not intended by Nietzsche). Nietzsche seems to have used the word to
describe people with an aristocratic grandeur who achieve greatness because they instinctively view themselves as
being above the conventional morality of those around them. The apotheosis of the Herrenmensch will apparently
be the Übermensch, the ‘superman’ of the future. In this instance I have translated the word in English as “elitist,”
because I do not feel that “master-type” or its equivalents would mean much to most readers, and “master race”
certainly does not seem appropriate. To my mind, “elitist” conveys the basic essence of what Jung seems to have
intended with his use of the word Herrenmensch – the ultra-individualist who feels himself to be a rank above the
community he lives among, and therefore not bound by its rules and conventions.

National Socialist Books and Writings.

173. “Ing.” is an honorific title in Germany and Austria for those with engineering degrees (short for “Ingenieur,”
i.e., “engineer”). Feder’s diploma was in civil engineering, while Rudolf Jung’s speciality was mechanical engineering.

174. The word “Umlerner” does not really have an equivalent translation in English. It describes a person who is
capable of correcting their pre-conceived ideas or prejudices when faced with direct, personal experiences which
counter those beliefs – in other words, someone who is intellectually flexible. During the period of the First World
War, some Majority Social-Democrats used the word to describe their decision to support the war effort and the
German state. Independent Social-Democrats conversely also used it to describe the Majority Social-Democrats,
although in a negative, ironical sense.
 165

APPENDICES
 166

APPENDIX A:
PROGRAMMES OF GERMAN NATIONAL
SOCIALISM, 1903 – 1923

The following appendix contains all the major political programmes of German National
Socialism produced in the twenty-year-period between 1903 (i.e., the beginning of the movement,
when the German Workers’ Party in Austria was first proclaimed at a workers’ meeting in Aussig,
Bohemia) and 1923 (the year in which the 3rd and final edition of Jung’s book was published, and
also the year of Hitler’s attempted putsch in Bavaria). None of these documents apart from the
Salzburg Programme are included in Jung’s original text, although the Party Principles of the
DNSAP (aka the ‘Vienna Programme’) were apparently reproduced in full within the 1919 first
edition. I have included these documents for reference purposes, in order to offer a clearer
picture of the ideological environment in which Jung was immersed and which helped influence
the development of National Socialism: Its Foundations, Development, and Goals. * Please note
that all footnotes under the following programmes are my own, and were not written by the
original authors. Also note that the Guidelines of the DAP (Appendix A.VI) is the only document
which was not translated by myself directly from an original source, but was instead transcribed
from an English-language publication. The DAP Guidelines were the only text I was unable to
locate in full in the original German, although I was able to find excerpts in historian Werner
Maser’s book Die Frühgeschichte der NSDAP which confirm that the available translation (by
Barbara M. Lane and Leila J. Rupp) does appear to be accurate. The sources from which I
translated the other programmes are listed at the end of each document.

*
A letter of 21st August, 1921, from the Lübeck Police Office to the Reich Commissioner for the Supervision of
Public Order noted the following common, identifiable characteristics of German Socialist (i.e., National Socialist)
movements: determination of the system of government via referendum; rejection of indirect taxes on the working
people; nationalization of the banks; reform of the monetary system; expansion of the cooperative system; extensive
land reform; the elimination of profiteering and usury; rejection of the Versailles Peace Treaty; limitations upon
religion; efforts directed against Jewish rule; and the expulsion of the Jews from Germany. This seems to be an
accurate assessment in light of the collective content of Jung’s book and the various programmes included here.
 167

I. The Trautenau Programme (1903/04)

The Sudetenland, as Jung explains in the chapter “The Development of National Socialism,” was the original “cradle
of [völkisch] National Socialism.” A number of factors led to the development of National Socialism as a distinctive
ideological trend in this region, but probably the most significant was the growing competition between German and
Czech workers in Austria-Hungary (especially in Bohemia and Moravia) for employment and housing. The
unwillingness of the internationalist Marxist unions to protect ethnic German proletarians and artisans against
‘foreign’ competition led some German workers to establish their own nationalist labor organizations in response,
in particular the ‘Mährisch-Trübauer Verband’ and the ‘Bund Germania’. The German Workers’ Party in Austria
(Deutschen Arbeiterpartei in Österreich, DAPÖ) grew out of these organizations, intended to be the political vehicle
for the cause of ‘national labor’. The decision to form the DAPÖ was first publicly announced at a nationalist
workers’ meeting in Aussig, Bohemia on November 15, 1903. Party chapters and a newspaper were set up over the
next few months, and on 15th August, 1904, the DAPÖ was formally founded at its first Party Conference in
Trautenau. The following programme was presented to attendees at the Trautenau conference by DAPÖ chairman
Wilhelm Prediger. Its author, Alois Ciller, was primarily influenced by Georg Ritter von Schönerer’s nationalist
‘Linz Programme’ of 1882, as well as by Social-Democratic reformism (most early DAPÖ members were former
Social-Democrats, or had previously been active in the Marxist unions). The programme sought to position the
DAPÖ as a nationally-grounded socialist movement, a party which was progressive, pro-worker, actively fighting for
social justice, and yet also unashamedly anti-Czech and German-nationalist in its orientation. Interestingly, there are
no mentions of Jews in the Trautenau Programme, although many members had volkisch sympathies; that aspect
of National Socialism would not become entrenched for several more years.

Party Programme of the German Workers’ Party in Austria

The German Workers’ Party seeks the uplift and liberation of the German working-classes from
their present condition of economic, political, and cultural oppression. It begins from the
conviction that only within the natural limits of his folkdom can the worker achieve full value for
his labor and intelligence in respect to the other classes of the cultural community.

We reject international organization because it weighs down the advanced workers by those of
lower standing, and must completely prevent any real progress for the German working-class in
Austria.

The German Workers’ Party affirms the position that an improvement in economic and social
conditions is only attainable through organisation via professional associations; that purposeful,
positive reform work can overcome today’s unsustainable societal conditions and safeguard the
social advancement of the working-class.

We do not constitute a narrow class party. The German Workers’ Party represents the interests
of all honest, productive labor in general, and strives for the complete elimination of all disparities
and the bringing about of fairer conditions in all areas of public life.

We are a liberal [freiheitliche] national party which combats with absolute severity all reactionary
ambitions, all feudal, clerical and capitalist privileges, as well as all racially-foreign influences.

The advancement of work and skill in state and society is our goal – and the economic and
political organization of the working German Volk is the German Workers’ Party’s means to this
end.

I.
The fulfilment of the cultural tasks of the Austrian state is consistently rendered impossible by
the so-called questions of state. The resolution of these questions is only possible in such a way
that Austria becomes a uniformly organized state, and is thus made viable.
 168

Therefore we demand:
1. Personal union with Hungary.
2. Special status for Galicia and Bukovina within the Cisleithanian federation, for which the name
‘Austria’ is designated.
3. Legal declaration of German as the state language of Austria; the German language is therefore
the exclusive language of the army, representative bodies, and public offices; appointment of
German officials and judges in German-speaking territories.

II.
In the political sphere the German Workers’ Party demands the free development of the
peoples’ nature:

1. Introduction of universal, equal, and direct suffrage; the national demarcation of electoral
constituencies; statutory compulsory voting; a proportional electoral system; severe penalties for
electoral abuses; abolition of the House of Lords.
2. Thoroughgoing expansion of political self-government.
3. Stipulation of three-year legislative periods.
4. Laws for free association and free assembly; laws for freedom of speech and freedom of the
press; the abolition of objective procedure; deregulation of colportage.
5. Protection against any interference in the exercise of political rights, in particular against the
utilization of wage conditions and terms of employment to restrict personal rights of self-
determination.
6. Basic Laws may in no way be modified by decree; §14 of the Basic Law is to be abolished. *
7. Individual ministers are to be selected from the Reichsrat and held liable, under severe penalty,
for the upkeep of the constitution and for the just implementation of the law.

III.
The economic policy of the state has to tailor itself to the interests of the great masses of the
Volk. In particular, the development of labor-protection legislation is a pressing need.

In the economic and socio-political spheres the following should primarily be strived for:

1. Creation of a common customs territory with the German Reich.

2. Transfer of large-scale capitalist enterprises, in which private property is injurious to the
common good, into the possession of the Reich, province, or municipality, in particular the
nationalization of the mining industry and railways.
3. Reform of the entire taxation system; abolition of all indirect taxes and introduction of a
progressive income tax; fixation of a tax-free living wage; scheduling of higher taxation rates for
rentier incomes, and lower rates for earned incomes; reform of the inheritance tax; raising of the
stock-exchange tax; introduction of luxury taxes; strict penalties for tax evasion.
4. Complete and unrestricted freedom of coalition; legal recognition of labor unions; full
freedom of association for agricultural laborers.
5. Creation of Chambers of Labor for the promotion of the economic interests of the working-
classes.

*
The 'Basic Laws' (Staatsgrundgesetze) were a series of laws, enacted by the Austrian Reichsrat in December 1867,
which served as the country's first modern, functioning constitution. §14 of the 'Law Amending the Basic Law of
Reich Representation of 26th February 1861' granted the Emperor and his ministers full executive power in the
absence of parliament, essentially allowing emergency decrees to be issued so long as the Reichsrat was not currently
in session.
 169

6. Fixation of minimum wage rates for each occupation and region; adoption of legal regulations
which enable public authorities and municipal self-governing bodies to prevent the engagement
of foreign workers of a different nationality for the purpose of putting pressure on wages.
7. Organization of a public employment office through the repeal of the private employment
agencies.
8. Regulation of home-based work, with the end-goal being its abolition.
9. Legal regulation of working-hours on the basis of the eight-hour-day, with shorter working-
hours set for hazardous industries; international labor protection legislation.
10. A ban on nightwork in all industries, where this is not unfeasible due to technical reasons; a
complete ban on nightwork for women and young workers.
11. General implementation of a 36-hour weekly rest period; female workers to have Saturday
afternoons free.
12. Prohibition on female labor in health-hazardous enterprises and in mining; introduction of
maternity leave; total prohibition of gainful employment for children under 14 years of age and
the establishment of a shorter working-period for young workers.
13. Establishment of qualification certificates as a requirement for highly-qualified work; stricter
legal provisions covering accident prevention and the condition of workplaces.
14. Development of the Trade Inspectorates and expansion of their scope of powers;
appointment of factory-inspection auxiliaries, who are to be drawn from the working-classes;
appointment of female inspectors for companies with female labor; maintenance of labor
statistics.
15. Establishment of industrial courts in all major industrial areas; the industrial courts are to be
organized as arbitration agencies for all labor and wage disputes.
16. Establishment of a Workers’ Housing Act; introduction of housing inspections; scheduled
facilitation of land reform.
17. Uniform reform of the entire labor insurance system; expansion of health and accident
insurance; introduction of general old-age and disability insurance, as well as widow and orphan
benefits; insurance against unemployment by supporting the free unions’ efforts aimed at
achieving this – furthermore, by structuring this branch of insurance within workers’ insurance.
18. Establishment of a Ministry of Labor, to which all trade inspection and mining inspection, as
well as the social insurance system, are subordinate.

IV.
The German Workers’ Party demands in the cultural field:

1. Compete separation of church and state.

2. Improvement in the legal status of women and reform of the Marriage Law.
3. Reform of the school system in the spirit of the modern Volksgeist [national spirit]; complete
separation of school and church; complimentary learning materials and public education;
regulation of further education and technical education; for teachers, an income appropriate to
their training and responsibilities; free election of teachers’ representatives to all school board
bodies.
4. Simplification of the administration of justice and free legal representation; compensation for
those wrongly arrested and convicted; nationalization of the medical profession.
5. Pursuant to general conscription, the restructuring of the army into a People’s Army in which
anyone who is capable can rise to the highest positions; reduction of the active term of service;
limitations on the pensioning off of more capable officers; public hearings for court martials.

Source:
Ciller, Alois. (1943). Deutscher Sozialismus in den Sudetenländern und der Ostmark, 2nd ed. Hamburg, Germany:
Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt.
 170

II. The Iglau Programme (1913)

In the first few years of its existence the DAPÖ focused its activities on expanding its political organization and on
attempting to unite the often fractious and loosely-organized nationalist trade-unions. To that end, nationalist labor
conferences were arranged by the DAPÖ in 1906 and 1909. In 1907 universal male suffrage was introduced in
Austria-Hungary, resulting in an influx of Slavs into Cisleithania’s representative bodies. This prompted concerned,
middle-class German-Austrians to stream into the nationalist parties in response, and the more radical of these
joined the DAPÖ. Typically the newer recruits in this period were university-educated, white-collar workers and
civil servants, attracted as much by the DAPÖ’s socialist credentials as by its ethnic nationalism. Rudolf Jung joined
at this time (1909), as did two other noteworthy DAPÖ intellectuals: Dr. Walter Riehl (1908), and Hans Krebs
(1909). Although attracted by the party’s ideology, these “young guns” believed that the DAPÖ needed to be more
radical and more overt in its demands for a new, socialist political order. To this end, Jung and Riehl sought to revise
the party’s existing programme, producing a modified version of the document which was formally ratified at the
DAPÖ’s national conference in Iglau, Moravia, on 7-8 September 1913. The Iglau Programme is very similar to
the earlier Trautenau Programme in structure and content, the primary differences being that the new programme
contains more explicitly völkisch language (including a mention of the Jews) and also includes a short, introductory
preamble, written by Riehl. As Jung notes in the chapter “The Development of National Socialism,” the final content
of the programme was the result of compromise between the authors and the delegates at the Iglau Conference.

