Der Fuehrer - Hitler's Rise to Power (1944) - Heiden

568 DER FUEHRERMinister Schaeffer out of their beds and beat them to a pulp. PrinceRupprecht, who had nearly been proclaimed regent, rapidly set out forGreece On March 10, Hitler in Berlin issued a joyous proclamation tohis party comrades: 'A gigantic upheaval has taken place in Germany,'he said. This was the 'national revolution.' From this day on, theNational Socialists, throughout the country, called their enterprise arevolution.The looting of Jewish shops, the theft of automobiles, the violentexpropriation of businesses and houses; the torture and murder ofpolitical enemies had swollen to an orgy of mass terror; once again themelancholy lesson of history was confirmed, that nothing turns peopleso rapidly into beasts as a great cause. And yet, humanity rebelledagainst this hideous form of greatness; people who had voted NationalSocialist, even on March 5, grumbled; the Deutsche AllgemeineZeitung, a newspaper close to industry, had courage to protest. In hisproclamation, Hitler wrung his hands and asked for an end of theatrocities; delicately, he referred to the misdeeds of his men as'molestation of individual persons, obstruction of autos, and interferencewith business life'; this, he said, must stop. On March 12, he flewvictoriously to Munich, alighted from the plane and made a littlespeech: 'Years ago I here took up the struggle, the first part of whichmay now be considered as ended. A coordination (Gleichschaltung) ofpolitical life, such as we have never before experienced, has beencompleted.'One people, one state, one machine, one stream — that is what Hitlermeant by his engineer's term; society can be guided; we have discoveredthis, and that is why we have our hand on the controls. Only seven daysbefore, the German people had examined its conscience in the solitudeof the election booth, and its majority had rejected Hitler; but thissolitude was at an end when the S.A. filled the streets and shouted up atthe windows: 'Flags out!' The people were now drawn into the 'streetsand squares,' by the ruse of pageantry, but also by the violence of fistsknocking on doors and voices speaking through the keyhole: 'Everyoneout to hear the Leader's speech.'The omnipresence of society, which embraces the individual in everystate form, began to grow noisy. Hitler liked to maintain