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Hitler said ALOT of things, all of which were veihcles to get him where he was going. He was for it before he was against it.UnionistsHitler?s appointment as German Chancellor on 30thJanuary 1933 was followed by attacks on unionmembers and their offices in at least 45 towns inGermany in the following two months. However, theunions rejected calls from some of their leaders for ageneral strike because they believed that this wouldgive the Nazis an excuse to take even more violentaction against them. Instead, they controversiallydecided that the best way of ensuring survival was todistance themselves publicly from the SPD and to try tocooperate with the Nazis. The Nazi leadership cynicallyencouraged this policy by making 1st May (thetraditional workers? day) a national holiday and invitingunion leaders to take part in the celebrations.The Nazis? true intentions were revealed just a day later.On 2nd May 1933, stormtroopers violently occupiedoffices of the Free Trade Unions across Germany.In the city of Duisburg, four officials were beaten todeath by Nazi thugs in the cellar of the trade unionheadquarters. Many more union leaders were arrestedand held in prison or concentration camps, and wereoften beaten up or tortured. Although most of themwere released after a few weeks or months, theycontinued to be monitored by the Gestapo (the Nazisecret police) and faced the risk of being rearrested.Additionally, many former union officials were placed ona blacklist which meant that they could not find work inthe factories.The Christian and liberal trade unions voluntarilysubmitted to Nazi control a day after the attack on theFree Trade Unions who were then abolished in June1933. Unions were replaced by a Nazi Partyorganisation, the German Labour Front (DAF), whichalso seized all of the money and property that hadbelonged to the unions. All German workers wererequired to be members of the DAF, even those whohad never belonged to a trade union, making it thebiggest organisation in Nazi Germany with more than20 million members by the late 1930s.The DAF did provide some benefits for its members,including training schemes and the Strength throughJoy (KdF) programme which offered subsidised leisureactivities such as sports and holidays to favouredworkers. The working class also gained from the rapidfall in unemployment after 1933. However, the DAF?sclaim that it represented the workers was clearly nottrue: all collective bargaining (the right to negotiatewages and conditions with employers) was abolishedas was the right to strike. Instead, pay and workingconditions were decided by officials appointed by Hitler.As a result, workers found themselves having to worklonger hours. By 1939 the average working week hadincreased by 20 per cent. The DAF was also used tospread Nazi propaganda and to identify workers whowere hostile to Nazism.Some former union leaders tried to encourageresistance to the Nazis but this was difficult due tosurveillance and repression by the Gestapo. After thefailed July Bomb Plot against Hitler in 1944, some ofthem were executed or sent to Dachau concentrationcamp. It is unknown just how many German tradeunionists were arrested by the Nazis between 1933and 1945 but the number was certainly in thethousands, not least because many were also membersof the SPD which further made them Nazi targets.Although relatively few were murdered outright, manysuffered prolonged imprisonment and physicalmaltreatment as well as loss of work and continuedpolice harassment. After the collapse of Nazism, unionswere restored with full legal rights in West Germany.They continue to play an important role in modernday Germany.
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(VISITOR) AUTHOR'S NAME
Sheila
MESSAGE TIMESTAMP
16 december 2014, 22:49:17
AUTHOR'S IP LOGGED
62.210.78.179
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