Party Principles of the German Workers’ Party in Austria

Preamble
The modern labor movement originated in England. The faceless exploitation of the workers by
emergent capitalism at the beginning of the 19th century led to bloody riots, which brought the
workers no practical results. It was French and German scholars and researchers, without
exception all members of the wealthy classes, who revised the age-old ideas of communism and
socialism and created those principles which Lassalle later utilized when founding the first
workers’ association in Germany. Karl Marx first created that doctrinal system of international
socialism to which the German Social-Democrats still cling to today, at least in principle, while
the socialists of almost all nations [Völker] have long since rediscovered the path to a healthy
völkisch ethos, at least in practice. The teachings of the social-democratic party-saint Marx are
today, for the most part, dismissed as obsolete, but his work maintains great influence over the
independent, political miscellany of all the working masses.

His teachings on internationalism were and are unsuitable and of immeasurable harm for
Germandom within Central Europe. The working-class has a special interest in the position of
power, in the maintenance and expansion of the living-space [Lebensraumes] of its own Volk.
Today it is not the whims of princes that leads to conflicts between peoples, but economic
competition. Especially in the most developed countries there has arisen a demand for labor;
foreign workers of lesser culture have often squeezed out the older, established inhabitants. This
phenomenon has impacted the German nation, with its central location, with full force above all.

Social-Democracy in Austria is a child of the German Reich, and its international principles were
supposed to pass the acid test here. Instead its theoretical structure collapsed completely under
the blows of reality. Only the poor comrades of “German tongue” still cling to it with maladjusted
loyalty – to their own cost. They, who used their contributions to make Social-Democracy great,
have in many areas been driven from their workplaces by their warmly-received Slavic comrades.
German employers hired the cheaper Slavic workers; the red organization, however, failed in its
duty-bound protection of its old German party veterans. This began, at last, to stir healthy
instincts of self-preservation in the heads of the German workers. Inspired by the great German-
national bourgeois movement of the nineties in German-Austria, they founded völkisch workers’
and journeymen’s associations in various cities. They recognized the disastrousness of the
international doctrines for their own Volk and the dishonesty of a Social-Democracy directed by
 171

Jews and in close union with transnational big business. In the same vein they took a stance
against the Black International’s attempt to found a clerical labor party.

But our new sympathizers, who have chiefly come from the Social-Democrats, soon wanted a
program that would affirm their economic demands. In this new program, strict völkisch thinking
goes together with the immediate economic demands of labor, as in the Trautenau Programme
of 1904.

Party Principles
The German Workers’ Party seeks the uplift and liberation of the German working-classes from
their present economic, political, and spiritual oppression. It begins from the conviction that only
within the natural limits of his folkdom can the worker achieve full value for his labor and
intellectual abilities in respect to the other classes of the cultural community.

We reject multi-ethnic (international) organization because it weighs down the advanced workers
by those of lower standing, and must completely prevent any real progress for the German
working-class in Austria.

The German Workers’ Party takes the view that an improvement in economic and social
conditions can only be achieved through the coordination of professional associations; that
purposeful, creative reform work can overcome today’s unsustainable societal conditions and
safeguard the advancement of the working class in society.

The German Workers’ Party is no narrow class party; it represents the interests of all honest,
productive labor in general, yet considers itself primarily to be the representative for the demands
of the German labor force, and it strives for the elimination of all injustices and for the bringing
about of fairer conditions in public life.

We are a liberal, völkisch party that combats with absolute severity all reactionary ambitions, all
medieval, ecclesiastical, and capitalist privileges, and every racially-foreign influence – but above
all do we combat the overwhelming influence of the Jewish spirit in all areas of public life.

The influence of work and skill in state and society is our goal – the economic and political unity
of the working German Volk the German Workers’ Party’s means to achieving this end.

I.
The fulfillment of the spiritual tasks of our state is made impossible by the ethnic struggles which
time and again arise out of the antiquated division of the Crown Lands. We therefore call for the
dissolution of the existing Crown Lands and the creation of new self-governing regions, whose
borders should be determined on the basis of ethnic settlement.

Therefore, we demand:

1. Reorganization of the relationship with Hungary in the spirit of a just distribution of burdens,
and the securement of civic and ethnic rights for our German-Hungarian folk-comrades living
under Magyar rule.
2. Until the provision of ethnic independence is secured, the complete provincial bipartition of
Bohemia as the most urgent and undeferrable measure of völkisch justice; repeal of the
advantages conferred upon the provinces Galicia, Bukovina, and Dalmatia at the expense of the
western Crown Lands.
 172

3. Legal declaration of the German tongue as the state language in Austria; the German language
is therefore the exclusive language of the army, representative bodies, and public offices! Only
Germans may hold public office in German-speaking territories.

II.
In the field of government, the German Workers’ Party demands the free development of the
peoples’ nature:

1. Timely expansion of voting rights in province and municipality; abolition of the House of
Lords.
2. Thoroughgoing expansion of state autonomy.
3. Rights to free association and free assembly; rights for freedom of speech and freedom of the
press; abolition of impersonal criminal proceedings; deregulation of the itinerant document trade
(colportage).
4. Protection against any interference in the exercise of civil rights, namely against the utilization
of wage conditions and terms of employment to restrict personal rights of self-determination.
5. Basic Laws may not be amended via decree; §14 of the Basic Law is to be abolished.
6. Individual ministers are to be selected from the Reichsrat and held liable, under severe penalty,
for the upkeep of the constitution and for the just enforcement of the law.
7. Pursuant to general conscription, the restructuring of the army into a People’s Army, wherein
anyone who is capable is able to rise to the highest positions; reduction of the active term of
service; restrictions on the decommissioning of the more capable officers; public hearings for
court martials.

III.
The economic policy of the state has to tailor itself to the needs of the great masses of the Volk.
Above all, the drafting of labor legislation is a pressing need.

In the economic and socio-political spheres, the following should be primarily be strived for:

1. Creation of a common customs territory with the German Reich.

2. Transfer of large-scale capitalist enterprises, in which private property is injurious to the
common good, into the possession of the Reich or municipality, particularly nationalization of
the mining industry and the railways.
3. Reorganization of the entire tax system; abolition of all indirect taxes and introduction of a
progressive income tax; fixation of a tax-free living wage; scheduling of higher taxation rates for
rentier incomes, and lower rates for earned incomes; refinement of the inheritance tax; raising
of the stock-exchange tax; introduction of luxury taxes and taxation on all as-yet-untaxed property;
strict penalties for tax evasion.
4. Complete and unrestricted freedom of association; legal recognition of labor unions; full
freedom of coalition for agricultural laborers; protection from any interference in the political
beliefs and trade-union membership of individual workers, not least from terrorism by dissident
fellow-workers and their associations.
5. Creation of Chambers of Labor for the promotion of the economic interests of the working-
classes.
6. Fixation of minimum wage rates for each occupation and region; enactment of statutory
legislation with which public authorities and self-governing bodies can prevent racially-foreign
workers being enlisted to put pressure upon wages.
7. Establishment of a public employment office through the repeal of the private employment
agencies.
 173

8. Placement of home-work under sanitary and commercial oversight, with the end-goal being its
eventual abolition.
9. Legal regulation of working-hours on the basis of the eight-hour-day, with shorter working-
hours set for hazardous industries; national labor protection legislation.
10. A ban on nightwork in all industries, where this is not unfeasible for technical reasons; a
complete ban on nightwork for women and young workers.
11. General implementation of a 36-hour weekly rest period; free Saturday afternoons for female
workers and the legal establishment of statutory leave entitlements for all employees in the sense
of the Commercial Clerks Act.
12. Prohibition on female labor in health-hazardous enterprises and in mining; introduction of
maternity leave; total prohibition of gainful employment for children under 14 years of age and
the establishment of a shorter working-period for young workers.
13. Establishment of qualifications certificates as a requirement for highly-qualified work; stricter
legal provisions covering accident prevention and the condition of workshops.
14. Development of the Labor Inspectorate and expansion of the scope of powers of its
supervisors (inspectors). Employment of factory-supervision auxiliaries drawn from the working-
classes. Appointment of female supervisors for companies with female labor. Maintenance of
labor statistics.
15. Establishment of industrial courts in all major industrial locations; the industrial courts are to
be organized as arbitration agencies for all labor and wage disputes.
16. Improvement of the Workers’ Housing Act; creation of a Homestead Law and introduction
of a Housing Authority; systematic promotion of land law; abolition of profiteering in land and
foodstuffs.
17. Uniform reorganization of the entire labor insurance system; expansion of health and
accident insurance; introduction of general old-age and invalid’s insurance; benefits for widows
and orphans; insurance against unemployment by supporting the free unions’ efforts aimed at
achieving this – furthermore, by structuring this class of insurance within workers’ insurance.
18. Establishment of a Ministry of Social Policy, to which the entire social insurance sector is to
be assigned. Moreover, we demand the nationalization of the entire insurance industry.

IV.
The German Workers’ Party demands in the cultural field:

1. Compete separation of church and state.

2. Improvement of the legal and political status of women and further development of the
Marriage Law.
3. Redevelopment of the school system according to the modern Volksgeist; complete separation
of school and church; complimentary learning materials and public education; regulation of
further education and technical education, particularly through their transfer to daylight hours
and weekdays. For teachers, an income in accordance with their training and responsibilities; free
election of teachers’ representatives to all school board bodies.
4. Simplification of the administration of justice; free legal representation; compensation for
those wrongly arrested and convicted; nationalization of the medical profession; enactment of a
drunkenness law, measures against the encroachment and influence of alcohol-capital
[Alkoholkapitals]; promotion of the construction of alcohol-free dining-houses.

Sources:
Berchtold, Klaus. (1967). Österreichische Parteiprogramme 1868 – 1966. Munich, Germany: R. Oldenbourg.
Whiteside, Andrew G. (1961). ‘Nationaler Sozialismus in Österreich vor 1918’. Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte,
9(4), pp. 553-559.
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III. The Vienna Programme (1918)

The Great War was devastating for the DAPÖ. After the Iglau Conference, the party’s focus was on expanding its
branches across Moravia and Silesia; the War interrupted these measures, leaving very few members available on
the home front to sustain the party’s activities. A great many party activists and trade-unionists were killed fighting
for the Habsburg Empire, including one of the DAPÖ’s elected Reichsrat representatives, Ferdinand Seidl – all
particularly difficult to bear, considering the DAPÖ had always been cautiously critical of the Habsburg monarchy,
seeing it as a barrier to Pan-Germany. Following the War and the collapse of Austria-Hungary, the party felt that it
needed to regroup, and at a Party Conference in Vienna on 5 May, 1918, the DAPÖ refounded itself as the German
National Socialist Workers’ Party (Deutsche Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei, DNSAP). There had been
several previous attempts to change the party’s name over the years, one as early as 1909, and the issue had been
raised again following the war by trade-union leader Walter Gattermayer, who successfully argued that “the substance
of the party’s guiding principles should be fully and completely reflected in its name.” A new programme for the
DNSAP was also ratified at the Vienna Conference. This ‘Vienna Programme’ was written entirely by Rudolf Jung,
incorporating the proposals he had been unable to include in the earlier Iglau Programme. It would remain the
programme of the DNSAP until its dissolution in 1933. A few months after the Vienna Conference, the Sudetenland
was absorbed into the territory of the new Czechoslovakian Republic, and a segment of Silesia was taken by Poland.
This meant as a result that the DNSAP was effectively broken into three separate, independent parties: one in
Austria, one in Czechoslovakia (the Sudetenland), and one in Poland (Upper Silesia).

Fundamental Party Principles of the

German National Socialist Workers’ Party

a) General Statement
The German National Socialist Workers’ Party seeks the uplift and liberation of the German
working-classes from economic, political, and spiritual oppression, and their full equality in all
areas of völkisch and civic life.

It professes itself unreservedly to the cultural community and the community of fate of the entire
German Volk, and is convinced that only within the natural limits of his folkdom can the worker
achieve full value for his labor and intelligence.

