Germany One People--Two Flags

One People--Two Flags

Paul von Hindenburg swore eternal fealty to the Hohenzollern Crown--yet permitted himself to be elected President. Elected and reelected, he twice swore as President to preserve, protect and defend the Republican Constitution, Article 3 of which reads: The national colors are black- red-gold.

Power to alter this national flag is not vested in the President, even by Article 48 which permits him to invoke many extraordinary powers. Therefore last week Old Paul broke his oath and violated the Constitution when he issued an edict triumphantly read to Germans over the radio at 2 p. m. by Chancellor Adolf Hitler.

" 'I ordain,' " read the Chancellor quoting the President, " 'that, from tomorrow until a definitive ruling on the national colors, the black-white-red banner* and the swastika flag [Nazi] are to be hoisted in common. These flags link together the glorious past of the German Reich and the mighty rebirth of the German nation. In common they shall incorporate the power of the State and the internal unity of all the national forces of the German people. Military buildings will fly only the Imperial war flag. ' "/-

While most Germans were staggered by this edict, the Official German Press Censor nonchalantly passed the following comment by Correspondent John Elliott, Chief of the New York Herald Tribune's Berlin Bureau: "The prestige of President von Hindenburg among the Republican portion of the population is completely ruined by today's developments. He no longer commands the confidence of the entire nation as he did a year ago. He was re-elected at that time by the Republican vote in the confident expectation that he would preserve the Constitution. In this belief the German Republicans have been sorely deceived."

Obviously the more complete Paul von Hindenburg discredits himself in the eyes of the world, the better for ambitious Adolf Hitler who last week was in effect Dictator of Germany with complete control of press censorship.

Speaking for himself, after he had quoted Old Paul's edict, Handsome Adolf cried: "The President has ordained that the banner of the National Revolution from now on is to fly on State and public buildings by the side of our unforgettable and time-honored banner of the old German Reich! By this marriage the victory of the National Revolution is made outwardly visible. A 14-year battle for power has now found its symbolic conclusion. It is up to us to see that this power never again is wrested from us."

Nazis Amuck. A Dictator, once he feels secure in the saddle, always tries to curb and discipline his followers who have invariably run more or less amuck. The U. S. Embassy reported to the German Government last week eight cases of assault by Nazis upon U. S. citizens (seven of them Jews) in the Reich, received no apology, only "official regrets." Throughout the Reich German Jews were beaten in numbers (censored) which apparently ran into hundreds.

On the night before Dictator Hitler's radio speech, ruddy-cheeked young Nazis ran amuck through virtually all the night clubs of Berlin, smashed china & glassware on general principles to the accompaniment of piercing screams of richly-dressed women.

When a night-club party of Frenchmen indomitably stated their right to continue sipping champagne, boiling-mad Nazis pulled the cloth off the Frenchmen's table with an impressive clatter, bellowed, "Schweinehunde! dancing and guzzling after midnight when 6,000,000 Germans are without work and food!"

The Frenchmen departed, the Nazis not daring to touch them because of the might and proximity of France.

"Blindest Discipline." Addressing his Nazis by radio, Dictator Hitler cried: ''As your leader, and in the name of the Government of National Revolution, I call upon you to guard the honor and dignity of the new regime--that it may pass with honor and dignity into history. . . . Henceforward the fight for cleaning up and setting the Reich in order will be a planned fight, directed from above. I therefore enjoin on you, from now on, the strictest and blindest discipline. Henceforward all individual actions must cease!"

"Pure Rising." Naturally a new Dictator's thoughts turn to securing the rights of private property & capitalist enterprise. "It is our task," postulated Dictator Hitler, "to give the German people and. above all. German business a feeling of unquestioned security. ... In commanding you [Nazis] to safeguard the purity of our National rising, I also thank you for the excess of faithfulness, discipline and sacrifices that you have made for me."

Absurdity & States. The absurdity of endowing a nation simultaneously with two national flags will be rectified, Germans understood last week, by an act of the Reichstag to superimpose the Nazi swastika on the former black, white & red Imperial banner, thus creating a brand new flag for Germany.

Much like U. S. banks, the German states have been highly jealous of their independence, have ever resisted that complete national unification for which even Prince Bismarck strove in vain. Last week, while U. S. banks were hurrying to apply for membership in the Federal Reserve system, Dictator Hitler sent Storm Troops to bring all German states under his Government's centralized authority. In a twinkling that was accomplished which might otherwise have taken years. Most dramatic was the merging of Bavaria.

In Munich polite siege was laid to the State Government of Catholic Premier Dr. Heinrich Held of Tiavaria by apple-cheeked youngsters trying to look grim in their brown shirt uniforms. They were led by Captain Ernst Roehm, the National Storm Troops' queer sub-commander.* Premier Held, reluctant to have dealings with such a person as Captain Roehm, nevertheless accepted a decree signed by President von Hindenburg (under his emergency powers to seize any part of Germany "if there be danger of Communist excesses").

About 4 p. m., when Captain Roehm again called on Dr. Held, the Premier resigned after stating the fact that "conditions for the application of this decree are completely lacking, because peace and order and prevention of Communist excesses are secured beyond a doubt by the resources of the State."

Ousted ex-Premier Held telegraphed to the Berlin Dictator his protest and abhorrence of Dictator Hitler's methods. Then, clapping on his hat, he walked out through serried ranks of Captain Roehm's young men.

Shame & Marx. In Nazi eyes nudism is a vice to be exterminated at all costs. Some 500,000 Germans, male & female, belong to nudist clubs. Suppressing them all by a single, nation-wide order, Nazi Minister-Without-Portfolio Hermann Wilhelm Goring denounced "the so-called cult of nudism" as "one of the greatest dangers to German culture and morals."

"In women," said Herr Goring, "nudism deadens the sense of shame, and in men it destroys respect for womanhood."

Communism being worse than nudism, the Hitler Government confiscated Karl Liebknecht House (the Communist headquarters in Berlin worth some $120,000), transformed it into a Nazi bivouack, announced that the life-size bronze statue of Karl Marx in the central hallway will be recast into busts of Adolf Hitler.

* 0f the Imperial & Royal House of Hohenzollern and of the German Empire.

/- A white flag, divided into four fields by a black cross.

* Chancellor Hitler takes the position that Captain Roehm's notorious and self-admitted unnatural conduct has no bearing upon politics. Portions of the Captain's correspondence with his medical advisers on the subject of young men are printed in Not To Be Repeated (Ray Long & Richard R. Smith-$3).

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