It therefore rejects organization on a multi-ethnic basis as unnatural. An improvement in

economic and social conditions is attainable only through the cooperation of all workers on the
soil of their own people. Not subversion and class struggle, but purposeful, creative reform work
alone can overcome today’s social conditions. Private property in itself is not malign, insofar as
it arises from one’s own honest labor, serves labor, and is limited in size so as not to damage the
common good. We reject, however, all forms of unearned income, such as ground-rent and
interest, as well as usurious profits extorted from the misery one’s fellow man. Against them we
stridently advocate the value of productive labor.

The private economy can never be wholly or violently abolished, yet all forms of social property
should exist alongside it and be increasingly expanded. We advocate unconditionally for all large-
scale capitalist enterprises which constitute private monopolies to be transferred into the
possession of the state, province (völkisch self-governing bodies), or municipality.

We see the guiding principles for future progress in the purposeful conversion of all other
enterprises into cooperative property, by steadily increasing the profit-sharing of all those who
work within them, whether physically or intellectually.

The German National Socialist Workers’ Party is no narrow class party; it represents the interests
of all honest, productive labor in general. It is a liberal [freiheitliche] and strictly völkisch party
and hence combats all reactionary tendencies, all ecclesiastical, noble, and capitalist privileges,
 175

and every racially-foreign influence – but above all does it combat the overwhelming power of
the Jewish-commercial spirit in every area of public life.

The influence of work and skill in state and society is our goal, the economic and political unity
of the working German Volk the means to this end.

b) Constitutional and Völkisch Demands

1. Consolidation of the entire area of German settlement in Europe into a democratic, social
German Reich. Vigorous protection of all our Volk presently inhabiting areas ruled by foreign
peoples.
2. Legal declaration of the German language as the state language of the entire German Reich.

c) Liberalization Demands
The German National Socialist Workers’ Party demands the free development of our peoples’
nature through:

1. Equal and universal suffrage in provinces and municipalities after their prior völkisch
safeguarding; creation of second parliamentary chambers on the basis of occupational
representation.
2. Thorough-going expansion of self-government.
3. Laws for free association and free assembly; laws for freedom of speech and freedom of the
press; the abolition of impersonal criminal proceedings; deregulation of the itinerant document
trade (colportage).
4. Protection against any interference in the exercise of national rights, namely against the
utilization of wage conditions and terms of employment to restrict personal rights to self-
determination.
5. Suppression of all party-rule, in particular through the introduction of plebiscites
(referendums) for all far-reaching laws in Reich, state, and province; creation of a People’s Army.

d) Economic and Social Demands

In the economic and social spheres, the following should primarily be strived for:

1. Transfer of all large-scale capitalist enterprises, in which private management is injurious to

the common good, into the possession of the state, province (völkisch self-governing bodies), and
municipality. Consideration shall be given in particular to: the entire transportation system,
natural resources, water power, insurance companies, and the advertising industry. Profit-sharing
among all employees in state, provincial, and municipal enterprises.
2. Reorganization of the entire taxation system with the aim of promoting labor, rendering
unearned incomes and usury in land, trade, and the stock-market impossible above all. Abolition
of unjust indirect taxes and introduction of a heavily graduated income tax. Scheduling of the
highest possible taxation rates for rentier incomes and the lowest conceivable rates for earned
incomes. High taxation of all fallow land; introduction of capital gains taxes; an increase in
inheritance tax and the stock-market tax; introduction of luxury taxes and taxation of all hitherto
tax-free property. Calculation of taxation rates according to number of children.
3. Elimination of the reign of Jewish banks over economic life; creation of national Peoples’
Banks with democratic administration.

e) Demands for the Workforce

1. Full and unrestricted freedom of association, including for agricultural laborers; legal
recognition of workers’ unions; protection against any infringement on political beliefs and trade
 176

union membership caused by terrorism from those with different opinions; legal protection of
elected office-holders and shop stewards.
2. Establishment of Chambers of Labor for the promotion of economic issues.
3. Fixation of minimum wage rates and salaries for each occupation and municipality through
consensus with the trade unions. Introduction of a cost-of-living supplement and family
allowance. Adoption of legal regulations according to which public authorities and municipal self-
governing bodies can prevent the engagement of racially-foreign workers.
4. Establishment of a völkisch-oriented public employment office through the repeal of the
private employment agencies.
5. Placement of home-based work under sanitary and commercial oversight.
6. Definitive regulation of working-hours on the basis of the eight-hour day as the maximum
working time, with the establishment of shorter working-hours for hazardous industries; Reich-
wide workers’ legislation.
7. A ban on nightwork in all industries, insofar as this is not unfeasible for technical reasons. A
complete ban on nightwork for women and young workers.
8. General implementation of a 36-hour weekly rest period; free Saturday afternoons and the
legal establishment of statutory leave entitlements for all employees.
9. Prohibition on female labor in health-hazardous enterprises and in mining; introduction of
maternity leave; total prohibition of gainful employment for children under 14 years of age and
the establishment of a shorter working-period for young workers.
10. Introduction of qualifications certificates as a requirement for highly-qualified work; stricter
legal provisions covering accident prevention and the condition of factory workshops.
11. Development of the Labor Inspectorate and expansion of the scope of powers of its
supervisors (inspectors). Engagement of factory-supervision auxiliaries drawn from the working-
classes. Appointment of female supervisors for companies with female labor. Maintenance of
labor statistics.
12. Establishment of industrial courts in all major industrial locations.
13. Improvement of the Workers’ Housing Act, establishment of a People’s Homestead Act,
and introduction of a Housing Authority; scheduled expansion of the housing laws and
restructuring of land law in line with the demands for land reform. Abolition of profiteering in
land and foodstuffs.
14. Uniform reorganization of the entire labor insurance system; expansion of health and
accident insurance; introduction of general old-age and disability insurance; benefits for widows
and orphans; introduction of children’s insurance within the health insurance framework.
Insurance against unemployment by supporting all the free unions’ efforts aimed at achieving
this, and through structuring this branch of insurance within workers’ insurance.

f) Demands for the Trades

Promotion of the trades through legal support for cooperative enterprises. Expansion and
broadening of technical instruction (especially in the decorative arts and specialized trades fields)
and the cooperative system; expansion of cooperative purchasing and sales opportunities;
elimination of bureaucratic impediments to the registration and operation of a business;
prohibition of all peddling and every kind of clandestine black-marketeering.

g) Demands for Agriculture

Increasing the production of agricultural goods through the expansion of peasant cooperatives.
Promotion of the agricultural education and training systems. Expropriation of large estates and
entails for the purpose of establishing small- and medium-sized peasant farmsteads. A prohibition
on the buying-up of land for luxury purposes (hunting and the like). Establishment of the state’s
 177

right of first refusal on every sale of property and land. Nationalization of the selling of property
and real estate.

h) The Party’s Demands for the Cultural Field

1. The moral renewal of our Volk; development of their religious life in the German spirit;
elimination of the Church’s influence over state and economic life.
2. Legal and political equality for women and further advancement of the Marriage Law.
3. Restructuring of the school system in the spirit of the Einheitsschule, complimentary learning
materials and education; reorganization of further education and technical education (particularly
by moving them to daylight hours and excluding Sundays); special promotion of education in the
decorative arts. Improvement of the general educational level of the entire population through
appropriate measures (adult education centers and folkic lectures, films and plays). The teaching
profession is to be supported to the greatest possible extent, teachers are to be paid according to
their training and responsibilities, and the election of school boards is not to be interfered with.
4. Simplification of the administration of justice; compensation for those wrongly arrested and
convicted. A legislative crackdown on alcoholism; promotion of the construction of alcohol-free
dining-houses.

Source:
Ciller, Alois. (1932). Vorläufer des Nationalsozialismus: Geschichte und Entwicklung der nationalen
Arbeiterbewegung im deutschen Grenzland. Vienna, Austria: Ertl-Verlag Wien.
 178

IV. The Brunner Memorandum (1918)

On 1 December, 1918, Düsseldorf engineer Alfred Brunner completed work on a ‘Memorandum for the Founding
of a German Socialist Party on a Jew-free and Anti-Capitalist Foundation’. Brunner had been involved in völkisch
politics since the early 1900s, and had been in close contact with the National Socialists in Austria-Hungary from
the DAPÖ’s formal beginning in 1904. During the War Brunner had decided to found a völkisch-socialist party of
his own, and his 1918 Memorandum was produced with the intent that it would inspire readers to establish their
own grass-roots German Socialist groups. Copies of Brunner’s document were distributed by hand or sold via
advertisements placed in völkisch newspapers. Printing costs for this were covered by the Germanen-Orden (a
völkisch organization which had strong links with, and soon merged with, the Thule Society), and the Orden invited
Brunner to publicly present his Outline at its 1918 Christmas conference. A copy also appeared in the 1918/1919
winter edition (no. 15) of the Germanen-Orden’s central newsletter, the Allgemeine Ordens-Nachrichten, and it was
published again in the 13 May, 1919 edition of the well-known Münchner Beobachter newspaper. Brunner’s
dissemination campaign proved effective, and with his assistance readers inspired by his work soon began forming
their own local German Socialist political clubs and working-groups – the first völkisch National Socialist
organizations in Germany. On 24-26 April, 1920, these various German Socialist grouplets would unite in Hanover
to formally establish the German Socialist Party (Deutschsozialistische Partei, DSP) on a national basis. For the first
year or two of its existence the DSP would prove to be the strongest National Socialist party in Germany, and the
one with the closest ties to the DNSAP in Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland.

Memorandum for the Founding of a German Socialist Party

on a Jew-free and Anti-Capitalist Foundation

To the German Volk!

World war, revolution, and turmoil lie behind us! We have waded through misery, blood and
humiliation, and yet everything has remained the same; yes, things even threaten to be worse
than they were before. Merely the form of government and the men in charge have changed,
while capitalism and Jewry rear their heads higher than ever under democracy. As before, you,
the German Volk, will be leeched dry, plundered and condemned to toil and worry. How did it
come to this, and shall it remain this way forever? The cause of this failure lies in the fact that the
struggle against these two powers has hitherto been conducted separately. Yet both are intimately
connected.

Social-Democracy only engages in a mock-battle against capitalism, for its leaders are Jews and
capitalists!

Yet the Jew-wise struggle in vain against Jewry, because they stand firmly on the ground of the
capitalist state order; hence both fronts are bound to collapse.

The change required to finally establish real freedom for the German Volk is to form a German
Socialist Party.

German-Völkisch and Socialist.

Lassalle, the founder of German Social-Democracy, must as a Jew have known his racial kin well
when he said: “A popular movement has to keep its distance from capitalists and Jews where
they appear as guides and leaders, and must pursue its own aims.”

The new socialist party accepts German-born men only. It stands naturally upon the ground of
political transformation; democracy will not at first be tampered with, but the party does however
not want a Western-style democracy with a Jewish-plutocratic apex, but instead a free Peoples’
State in which both capitalism and Jewry have been vanquished.
 179

Pure parliamentarism, in which executive power rests solely with elected deputies, is not
sufficient; instead the party calls for fundamental new laws to be decided in each case by
referendum, in order to eliminate the threat of party mismanagement.

Its principal demands are of a radical type; the new party does not confine itself to sham reforms.
It goes to the root of racial and social adversity.

Until now capitalism and Jewry have stood in the way of such reforms. All our parties were, more
or less, consciously or unconsciously, the trainbearers of one or the other, or even of both
powers. This is the reason why up to now all work was in vain and only brought forth sham
reforms. The new party is not privy to such conditions, being instead quite anti-capitalist and Jew-
free. It allows itself to be guided solely by the welfare of the whole, and strives for a far more even
distribution of vital commodities and for the recovery and revival of the Germans, whose folk-
strength [Volkskraft] has been so gravely afflicted. But new conditions should not be strived for
through a fresh revolution or by an abrupt change – for this unfailingly leads to the opposite of
what is intended – but instead should be achieved in a legal fashion, via the gradual dismantling
of the past and the building up of the new.

The root cause of our misery lies in our false land legislation, in our social rights, and in our
monetary system.

Accordingly, we demand:

1. Free land, since the cancerous harm afflicting the national economy, as well as the
economies of home, business, and even that of the individual folk-comrade, derives from
rent charges. The indebtedness of the German soil (100 billion Marks before the War)
brings all social and economic evils in its wake: tenement buildings, housing distress,
infant mortality, national epidemics, poverty, crime, growing mob mentality, and national
disintegration.

This can be remedied by means of declaring German land as state property beyond
private ownership, i.e., that the sale of land and soil from private hands to private hands
is in future to be barred. Land is to lose its character as a commodity. Commodities are
characterized by the fact that they are replaceable. Soil, however, is irreplaceable.
Anybody who wants to or has to sell can only do so to the community. The community
issues land to interested parties as Zeitpacht or Erbpacht. * Thereupon land may no
longer be used to raise capital in future. It will be declared non-mortgageable.
Accordingly, personal loans will be issued, as opposed to the mortgage loans of today.
All current mortgages, where it is not the case already, are to be declared non-terminable
short-term direct-reduction mortgages, reducing the rate of interest. In this manner
German land is gradually liberated and a truly generous settlement is achieved. Even the
simplest man will once again be able to live on his own plot in his own small house. The

*
Forms of pre-capitalist land ownership in which a feudal lord would split his fief into plots of land and lease them
out to peasant families. An Erbpacht was a leased plot over which peasants had full right of use, so long as they made
continued payment to the owner via goods, labor, or currency. An Erbpacht was also hereditable, meaning that
peasants could pass the plot on to their children indefinitely through inheritance, so long as they also continued to
repay the feudal owner (the plot could not be sold nor distributed to those outside the leasee’s immediate family,
however). A Zeitpacht was a more commercial arrangement, in that it constituted a plot which was leased to peasants
only on a temporary, fixed-term basis.
 180

emergence of supercapitalism derives from the present free marketability and

mortgageability of the soil. With free land there is no supercapitalism.

2. Replacement of modern Roman Law by German common law. Our contemporary

land law is based upon Roman Law, hence all the afflictions of our public life are legal
afflictions. Roman Law was introduced 400 years ago by the nobles and the high clergy;
the Volk resisted it in vain, recognizing that with this foreign law the very ground beneath
their feet, along with other legal rights, had been stripped away. The Peasants’ Wars, the
first social uprisings, were a bloody struggle against foreign law. Time and again the
peasants demanded the restoration of the old German Law.

Today once more we raise the same demand; it is on you, German Volk, to ensure that
it does not again go unheeded. This issue is more important than it may appear to most;
it is the linchpin of our future being and existence. Roman Law arose at a time when
Rome was declining and overrun by Jews; it is anti-social, and it safeguards private gain at
the expense of the community. It is a law of the cunning and the sly. On this un-German
legal foundation the German is always inferior to the Jew. The facts are evidence of this.
Consequently, the German Volk must be given a law which corresponds with their own
nature and their own spirit, a law which is in accord with the old principle: Common
interest comes before self-interest. The deep-seated greed, dishonesty, and immorality
which are widespread in trade and commerce, the Judaization of our Volk, all are
attributable to Roman Law, as is the degeneration of our economy into an extreme
interest-economy which has ultimately, under the leadership of the Jewish race, brought
the war and misery of recent years upon the world.

3. Nationalization of the monetary system. Our finances are in the hands of private
individuals, particularly Jews and other international peoples. This is an absurdity in itself,
since money is the blood of the national body of the Volk. The state as the representative
of the Volk can only really govern if it possesses power of disposal over money and
finance. Today money too has been alienated from and deprived of its purpose of being
a convenient means of exchange between labor and wages, between goods and purchase
price, between producer and consumer. Money today instead serves as a means of
generating more money again and yet again via banking-practices and stock-jobbing,
without any real work being involved.

For the majority of our Volk, who live off their own labor, money today is still nothing
more than a medium of exchange; there is no reason to let it to be debased into an
unwholesome means of enrichment for a small number of rapacious capitalists and
speculators at the expense of the productive Volk. Only real work should be rewarded
and remunerated.

Our true savings- and credit-institutes must be nationalized banks, eliminating the
obscene profits of the shareholders as well as the princely salaries of the directors and
the royalties of the supervisory boards. We demand a Reich Economic Council to assess
newly-established banks and companies in relation to the real requirements and welfare
of the community. Future creditworthiness will no longer extend to things, but to people.
From this it follows that, as in the past, business will be built upon the competency,
reliability, and honesty of the individual, by which the requisite tranquility and organic
growth will be brought to our economy.
 181

The stock market game is to be rejected as harmful and unnecessary, and trading in stocks
is to be prohibited. Our currency is to be redesigned. Perpetual interest, which is
predicated upon the immoral assumption (so cunningly conceived by its inventors and
defenders) of capital’s immortality, is in general to be superseded by an interest payment
system which gradually depletes one’s capital. This would put an end once and for all to
the interest-slavery originating out of the Orient.

These are the three key points and the three principle demands of the new party. By these means
the unresolved questions of supercapitalism and Semitism will be resolved for the good of the
whole.

Anyone born of German blood who acknowledges these demands and observations belongs to
us; but those who do not want to see, or are too simple-minded, and who thereby prop up today’s
usurious system, may quietly remain with their current parties.

The victory of our ideas is certain; as always, the truth prevails over deceit and falsehood! The
interest-economy will collapse, and people will unite in a natural existence in the spirit of a joyful
community in love with its ancestral folkdom. Further demands, which arise logically out of the
three principal demands, are:

4. The progressive transformation of our economy to such an extent that it becomes a

true people’s economy.

5. The breaking up of our large estates for the purposes of settlement, based upon the
yield capacity of the individual territories.

6. A fair redistribution of taxation, creating barriers to the emergence of super-capital.

7. Arrangement of our commerce in accordance with the natural perspective that goods
should take the cheapest and shortest route from producer to consumer. Without
eliminating honest middlemen, all superfluous intermediaries – who only manage to
somehow effectuate avoidable profit mark-ups and to drive up price increases on goods
– must disappear. Our vital living necessities, particularly foodstuffs, need not enrich
thousands of layabouts.

8. When it comes to far-reaching fundamental laws and constitutional amendments,

parliament only has an advisory role; through voting yes or no, the Volk exercise the
casting vote.

9. The establishment of a Reich Economic Council, which through a broad array of

perspectives sets the dimensions and goals of our entire economy. It allows itself to be
guided solely by the welfare of the country. The men of this office – neither capitalists
nor Jews – must have experience in practical life and must have been outstanding in their
services to the community.

10. The creation of a truly independent German press. A fundamental change is required
in view of the fact that 90% of our press is in Jewish-capitalist hands, is for the most part
directed by Jews, and is dependent upon big Jewish advertisers. Today the press does not
reflect the mood of the Volk; instead a mood is artificially created and imposed upon
them in order to satisfy the selfish plans of the capitalists and Jews, without the Volk being
 182

able to recognize these plans. We demand: Only companies which are German and
whose owners are German may call themselves German newspapers. Where these
conditions do not apply, newspapers are to be designated as Jewish on the newspaper’s
masthead.

11. A fundamental readjustment in the German stance towards the Jews. An investigation
into the law and religion of the Jews. Today’s civic equality is founded upon the erroneous
perception that the issue is one of a difference of religion. Today, research and proven
facts leave no doubt that the Jewish question is a question of race and that it has nothing
to do with religious denomination. The query is: will we German folk-comrades continue
in the future to allow ourselves to be dominated politically, economically, and spiritually
by an infinitesimal minority of an alien race, which is consciously aware of itself as such
and which wilfully keeps itself pure-blooded and aloof through law and religion, which
among the Jews are one and the same thing? This is a matter of our honor, all the more
so as it is clear to even the simplest man today that the Jew’s innate greed and lust for
power works a destructive effect upon every nation.

We demand: the new Germany for the German, not the Jew! The Jews are a thoroughly
foreign race; they should enjoy the protection of the state, its benefits, but should no
longer have the right to be the representatives, leaders, or educators of the Volk. The
Jewish people are permitted to send their quota of representatives to the German
parliament. We count baptized Jews and Mischlings as Jews.

12. Protection of the German worker against foreign labour, which depresses the German
worker’s wages and standard of living.

Generally speaking, our economy must be managed in such a fashion that we can sustain
ourselves as far as possible.

Standing at the center of our entire politics, administration, and economy must no longer be the
commodity, as before, but the German man. Our folkdom is our prosperity.

We do not wish to become richer and richer in wealth and worldly goods, which benefit only a
few; instead we wish to be rich in contented, vigorous people, whose livelihoods are secure and
who live upon their own soil. Through these principles and demands of our party, which are free
of any bondage or paternalism, it is possible to finally bring down the interest-economy and the
Jews, who continue to feast upon the masses and drive them to ruin. Upon implementation of
our demands, as early as the first gradual dismantling of the contemporary interest-economy, a
sigh of relief would go up from the German Volk. In place of the few, who have accumulated
ever more riches, and the many, who have had to struggle all their lives, a more equitable
distribution of all life’s resources would emerge; as opulence, snobbery, and extravagance
disappear, so too would poverty and unemployment be banished, while honesty and decency
would push pretense, deception, and cunning into the background. Our inflated land prices, the
soaring rents, the ever-increasingly expensive cost-of-living, all the obvious consequences of the
interest-economy, would subside of their own accord, while national wealth would be distributed
correctly and fairly and would not, as hitherto, be clutched together in the hands of the
unscrupulous. Our entire lives would be simplified, beautified, and rendered more affordable;
in place of confinement, agitation, and never-ending worries, instead tranquility, contentment,
and stability would once again enter into the hearts of the long-suffering German Volk.
 183

The German Socialist Party is a party of the financially-weak layers of the Volk, i.e., of the
workers, civil servants, shop-assistants, artisans, small-businessmen and peasants, the teachers,
settlers, and technicians. He who sees things clearly joins us without hesitation. False Jewish-
socialism and the interest-economy must be as chaff before the wind.

Source:
Sebottendorff, Rudolf von. (1933). Bevor Hitler Kam: Urkundliches aus der Frühzeit der nationalsozialistischen
Bewegung von Rudolf von Sebottendorff, 1st ed. Munich, Germany: Deukula-Verlag Grassinger & Co.
 184

V. The Guidelines of the DAP (1919)

On 5 January, 1919, a German Workers’ Party (Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, DAP) was founded in the Fürstenfelder
Hof tavern in Munich, Bavaria, by railway fitter Anton Drexler and sports journalist Karl Harrer. Although
apparently established completely independently of the DAPÖ/DNSAP, the DAP was possibly influenced to some
degree by the other party’s propaganda – Harrer, like Alfred Brunner, was apparently already familiar with the
Sudeten and Austrian National Socialists, possibly through his Thule Society connections. Additionally, a significant
proportion of the DAPÖ/DNSAP membership were railway workers, like Drexler, and Munich was part of the
direct rail line to Salzburg, where one of Austria’s most active DNSAP branches was located, making prior contact
of some kind entirely likely. In any case, the DAP was unquestionably a National Socialist party, and by the end of
1919 Drexler had established a regular correspondence with the leaders of the National Socialist groups outside of
Germany. By that time the DAP was also beginning to make a name for itself in Munich, particularly after being
joined on 19 October, 1919 by a gifted young Reichswehr operative named Adolf Hitler. The DAP’s original
programmatic statement, its party ‘Guidelines’, were apparently first published in poet Dietrich Eckart’s newspaper
‘Auf gut Deutsch’ around a month after the party’s initial founding. The DAP Guidelines are rather basic and
loosely-defined, and they were a cause of dissatisfaction among the young party’s leadership, who regarded them
only as a temporary stopgap which could be set aside once a more extensive party programme was written.

Guidelines of the German Workers’ Party

What is the German Workers’ Party?

The DAP is a socialist organization, composed of all folk-comrades engaged in mental or physical
work. It may only be guided by German leaders who put aside selfish goals and allow national
needs to be the highest concern of the programme.

What does the German Workers’ Party offer the worker?

The DAP seeks the ennoblement of the German worker. Skilled resident workers have the right
to be considered members of the middle-class. A sharp distinction between workers and
proletarians should be made. An international agreement with the trade-unions of other
countries must stabilize wages, making it impossible for the working-class of a particular country
to engage in sharp bargaining. In the future the competitive position of an individual country shall
be determined not by the lowest wages, but by the diligence and efficiency of its workers. In this
way the causes of friction among the various countries will be avoided. Big business provides
food and employment and is therefore to be protected, as long as it does not relentlessly exploit
the worker, making it impossible for him to lead a worthwhile life. The DAP believes that the
socialization of German economic life signals the collapse of the German economy. By
controlling socialized businesses, our enemies would be in the best possible position to collect
efficiently the war indemnities which have been imposed on us, and to do so at the expense of
the workers. Therefore the German worker should have not socialization, but profit-sharing.
Profit-sharing can be made possible by founding work cooperatives in the cities, and by founding
farm cooperatives among the agricultural workers in the country in order to protect land and soil.

Who is the DAP fighting against?

The DAP is fighting with all its strength against usury and the forcing up of prices. Against all
those who create no values, who make high profits without any mental or physical work. We fight
against the drones in the state; these are mostly Jews; they live a good life, they reap where they
have not sown. They control and rule us with their money. For these drones Germany and her
entire people were just objects of speculation; their party slogans are much the same. Talk, no
action. The DAP honors the principle: he who will not work shall not eat. We fight for justice,
true freedom, and happiness. No dictatorship of the proletariat! Equal justice for all. No rule of
bayonets. Everyone shall feel himself to be a free German. There is no happiness in phrases and
empty speeches at meetings, demonstrations, and elections. Our striving is toward the free
happiness of good work, the full pot, and prospering children.
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To what extent is the DAP politically active?

The DAP opposes any threat to the unity of the Reich, but excludes the predominance of a single
state. We want to be governed only by Germans; foreigners and Jews govern us only in their own
interest or in the interest of a foreign country. With the people and with the government they
make deals, not politics. The Foreign Office shall consist of German representatives from all of
the states participating in the federation, representatives elected by the peoples of the federated
states. The party advocates an international law for the press of all countries. By punishing the
international reporting of false news, this law will prevent the kind of incitement of peoples to
aggression which occurred during the World War. The highest principles of justice and truth
must again be made valid in today’s world.

How does the DAP think the costs of the war can be paid?
Our guiding star is this: war is a disaster for a country and disaster means suffering. For this
reason, no one had any right to gather riches at home while our soldiers fought abroad.
Regardless of earnings before the war, we consider 10,000 Marks to be the highest permissible
annual earnings during the war; the rest is to be delivered to the central government, which will
use it to pay war costs. Furthermore, property owners must be called upon to help cover the war
costs, and any estates which are little encumbered are to be forced to take up compulsory
mortgages.

Source:
Lane, Barbara Miller & Rupp, Leila J. (2014). Nazi Ideology before 1933: A Documentation. Austin, USA:
University of Texas Press.
 186

VI. The 25-Point Programme of the NSDAP (1920)

On 16 November, 1919, Adolf Hitler was inducted into the leadership committee of the DAP, an acknowledgement
of his talents as a speaker and propagandist. At this meeting the issue of a new party programme was raised, and
there was some discussion of setting up a commission (consisting of Anton Drexler, Gottfried Feder, Karl Harrer,
Adolf Hitler, and Dr. Paul Tafel) to prepare a draft. In actuality the programme which was eventually produced for
the party seems to have been entirely the work of Hitler and Drexler, composed by the two over several “long nights
together in the workers’ canteen at Burghausenerstrasse 6,” as Drexler recalled many years later. It has been
speculated by some historians that the authors drew inspiration for their programme from Brunner’s German
Socialist Memorandum of 1918, although there is apparently no direct evidence of this. It is known, however, that
Dr. Walter Riehl had sent copies of the DNSAP’s Vienna Programme to Drexler in September 1919, and had
encouraged Drexler in a following letter in December to amend the name of the DAP to include the terms “German
Socialist” or “National Socialist.” Sections of the new programme (point 11 in particular) were undeniably inspired
by Feder’s philosophies, with which both Hitler and Drexler were already very familiar, although Feder was not
directly involved in writing the document. Whatever the origin of its ideas, the new programme was first presented
in its finished form on 24 February, 1920, at a tumultuous meeting of over 2,000 people at the Hofbräuhauskeller
tavern in Munich, an event opened by Max Sesselman of the Munich DSP. The party’s name appears to have
changed from “German Workers’ Party” to “National Socialist German Workers’ Party” (Nationalsozialistische
Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, NSDAP) at around the same time, although use of the new name was at first very
inconsistent – the party is still referred to as the “German Workers’ Party” within the new programme, for example,
and party-members frequently continued to use the old name for some time after the formal change.

Basic Programme of the National Socialist

German Workers’ Party

The programme of the German Workers’ Party is a programme of its time. Its leaders have no
intention, once the aims laid out in the programme have been achieved, of drawing up new ones
solely for the purpose of facilitating the continued existence of the party by artificially increasing
the discontent of the masses.

1. We demand the union of all Germans, on the basis of the self-determination of peoples, within
a Greater Germany.

2. We demand equal rights for the German Volk vis-à-vis other nations, and the revocation of
the peace treaties of Versailles and St. Germain.

3. We demand land and soil (colonies) in order to feed our people and to settle our surplus
population.

4. Only he who is a folk-comrade can be a citizen of the state. Only those who are of German
blood, regardless of creed, can be a folk-comrade. Accordingly, no Jew can be a folk-comrade.

5. Whoever is not a citizen shall only be able to live in Germany as a guest, and must be subject
to legislation relating to foreigners.

6. The right to determine the leadership and laws of the state shall belong to citizens of the state
alone. We demand therefore that every public office, no matter of what type, whether in Reich,
province, or municipality, may only be held by citizens.

We oppose the corrupting parliamentary custom of filling posts solely according to party
considerations and without consideration for character or ability.
 187

7. We demand that the state pledge itself above all to providing its citizens with possibilities for
life and opportunities for employment. If it should prove impossible to feed the entire population
of the state, members of foreign nations (non-citizens) are to be expelled from the Reich.

8. Any further immigration of non-Germans is to be prohibited. We demand that all non-

Germans who have entered Germany since 2nd August 1914 be obliged to leave the Reich
immediately.

9. All citizens must have equal rights and duties.

10. It must be the first duty of every citizen to produce, mentally or physically. The activities of
the individual may not conflict with the general public interest, but must be take place within the
framework of the community and for the benefit of all.

We therefore demand:

11. The abolition of incomes unearned by work and effort.

The Breaking of the Slavery of Interest.

12. In view of the immense sacrifices of property and blood which every war demands from a
people, personal enrichment through war must be designated a crime against the Volk. We
therefore demand the complete confiscation of all war profits.

13. We demand the nationalization of all (until now) amalgamated companies (trusts).

14. We demand profit-sharing in large enterprises.

15. We demand a generous expansion of retirement benefits.

16. We demand the creation and maintenance of a healthy middle-class. The immediate
communalization of the big department stores and their leasing to small traders at a cheap rate;
utmost consideration for all small traders when awarding state, provincial, or municipal contracts.

17. We demand a land reform suitable to our national requirements; the passing of a law for the
expropriation of land, without compensation, for the purposes of public benefit. The abolition
of ground-rent and the prohibition of all speculation in land. *

18. We demand relentless struggle against those whose activities are injurious to the common
interest. Persons committing base crimes against the Volk, usurers, profiteers, etc. must be
punished with death, whatever their creed or race.

*
On 13th April, 1928, Adolf Hitler issued the following statement regarding this point of the programme: “With
respect to the mendacious interpretations on the part of our opponents of Point 17 of the programme of the
NSDAP, the following statement is necessary: Since the NSDAP stands in favor of private property, it naturally
follows that the words ‘expropriation without compensation’ refer only to the creation of possible legal remedies for
the confiscation, if necessary, of land which has been acquired in an illegal manner or which is not being managed
in consideration for the public welfare. Accordingly, this is directed in the main against Jewish companies which
speculate in land.” Copies of the programme produced after April 1928 would often contain this amendment at the
end of the document.
 188

19. We demand that Roman Law, which serves a materialistic world order, be substituted by a
German common law.

20. In order to make it possible for every capable and hardworking German to attain higher
education and to thereby move into leading positions, the state must make arrangements for a
thorough-going expansion of our entire national education system. The curricula of all
educational institutions are to be brought into line with the requirements of practical life. An
understanding of the concept of the state (civics) must be imparted by schools very early on, at
the first stages of a child’s comprehension. We demand the education of the intellectually gifted
children of poor parents, regardless of estate or occupation, at the expense of the state.

21. The state must ensure the improvement of national public health through the protection of
mothers and infants; through the prohibition of child labor; through the promotion of physical
fitness by means of legislation providing for compulsory gymnastics and sports; and through
extensive support for all organizations engaged in the physical training of youth.

22. We demand the abolition of the mercenary army and the formation of a People’s Army.

23. We demand a legal battle against deliberate political lies and their dissemination via the press.
In order to facilitate the creation of a German press, we demand that:

a) All editors of and contributors to newspapers which appear in the German language
must be folk-comrades.

b) Non-German newspapers require the express permission of the state to appear. They
may not be printed in the German language.

c) Any non-German financial involvement in or influence over German newspapers must

be prohibited by law, and we demand as the penalty for violations of this law the closure
of any such newspapers, as well as the immediate expulsion from the Reich of the non-
Germans involved.

Newspapers which are not conducive to the public welfare are to be banned. We demand legal
prosecution against all those tendencies in art and literature which exert a corrosive influence
over the life of our Volk, and demand also the closing down of any gatherings or events which
contravene the foregoing demand.

24. We demand freedom for all religious denominations within the state, provided they do not
jeopardize its existence nor offend against the moral and ethical sensibilities of the Germanic
race.

The party, as such, advocates the viewpoint of a Positive Christianity, although without
confessionally binding itself to any particular denomination. It combats the Jewish-materialist
spirit within us and around us, and is convinced that a lasting recovery for our Volk can only take
place from within, on the basis of the principle:

The Common Interest before Self-Interest.

25. In order to carry all of this out, we demand the creation of a strong, central authority within
the Reich.
 189

The unconditional authority of the central political parliament over the entire Reich and over its
organizations in general.

The formation of chambers based upon estate and occupation for the purpose of enacting, within
the individual federal states, the general legislation passed by the Reich.

The leaders of the party promise to relentlessly advocate for the implementation of the foregoing
points, if necessary at the cost of their own lives.

Munich, 24th February 1920

On Behalf of the Party Committee: Anton Drexler. *

Sources:
Ciller, Alois. (1943). Deutscher Sozialismus in den Sudetenländern und der Ostmark, 2nd ed. Hamburg, Germany:
Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt.
Franz-Willing, Georg. (1974). Ursprung der Hitlerbewegung, 1919-1922. Preußisch Oldendorf, Germany: Verlag
K.W. Schütz KG.

*
After Hitler was elected chairman (“with dictatorial powers”) of the NSDAP on 29 July, 1921, future copies of the
programme were amended to replace Drexler’s name with his own. Reference to the Party Committee was also
omitted; instead, newer programmes simply read: “Signed: Adolf Hitler.”
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VII. The Salzburg Programme (1920)

Over 7-9 December, 1919, the first ‘Inter-State Representatives’ Congress of the National Socialists of Greater
Germany’ was held in Vienna, Austria. Chaired by Walter Riehl, the purpose of the Inter-State Congress was to
help direct the activities and policies of the National Socialist parties which had been divided from one another by
the territorial divisions created following the end of the First World War. The first Congress was attended solely by
delegates from the Austrian, Czechoslovakian, and Polish DNSAPs; it was not until the second Congress, held in
Salzburg, Austria over 7-8 August, 1920, that the DSP and NSDAP would also send representatives (Alfred Brunner
and Rudolf Runge as chief spokesmen for the DSP, Anton Drexler and Adolf Hitler as spokesmen for the NSDAP).
At the Salzburg Congress in 1920 a resolution was passed agreeing to close cooperation between all the National
Socialist parties, and to that end a programme was drafted for a new umbrella organization which would help
coordinate relations between all the participating groups: the National Socialist Party of the German Volk
(Nationalsozialistischen Partei des deutschen Volkes, NSPDV). The ‘Salzburg Programme’ of the NSPDV was
almost identical to the programme of the DNSAP, although considerably shortened via removal of most of the
DNSAP’s social and economic demands. This was the result of disagreements at the Congress between the DSP
and DNSAP on one side, and the NSDAP on the other – Hitler was in general opposed to the concept of an
umbrella party, and the decision to water down the NSPDV’s socio-economic proposals was taken partly in order
to appease the Congress’s NSDAP delegates, who were less amenable to the reformist and trade-unionist orientation
of the other National Socialist parties. In the end the NSPDV would prove to be stillborn as a concept. Hitler
resolutely opposed multiple NSDAP-DSP-DNSAP merger attempts over the following years, and the NSPDV
maintained a purely paper-based existence before the whole concept eventually fizzled out as the NSDAP grew to
dominate all the other parties.

Guiding Principles of the

National Socialist Party of the German Volk

The German National Socialist Party seeks the uplift and liberation of the German working-
classes from economic, political, and spiritual oppression and their full equality in all areas of
völkisch and state life.

It professes itself unreservedly to the cultural community and the community of fate of the
German Volk, and is convinced that only within the natural limits of his folkdom can the worker
achieve full value for his labor and intelligence.

It therefore rejects amalgamation on a multi-ethnic basis as unnatural. An improvement in

economic and social conditions is attainable only through the cooperation of all workers on the
soil of their own people. Not revolution and class struggle, but purposeful, creative reform work
alone can overcome today’s untenable social conditions. * Private property in itself is not malign,
insofar as it arises from one’s own honest labor, serves labor, and is limited in size so as not to
damage the common good. We reject, however, all forms of unearned income, such as ground-
rent, interest, and usurious profits squeezed from the misery of one’s fellow man. Against them
we stridently advocate the value of productive labor!

The private economy can never be wholly or violently abolished, yet all forms of social property
should exist alongside it and be increasingly expanded. We advocate unconditionally for all large-
scale capitalist enterprises which constitute private monopolies to be transferred into the
possession of the state, province (völkisch self-governing bodies), or municipality.

*
At the Third Inter-State Representatives’ Congress of the National Socialists of Greater Germany (held in Linz,
Austria, over 13-14 August, 1921), the Congress voted to amend this line of the Salzburg Programme to read: “Not
revolution, but purposeful, creative reform work alone can overcome today’s untenable social conditions.” The
motion to omit the words “and class struggle” was initiated by Rudolf Jung, taking advantage of the NSDAP’s
decision not to attend the Congress in order to reassert the class nature of National Socialism. At the previous Inter-
State Congress, NSDAP delegates in particular had objected to proposals that National Socialism be positioned as
a class-oriented ideology. See the chapter ‘Documents of National Socialism’.
 191

We see the guiding principles for future progress in the purposeful conversion of all others into
cooperative property by steadily increasing the profit-sharing of all those who work within them,
whether physically or intellectually.

The National Socialist Workers’ Party is no narrow class party; it represents the interests of all
honest, productive labor in general. * It is a liberal [freiheitliche] and strictly völkisch party and
hence combats all reactionary tendencies, all clerical, noble, and capitalist privileges, and every
racially-foreign influence – but above all does it combat the overwhelming power of the Jewish-
commercial spirit in all areas of public life.

The influence of work and skill in state and society is our goal, the economic and political unity
of the working German Volk the means to this end.

We demand therefore:

1. Consolidation of the entire area of German settlement in Europe into a democratic, social
German Reich, with the most vigorous protection for all our Volk inhabiting areas ruled by
foreign peoples;

2. Equal and universal suffrage in provinces and municipalities following their prior völkisch
safeguarding; creation of second parliamentary chambers on the basis of occupational
representation;

3. The moral renewal of our Volk, and the development of their religious life in the German
spirit;

4. Protection against any interference in the exercise of national rights, in particular against the
utilization of wage conditions and terms of employment to restrict personal rights to self-
determination;

5. Crackdown against party rule, in particular through the introduction of plebiscites

(referendums) for all far-reaching laws in Reich, state, and province; creation of a People’s Army.

Source:
Jung, Rudolf. (1922). Die nationale Sozialismus: Seine Grundlagen, sein Werdegang, seine Ziele, 2nd ed. Munich,
Germany: Deutscher Volksverlag.

*
At the Third Inter-State Representatives’ Congress in Linz, 1921, the Congress voted to amend this line of the
Salzburg Programme to read: “The German National Socialist Party is the class party of productive labor.” (The
inconsistent naming of the party is taken directly from the original German text, as provided by Jung.) The motion
for amendment was initiated by Max Karg, editor of the DNSAP daily newspaper Der Tag.
 192

VIII. The Guidelines of the DSP (1920)

When the national DSP organization was first founded in Hanover over 24-26 April, 1920, a slightly expanded
version of Brunner’s original 1918 Memorandum was adopted as the party’s programme. Several months later, in
November 1920, Brunner expanded the document again, producing a much more extensive set of ‘Guidelines’
(reproduced below) which were subsequently adopted by the DSP as its foundational programmatic document. The
greater level of detail in the updated Guidelines was intended to assist in broadening the basis for merger notifications
with the NSDAP, which had been ongoing since at least early 1920 and which now seemed to be coming to a close
following the Second Inter-State National Socialist Congress in Salzburg, where the NSDAP and DSP had tentatively
agreed to divide their spheres of activity within the German Reich in preparation for their formal unification in 6
months’ time. Hitler later reneged on this agreement (in a letter of 19 January, 1921 to Walter Riehl he listed the
DSP’s organizational weakness and its commitment to parliamentarism as his primary reasons for rejecting the
merger), and he also directly interfered in further attempts at NSDAP-DSP-DNSAP merger talks: first in a meeting
at the Munich Kindlkeller tavern on 14 April, 1921 (chaired by Rudolf Jung, who left frustrated with Hitler’s
obstinacy), and again at a similar meeting in Augsburg in early July, 1921. Despite this lack of success, the 1920
Guidelines were retained by the DSP as their party programme until the organization’s eventual dissolution in late
1922, when most of the party branches recognized that they were effectively stagnating and no longer capable of
competing with the far more dynamic and revolutionary NSDAP. The DSP’s lack of success was primarily due to
its organizational structure and tactical approach. Like the DNSAP, the DSP was structured democratically, with
leadership positions filled through elections and party policies decided by debate and majority vote. Unlike the
DNSAP, however, the DSP was a weak party which had spread itself thin – many of its branches had no more than
a few dozen members, and the party’s commitment to sedate discussions and dense, theoretical debate (as opposed
to the exciting, uniformed paramilitarism and rowdy meetings of the NSDAP) did little to help it attract public
support and the vital funding needed to expand its activities. When the DSP’s most active and popular branch (the
Nuremberg local, led by Julius Streicher) defected en masse to another National Socialist group on 20 October,
1922, the DSP effectively collapsed. Most party branches chose to amalgamate their resources and memberships
into the NSDAP or the competing German Social Party, while a few lingered on in a kind of twilight existence for
another year or so as micro-parties.

The Guidelines of the German Socialist Party

The German Socialist movement was born out of the realization that neither capitalist
nationalism nor internationalist Marxism will ever prove capable of leading the German Volk
back from their present misery, humiliation, and shame.

Only a sound, true socialism on a völkisch foundation, rejecting class hatred and internationalist
madness, can bring about our recovery.

The struggle against capitalism (i.e., the supercharging of the concept of capital in the form of a
system of unearned income and debilitating interest-slavery) has so far in general been directed
against the concept of capital itself, and thus has impacted that form of capital which creates
value. Social-Democrats and Communists are therefore only engaged in a sham battle against
capitalism. This can be explained by the fact that their leaders are mostly Jews who, as the actual
pillars of the capitalist system, know how to protect it.

But those who oppose Jewry because of its corrosive influence upon the state, Volk, and
economy have also ultimately remained unsuccessful, because they do not wish to adequately
divest themselves of their capitalist views. In order to change this, and to finally create real
freedom for the German Volk, the

German Socialist Party

arose out of the German Socialist movement as the practical form thereof.
 193

Based on the insight above, that true socialism can by its very nature only flourish upon the soil
of folkdom, the DSP addresses itself solely to German-born, anti-capitalist folk-comrades.

The DSP is manifestly a people’s party, and it represents the rights of productive labor against
the class of exploiters, idlers, and profiteers.

Just as it fights against sham democracy, established along Western lines and with a plutocratic
apex, it also combats pure parliamentarism, in which executive power lies solely with elected
deputies. In order to eliminate party maladministration and malign personal influences, the DSP
calls for fundamental new laws to be decided through special referenda. For cultural and
economic laws, occupational representatives (the Chamber of Estates) are to play an equal role
alongside parliament (the People’s Chamber).

Its principal demands are of the most radical kind; the new party does not bother itself with sham
reforms, it goes to the roots of our social adversity. Until now such reforms have been all that
stood in the way of capitalism and of foreign rule. All of our previous parties have been, more or
less, consciously or unconsciously, the trainbearers and pathmakers of both. This is the reason
why, up to now, all political work has been in vain, and has only given rise to sham reforms.

The root cause of all misery lies in our anti-social Roman Law, our false land legislation, our
monetary system, and the political equality of racial and foreign-born aliens.

Accordingly, we demand:

1. Replacement of the Roman Law of the present with German common law. All harm
against our public life is a legal harm. Roman Law was imposed upon our ancestors by
force around 400 years ago by the ruling powers of that period; the Volk resisted and
fought back against it in vain, fully realizing that with its implementation the very ground
beneath their feet, along with other legal rights, had been stripped away. The bloody
Peasants’ Wars, the first great socialist uprisings, were in part attributable to this. Time
and again the peasants demanded the restoration of the old German Law.

Today once more we raise the same demand. It is on you, German Volk, to ensure that
the call does not again go unheeded. This issue is more important than it may seem to
most; it is the linchpin of our future being and existence. Roman Law, devised and
documented during an era of decline, during Rome’s inundation by Orientals, is anti-
social, and it safeguards private gain at the expense of the community; it is a law for the
cunning and the sly. On this un-German legal foundation the social German is always
inferior to the anti-social foreigner. Hence why the German Volk must be given a law in
accordance with their own nature and their own morality, a law which accentuates the old
principle: “Common interest comes before self-interest.”

The deep-seated greed, dishonesty, and immorality in trade and commerce, the
Judaization of our Volk, can all be traced back to the impact of Roman Law, as can the
development of our economy into one of pure private gain, an economic system which
ultimately, under the leadership of Jewish world usury-capital, brought the war and misery
of recent years upon the world.

Our current land legislation and the entire monetary system are based upon this
capitalists’ legislation. Hence why we also demand:
 194

2. Free land and soil, since the cancerous harm afflicting the national economy, as well
as the economies of home and business – including that of the individual folk-comrade
– derives from land rent charges. The indebtedness of the German soil (100 billion
Marks before the War) brings all social and economic evils in its wake: tenement
buildings, the desperate housing situation, infant mortality, national epidemics, poverty,
crime, growing mob mentality, and national disintegration.

This can be remedied by means of fundamentally declaring German land as state

property beyond private ownership, i.e., that the sale of land from private hands to private
hands is in future to be barred. Land is to lose its character as a commodity, the chief
characteristic of commodities being that they are always replaceable: soil, however, is
irreplaceable. Anyone who wants to or who has to sell can only do so to the community,
which issues the land for purchase as Zeitpacht or Erbpacht. Thereupon land may no
longer be used to raise capital in future; it will be declared non-mortgageable.
Accordingly, personal loans will be issued, as opposed to the mortgage loans of today.
All current mortgages, where it is not the case already, are to be declared non-terminable,
short-term, direct reduction mortgages. In this manner German land will be gradually
liberated, and a truly generous settlement is to be made possible. Even the simplest man
will be able to live in his own house upon his own plot. The basis of loan-capitalism lies
in the present free marketability and indebtedness of the soil.

3. Food products are common property, i.e., just as every German has a right to his home
soil, so does he also have a right to its proceeds. To that end the most essential food
products have to get from the producer to the consumer in the fastest and cheapest
manner possible.

These indispensable vital goods must therefore be immune to the profit-driven

manipulations of the stock-exchange, driven by artificial shortages; they must be exempt
from price increases and the burdens of unnecessary middlemen; they must be excluded
from dishonest business operations.

Like land, food products are not a commodity, much less a luxury good.

Our demands would eliminate the artificial scarcity of goods, one of the central pillars of
the capitalist system.

Every available worker would once again be of service in the raising of productivity,
thereby rendering foodstuffs cheaper, which would be to the benefit of national supply.

Through the concept of supply we arrive at the notion of the general obligation to provide
food, which guarantees to everyone that he is able to sustain himself.

4. Nationalization of our monetary system, along with the dismantling of the interest-
economy. This should not be understood to mean the expropriation of working capital,
but rather a rearrangement of the present system. Our financial system lies in private,
specifically international hands. This is an absurdity in itself, since money constitutes the
blood within the national body of the Volk. The state, as the representative of the Volk,
can only truly govern if it possesses power of disposal over the monetary system. Today
money has been alienated from and deprived of its original purpose of being a convenient
 195

medium of exchange between labor and wages, between goods and purchase price,
between producer and consumer; instead money itself is used to make more money again
and yet again via bank fraud and stock-market swindling, without any real work being
involved. – For the majority of our Volk, however, who live off of their own labor, money
today is still nothing more than a medium of exchange, and there is no reason to let it be
debased into an unwholesome means of enrichment for a small number of rapacious
capitalists and speculators at the expense of the productive Volk. Only real work should
be rewarded; we do not need the rampant growth of fortunes into the millions. Our banks
must be nationalized so that they become genuine savings- and credit-institutes,
eliminating the obscene profits of the shareholders as well as the princely salaries and
royalties of their directors. In future, the banks – in conjunction with the Reich
Economics Office (detailed further below) – are to assess newly-established companies
in relation to the real requirements and welfare of the community. Future
creditworthiness will no longer extend to things, but to people. From this it follows that,
as in the past, business must be based upon the competency and honesty of the individual,
through which the requisite tranquility and organic growth will be brought to our
economy. The stock market game is to be rejected as pointless and harmful, and the
trade of financial assets is to be prohibited. Our currency is to be completely and
permanently redesigned, and it must be backed by domestic products.

Perpetual interest, which is predicated upon the immoral assumption (so cunningly
conceived by its inventors and defenders) of capital’s immortality, is in general to be
superseded by an interest payment service which gradually depletes one’s capital, a
preliminary stage to the abolition of interest in general! This would put an end once and
for all to interest-slavery, which originated out of the Orient. After a certain amount of
time every capitalist would have to reckon with the loss of his capital. In due course he
or his successors would have to look around for a new line of work, and for the earnings
arising therefrom.

In the future, only that value which is produced through one’s own labor will lead to the
creation of wealth.

5. Freedom from every form of foreign domination, particularly Jewish rule. Once Jewry
has been recognized as a racially-alien Volk and once it acknowledges itself as such, then
it must be treated accordingly. It will enjoy the protection of the state and official
recognition as a national minority which can elect its own representatives. Naturally,
however, the Jews will also no longer have the right to be the representatives, leaders,
judges, and teachers of the German Volk. We count baptized Jews and Mischlings as part
of the Jewish Volk.

These are the 5 principal demands of the party, through which the unresolved issues of capitalism
and Judaism will be decided for the good of the whole. Anyone born of German blood who
acknowledges the correctness of these demands and observations belongs with us.

Additional demands, which arise logically out of the orientation of the principal demands, are:

6. Progressive transformation of our economy to such an extent that it becomes a true

people’s economy. To that end, the exploitation of wind and water power is to be placed
under the supervision of the state, as is the exploitation of mineral resources.
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Those large-scale enterprises which constitute private monopolies are to be transferred

into the administration of the state, province, or municipality.

The private sector is accepted as part of the implementation of our above-mentioned

principal demands, but alongside it every form of socially-owned and cooperative
enterprise must also be strived after.

In order to counteract the population’s concentration within the major cities – those
tombs of modern humanity – we also demand: The decentralization of industry and the
relocation of the same to the smaller cities and the open country. Semi-sustainability in
industry can be established by allocating land and soil to the workers. Handicrafts, trades,
and small industry especially are to be protected.

7. Preparation of our great estates for the purpose of settlement, based upon the yield
capacity of the individual territories; state-owned domains are to be divided up;
wastelands are to be cultivated. Every German has the right to manage his own land.
Those harmed physically or professionally by the War are to be allotted land for
settlement first and foremost.

8. A tax legislation which assists in the fight against loan capital and which prevents the
rise of supercapitalism. Small assets, accumulated so that someone can sustain themselves
in old age or so that they can support the education of their children, remain tax-free.
Educational costs are to be distributed uniformly across the population.

9. The reshaping of our capitalist electoral code, which only permits parties with
considerable resources to participate in elections. Such electoral humbug is not the will
of the people.

10. Establishment of a Reich Economics Office and a Reich Currency Board which,
guided by a broad variety of perspectives, will direct our entire economy and determine
its limits and its goals. Through close coordination these two authorities must always keep
the production of goods and the circulation of currency in balanced proportion.

11. Creation of a German press independent of capitalism. In view of the fact that 95%
of our press lies in capitalist hands and in the hands of foreigners, and given also that it is
largely run by Jews and is dependent upon the big advertising agencies, fundamental
change therefore seems essential. Today the press does not reflect the mood of the Volk;
instead the mood of the Volk is artificially manufactured in order to satisfy the selfish
plans of capitalists and foreigners, with the Volk unable to recognize these motives.
German newspapers may only describe themselves as being “companies in German
hands” if their directors and assistants are of German blood.

12. In order to deliver them from the capitalist spirit of rapacious materialism and lust
for pleasure, and in order to foster a social ethos within them, we demand the physical
strengthening of our youth – not so that they can compete for consumer goods, but in
order that they might better serve the Volk as a whole.

In place of the regimentation of special schools, the social Einheitsschule is to be

organized and expanded in a timely manner.
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A uniformly-standardized teaching profession is the prerequisite for this.

Furthermore, our schools must be labor and training schools more than schools of
learning. They must work towards the promotion of frugal living, physical fitness, self-
discipline, and analytical abilities. Educational progress is not to be measured according
to one’s knowledge, but by a person’s thirst for learning and by the independence of their
judgement. Schools must cultivate love for one’s own Volk and homeland.

13. As a matter of principle we demand: state unification with German-Austria.

Additionally, we demand protection for the rest of Germandom and alignment with those
peoples [Völker] who are racially or culturally related to us. Also, partnership with
National Socialist movements in other countries.

Emigration is to be prevented as much as is possible; if it cannot be avoided to some

extent as a result of economic pressure, then there is to be a planned management of
emigration to areas suitable for Germandom.

Legislative prohibition against the immigration of racial and cultural aliens, with the
exception of members of the German and Germanic race.

Gradual expulsion of those who have immigrated from the East in the last 10 years, so
long as they are not Germans or Germanics.

14. Politically we call for the revocation of the peace treaties of Versailles and St.
Germain.

To that end, unanimity among all the political parties must be achieved, for without the
annulment of these shameful treaties any efforts towards renewal will be impossible, and
Germany will thereby remain condemned to an everlasting death.

15. We demand a People’s Army in place of the mercenary army.

Accordingly, everyone is to undertake a one-year period of service, either within the army
or in service to the Volksgemeinschaft.

16. Protection of the German worker against foreign labor, which lowers the German
worker’s wages and standard of living.

Full freedom of association for all working people. From this follows: the strongest
protection possible for all those willing to work, and their protection against being
terrorized by those with dissenting opinions.

Since the revolutionary-political class struggle leads increasingly towards economic chaos,
we demand the depoliticization of the trade-unions and a purely economic character for
the works councils.

The full proceeds of labor can never be attained through a schematic socialization, but
only via the abolition of interest-slavery and land-usury.
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We recognize the Volksgemeinschaft’s duty to provide support to all workers of brain

and fist in their old age, or in the event of their incapacity.

17. We are committed to permanency for the civil service, and are of the firm conviction
that the well-earned rights of civil servants must be protected and expanded; we will make
old-age pensions both essential and achievable for all working people once the state has
finally been freed from the usurious grip of international plutocracy.

Any political interference with public officials and teachers is impermissible. Here, too,
nothing must stand in the way of the advancement of the capable and the conscientious.

18. The development and safeguarding of a healthy middle-class; as the core of our
folkdom, this must be one of the most important tasks of the state. Every effort towards
monopolization in this sphere is to be decisively opposed.

The large department stores, as the tombs of the middle-class, must immediately be
transferred to the community and leased out to small traders.

For every consignment to the state, province, or municipality, the middle-class in

particular is to be given special consideration.

19. A healthy family life is the prerequisite for a healthy state structure. The family is and
remains the natural sphere of activity for women. As far as is possible, women must be
withdrawn from their unhealthy competition with men in working life and reintroduced
to their actual occupation.

20. Religion and Christianity find friends and supporters in us. We welcome every effort
which works towards deeper religious understanding and towards the internalization of
the Christian essence.

We are committed to freedom for the religious denominations, provided that they do
not undermine the state nor violate German moral standards.

Without being bound by any particular denomination, we strive for to purify Christianity
of all its Jewish-material accoutrements and to reposition it upon an Aryan-Germanic
foundation.

These demands illustrate the great and economically profound guidelines of our party.

Commodities should no longer stand at the epicenter of our entire politics, administration, and
economy, as before; instead there should stand the German man. Our folkdom is our prosperity.
We do not wish to become richer and richer in money and earthly luxuries, which are beneficial
only to a small number, but instead we wish to be rich in: satisfied German people, who have a
secure livelihood upon their own soil.

Our soaring land prices, our rising rents, the increasingly expensive cost of living, the growth in
taxes, in short, the never-ending turning of the screws – all of these most obvious consequences
of the capitalist system would dissipate if our demands were carried out, if our national wealth
was distributed correctly and fairly and not, as before, concentrated in the hands of the most
unscrupulous. Our entire lives would be made simpler, less expensive, and much more pleasant.
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In place of confinement, eternal agitation, and never-ending worries, instead tranquility,

contentment, and steadfastness would move once more into the hearts of the long-suffering
German Volk.

Our party is the party of the value-creating Volk, regardless of estate.

Those who do not allow themselves to be muddled by slogans, and who can see things clearly,
join us without hesitation. Sham-socialism and capitalism must vanish, like chaff before the wind.

In the German-ruled People’s State, on the basis of community, the Germans shall truly become
the freest Volk on Earth. Thus do we unfurl the green flag of hope! *

Source:
Deutschsozialistische Partei Deutschlands. (1922). Richtlinien der Partei. Sulzbach, Germany: Buchner & Co.
Retrieved from Bundesarchiv Berlin, R 1507 / 307, doc. 3.

*
The “green flag of hope” is an old expression playing upon the color green’s traditional association with spring,
natural renewal, fresh opportunities, etc. The color green was not actually associated with the party in any way.
 200

IX. The Programme of Salvation (1921)

On 23 February, 1921, a new National Socialist party was established in Berlin: the German Social Party
(Deutschsoziale Partei, DtSP), founded by a former school-teacher named Richard Kunze. Kunze was a fairly
notorious völkisch activist who had given up his career in teaching in the early 1900s after becoming heavily involved
in nationalist politics. His rather infamous nickname in Germany was ‘Knüppel-Kunze’ (‘Cudgel-Kunze’), which he
had supposedly acquired after selling rubber truncheons in his newspapers explicitly marketed as “the best and most
effective weapons for use against the Jews” (other stories state that Kunze earned the nickname by carrying a
truncheon or whip himself, which he would explain was for “settling intellectual arguments with Jews”). Following
the end of the War, Kunze joined the bourgeois-nationalist German National People’s Party (Deutschnationale
Volkspartei, DNVP) and worked for a time as that party’s publicist. His decision to leave the DNVP to found his
own party was prompted by the belief that the DNVP was not paying enough attention to social issues and to
ameliorating the economic misery afflicting the German Volk. He was also frustrated that, like other völkisch activists
before him, he had been unable to push the DNVP in a more overtly radical, anti-Semitic direction. The programme
for Kunze’s new party was presented to members at the DtSP’s first national Party Conference in Berlin on 10
October, 1921. The name Kunze adopted for it – The Programme of Salvation – was typical of DtSP propaganda,
which made frequent use of the word “salvation” (“Rettung”) in its leaflets and newspapers, and the programme’s
heavy emphasis on social and economic demands was testament to the fact that the DtSP was intended to be a
reformist rather than a revolutionary National Socialist party. Yet despite this intention, the party still managed to
acquire a reputation for violence. Kunze was a skilled demagogue, known for openly advocating physical attacks
upon the Jews, and his party allied itself with a number of underground radical groups (including, bizarrely, a
German branch of the KKK). Although the DtSP experienced some early electoral successes, winning 4 mandates
in the May 1924 Reichstag elections, the party’s fortunes rapidly waned in the mid-1920s. After a particularly
devastating split in 1927, Kunze and his followers eventually gave in to the inevitable, merging the remaining German
Social branches into the NSDAP in 1930. It should be noted that Kunze and the German Socials, unlike the other
groups in this Appendix, are not mentioned by Jung in his book. Jung was probably aware of Kunze, however (most
of those involved in völkisch politics were), and Kunze was certainly aware of Jung – instructions for DtSP members
on founding their own local party groups listed Jung’s book as a key ideological text.

Programme of the German Social Party (Programme of Salvation)

1.) We demand the immediate alleviation of the economic woes afflicting the productive Volk

a) through reform of the monetary system and the abolition of the current system of
paper currency,

b) through annulment of the burden of debt and the appalling bondage of taxation and
interest,

c) through the elimination of land-usury and through a generous settlement policy that
secures for the settler the proceeds of his labor and protects him from any new interest-
slavery,

d) through the propagation of small and medium-sized rural businesses and an

economically justifiable curtailment of the great estates,

e) through the creation of abundant and healthy housing opportunities in town and
country, and through the establishment of private residential dwellings for workers and
employees,

f) through the expansion and improvement of the cooperative system,

g) through the elimination of profiteering and usury. The most severe punishments are
to be meted out against profiteers and usurers. Moreover, all of their assets, inclusive of
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household luxury items, are to be seized for the purpose of creating employment
opportunities.

2.) We demand the nationalization of the banking system, stock exchange, and insurance
industry.

3.) We demand the setting of a maximum asset limit within which each individual shall be able
to develop freely.

4.) We demand that workers of brain and fist enjoy a share in their company profits.

5.) We reject any indirect taxation which impacts the working masses.

6.) We call for the restriction of chain stores and other big businesses in order to increase the
number of independent tradesmen.

7.) We call for all ill-gotten profits from war and revolution to be confiscated in order to provide
for the victims of war. Widows, orphans, and those disabled by the war must no longer be
relegated to private care.

8.) We demand extensive state welfare for the involuntarily unemployed, as well as for those who
are physically unfit for work. (The expansion of health insurance, disability insurance, and old-
age pensions.)

9.) Public officials and teachers are to be adequately remunerated, and are to have the same rights
and duties as other citizens.

10.) Assets shifted to foreign countries are to be placed at the disposal of the enemy alliance in
order to satisfy its peremptory demands.

11.) We demand the annulment of all contracts concluded since 9th November 1918 via which
state property has been cheaply offloaded onto private individuals or companies.

12.) We advocate tolerance for every religious conviction which does not set itself in conflict with
the Germanic legal and moral outlook.

13.) We demand the conversion of German paragraph-law (more a form of injustice!) into a
German common law which is in accordance with German popular sentiment. *

14.) We demand the reorganization and improvement of the school system in line with the
German spirit, as well as sufficient state funding in support of gymnastics associations, hiking
groups, and sports clubs.

*
“German paragraph-law” (“des deutschen Paragraphenrechts”) is another way of describing what National Socialists
often called “Roman Law”: the mechanical application of the law based on abstract rules (“paragraphs,” i.e., legal
statutes) and reason divorced from emotion. German Law or “German common law,” by contrast, would involve a
more flexible application of the law. Under German Law, for example, a judge’s legal judgements would in part be
determined by open reference to his folkdom (cultural mores) and to the will of the Volksgemeinschaft (community
expectations).
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15.) We call for a pronounced Germanic consciousness to be nurtured within the entire Volk,
along with a militant spirit for the protection of our German Fatherland.

16.) Jewish rule in Germany must be broken at all costs. We do not want to be ruled by Jews,
nor by comrades of the Jews. Therefore we demand:

a) the expulsion of all Jews and other foreigners who have immigrated here since
1.8.1914;

b) the closure of the borders against further immigration;

c) that those Jews remaining in the country are to be placed under legislation relating to
foreigners; Jews may only be admitted to higher schooling in proportion to their number
among Germany’s total population.

17.) The system of government is to be determined by referendum.

18.) We do not recognize the Versailles Peace Treaty, because it

a) does not conform to Wilson’s 14 Points, which constituted the precondition for the
German military’s laying down of its arms;

b) is constantly broken by our enemies.

***

It is impossible to clarify in just a few lines the tremendous importance of the “Programme of
Salvation.”

If you do not wish to go under, ask for one of our information sheets (Head Office or Völkisch
Product Vendor, Berlin, Potsdamer Platz, Köthener Straße 36). In return for a delivery of 2
Marks, these sheets will be sent free to one’s home. A detailed explanation of our demands is
also available in the special edition of the Deutschen Wochenblatte under the heading: “The
Path to Salvation.”

How reasonable and how immensely important our demands are is shown by the fact that
communist, independent, majority socialist, democratic, and right-leaning individuals are already
working for our just cause with ardent zeal. All of these men and women have had enough of
being cheated and deceived.

What we ultimately desire is a ruthless struggle against the exploiters of the productive Volk. We
will no longer allow ourselves to be fobbed off with words and paper banknotes. The hardship
of all wage-laborers, artisans, tradesmen, public officials, private sector employees; the hardship
of the unemployed and the war-wounded; in a word, the hardship of all workers of brain and fist
– this must finally come to an end, which is why we also demand in particular:

1. The immediate partitioning of large apartments and the expropriation of double apartments.

2. A prohibition against converting hotels and private apartments into offices!

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3. Share companies and other commercial enterprises which have converted entire apartments
and houses into office space are to be compelled to build their own commercial offices.

4. The immediate expropriation of fallow building sites at peacetime prices and the rapid
construction of small apartments.

5. A strictly proper, commercial management of municipal enterprises, with their workers and
employees to receive a share of the profits which thereby result.

6. When recruiting civil servants, teachers, and all other specialist positions, only the candidate’s
proven ability may influence the decision. For promotions only performance, never political or
personal reasons, must be decisive.

7. Every civic employee, worker, teacher, and official has the unconditional right to the free
expression of their political opinions.

8. Tuition fees in higher schooling are to be tiered according to the income of the parents, in
order to finally establish a clear path for the capable. Sufficient funds are to be provided for those
without means, so that they may attend university and other academic institutions.

9. When awarding contracts for municipal works and supplies, local businesses of German
extraction must be given foremost consideration. Artisans and small businesses are to be
favoured as far as is possible.

10. The closure of municipal handicrafts enterprises, trading operations, and purchasing
companies, which cause undue harm to artisanry and the trades, whose work is dearer than these.

11. Adequate remuneration for municipal workers, employees, officials, and teachers; family
accommodation is to be procured for those newly-arrived from other locations, if they are
married.

This is the path to salvation; anyone who wishes to traverse it, come to us – we have little money,
but we have the will to act. We will uphold our demands ruthlessly. Whoever does not wish to
perish should immediately join the German Social Party.

Source:
Deutsch-Soziale Partei. (1922). Volksgenossen! Berlin-Friedenau, Germany: Verlag Richard Kunze. Retrieved from
Bundesarchiv Berlin, R 1507 / 306, doc. 118.
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X. Goals of the German Working-Community (1921)

The German Working-Community (Deutsche Werkgemeinschaft, DWG) was established in March, 1921 in
Augsburg by school-teacher Dr. Otto Dickel, and was the last major National Socialist organization founded before
Hitler’s putsch in 1923. The DWG was intended to be a cross-party organization uniting all other like-minded
movements within Germany, as well as a vehicle for the ideas expressed in Dickel’s 1921 political-philosophical
work ‘The Resurrection of the West’ (‘Die Auferstehung des Abendlandes’). Central to Dickel’s worldview was the
concept of the ‘Working-Community’ (Werkgemeinschaft), his term for what he deemed the natural expressions of
Western collectivist spirit in public life: the Germanic family; the clan and tribe; the monasteries and knightly orders;
the guilds and fraternities; and, in more modern times, the trade-unions, cooperatives, works councils, and,
ultimately, the Reich itself. In foreign policy Dickel championed an Anglo-German Federation (“Germany and
England belong together, as closely as Prussia and Bavaria”) as the first step towards a National Socialist League of
Nations (the “Working-Community of the Occidental Nations”). He was anti-Semitic, like all National Socialists,
but relatively moderate in comparison to others in the movement, and was willing to be complimentary towards
individual Jews whom he deemed worthy, such as Walther Rathenau. Dickel also advocated for an intricate
corporatist system of tiered councils of various types, culminating in a ‘Reichstag of Estates’ (Ständereichstag), which
he viewed as the best means of ameliorating social and economic conflict. The most basic elements of DWG
philosophy were summarized by Dickel within the organization’s Goals, reproduced below. For a very brief period
the DWG was somewhat influential in the National Socialist scene – Dickel was directly involved in negotiations in
Augsburg in July, 1921 to merge the NSDAP, DSP, DNSAP, and DWG into a single party (the merger was
scuppered by Hitler), and the popular Nuremberg branch of the DWG was led by influential orator Julius Streicher,
who had defected from the DSP on 1 October, 1921, and brought most of the city’s DSP members over with him.
The DWG continued to be active into the late 1920s, but was largely lacking in impetus after its brief period of
popularity in 1921-22; the NSDAP’s ostracism of the group hampered its influence, as did Streicher’s defection to
the NSDAP on 20 October, 1922, which crippled the DWG’s most active and vital branch.

Goals of the German Working-Community

The goals of the German Working-Community are as follows:

1) ESTABLISHMENT OF GERMAN LAW. A part of this, German land law, which can still
be found in a distorted Roman-Jewish form in the crown fiefs and entailed estates, must be put
into practice immediately. Every German family deserves a debt-free and unindebtable home, a
small entailed property. All natural energy and natural resources located in, on, and above the
soil are the property of the Volk, and are to be exploited in accordance with German feudal law.

2) CREATION OF A GERMAN CONSTITUTION. The party system and parliamentarism

are to be eliminated; self-government is to be introduced in all areas of economic, intellectual,
and political life. This entails a Greater German Reich established upon a federal basis, to which
German families, communities, and tribes from all over the world can affiliate in free self-
determination. Family and community are its natural foundations; from them arise Gau, tribe,
and Volk. German popular representation can only be of an occupational form which, beginning
in the municipality, culminates in the Reichstag of Estates [Ständereichstag].

3) CREATION OF A GERMAN TAX LAW. This involves the elimination of all presently-
existing taxes, with the reclamation of ground-rent as the single tax. This tax is equitable, fair,
non-transferrable, and it also cannot be evaded. It is a tax upon idleness and the lust for power.
It therefore creates cultural values. The reclamation of ground-rent as the single tax, in
conjunction with the immediate abolition of the privileges of the so-called Reichsbank
(established through the Reichsbank Act of 1875) and the conversion of state and municipal
bonds into legal tender, eliminates the big banking system – and thus also bondage of interest –
in a non-violent fashion. This leads to a true social economy of a truly free Volk.
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4) CREATION OF A PEOPLES’ ARMY. Military rights and civil rights are mutually
dependent.

5) GERMANY FOR THE GERMANS! Only those with German blood can be citizens; citizens
alone are entitled to hold public office in the municipality, tribe, and Reich.

6) ORGANIZATION OF THE GERMAN EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM, from elementary

school to university, to be the bearer of the German essence and German culture; to teach
German customs and German rights; to fashion free, patriotic, dynamic, indigenously-oriented
men and women. Self-administration of the educational system, including the school health
system and the national public health service, according to common guidelines in accordance
with the German nature. Jews may not work as teachers in German schools and universities.

7) PROTECTION AND RESPECT FOR RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS. Foreigners are

guaranteed the protection of their religion, provided it is not misused for purposes of völkisch
subversion.

Source:
von Schuh, Wolf. (1922). ‘Deutsche Werkgemeinschaft.’ Deutscher Volkswille, 3(5), p.1. Retrieved from
Bundesarchiv Berlin, R 1507 / 307, doc. 25.
 206

APPENDIX B:
JUNG’S SOURCES AND WRITINGS

In the chapters “Sources” and “National Socialist Books and Writings,” Jung provides a list of
those works he referenced during the writing of his book, as well as a listing of various National
Socialist ideological texts which were available to readers to purchase in 1922. Because most of
these books and pamphlets are unavailable in English, the translated names which I have
provided for them in those chapters may not be useful to any readers interested in locating copies
for themselves. For that reason I have included the original German titles of these texts below,
and have marked with an asterisk * those books which I know are available in English.

I. Sources
A. Damaschke: Die Bodenreform.
-----------------------: Geschichte der Nationalökonomie.
Dr. R Danneberg: Das sozialdemokratische Programm.
Ing. G. Feder: Manifest zur Brechnung der Zinsknechtschaft des Geldes. *
---------------------: Der kommende Steuerstreik.
Th. Fritsch: Handbuch der Judenfrage.
S. Gesell: Natürliche Wirtschaftsordnung. *
H. George: Fortschritt und Armut. *
H. Claß (Einhart): Deutsche Geschichte.
Dr. P. Lensch: Die Sozialdemokratie, ihr Ende, und ihr Glück
O. Spengler: Preußentum und Sozialismus. *
H. Ford: Der internationale Jude, ein Weltproblem. *
Dr. P. Tafel: Das neue Deutschland, ein Rätestaat auf nationaler Grundlage.

II. National Socialist Books and Writings

Ferdinand Burschofsky: Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutschnationalen Arbeiterbewegung in
Österreich.
Ferdinand Ertl: Über die Hürden.
-----------------------: Die wahre deutsche Schande.
-----------------------: Die Zukunftsbesoldung der Angestellten.
Ing. Gottfried Feder: Das Manifest zur Betrachtung der Zinsknechtschaft des Geldes. *
--------------------------------: Der Staatsbankerott, die Rettung.
--------------------------------: Der kommende Steuerstreik.
Ing. Rudolf Jung: Boden- und Geldreform.
--------------------------: Sozialisierung.
--------------------------: Aufgaben der Gemeindepolitik.
--------------------------: Leitsätze der deutschnationalen Gewerkschaftsbewegung.
--------------------------: Vom Bismarckreich in den Sumpf der Erzbergerei.
 207

--------------------------: Denkschrift der deutschen Arbeiterpartei 1915.

--------------------------: Der Völkerstreit in der Sozialdemokratie.
--------------------------: Revolutionärer oder reformerischer Sozialismus?
Hans Krebs: Katechismus der deutschen Arbeiterbewegung.
-------------------: Sozialdemokratie von heute.
-------------------: Macht und Recht.
Dr. W. Riehl: Unser Endziel.
---------------------: Unsere deutsche Arbeiterjugendbewegung.
Dr. A. Schilling: Kritische Studie des Marxismus und der Sozialdemokratie.
------------------------: Probleme der Arbeiterbewegung.
------------------------: Die Sozialdemokraten als Umlerner.
------------------------: Einführung in das nationalsozialistische Gemeindeprogramm.
------------------------: Die geistigen Arbeiter und der Sozialismus.
------------------------: Sozialdemokratische Worte und Taten.
------------------------: Die wissenschaftlichen Grundlagen des nationalen Sozialismus.
Theodor Wollschack: Warum ich aus der sozialdemokratischen Partei austrat.
208