Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler

system, where the names and particulars of all the members are enrolled. The financing of
the party has been placed on sound lines. The current expenditure must be covered by the
current receipts and special receipts can be used only for special expenditures. Thus,
notwithstanding the difficulties of the time the movement remained practically without any
debts, except for a few small current accounts. Indeed, there was a permanent increase in
the funds. Things are managed as in a private business. The employed personnel hold their
jobs in virtue of their practical efficiency and could not in any manner take cover behind
their professed loyalty to the party. A good National Socialist proves his soundness by the
readiness, diligence and capability with which he discharges whatever duties are assigned to
him in whatever situation he holds within the national community. The man who does not
fulfil his duty in the job he holds cannot boast of a loyalty against which he himself really
sins.
Adamant against all kinds of outer influence, the new business director of the party firmly
maintained the standpoint that there were no sinecure posts in the party administration for
followers and members of the movement whose pleasure is not work. A movement which
fights so energetically against the corruption introduced into our civil service by the various
political parties must be immune from that vice in its own administrative department. It
happened that some men were taken on the staff of the paper who had formerly been
adherents of the Bavarian People's Party, but their work showed that they were excellently
qualified for the job. The result of this experiment was generally excellent. It was owing to
this honest and frank recognition of individual efficiency that the movement won the hearts
of its employees more swiftly and more profoundly than had ever been the case before.
Subsequently they became good National Socialists and remained so. Not in word only, but
they proved it by the steady and honest and conscientious work which they performed in the
service of the new movement. Naturally a well qualified party member was preferred to
another who had equal qualifications but did not belong to the party. The rigid determination
with which our new business chief applied these principles and gradually put them into
force, despite all misunderstandings, turned out to be of great advantage to the movement.
To this we owe the fact that it was possible for us – during the difficult period of the inflation,
when thousands of businesses failed and thousands of newspapers had to cease publication
– not only to keep the commercial department of the movement going and meet all its
obligations but also to make steady progress with the Völkische Beobachter. At that time it
came to be ranked among the great newspapers.
The year 1921 was of further importance for me by reason of the fact that in my position as
chairman of the party I slowly but steadily succeeded in putting a stop to the criticisms and
the intrusions of some members of the committee in regard to the detailed activities of the
party administration. This was important, because we could not get a capable man to take on
a job if nincompoops were constantly allowed to butt in, pretending that they knew
everything much better; whereas in reality they had left only general chaos behind them.
Then these wise-acres retired, for the most part quite modestly, to seek another field for their
activities where they could supervise and tell how things ought to be done. Some men
seemed to have a mania for sniffing behind everything and were, so to say, always in a
permanent state of pregnancy with magnificent plans and ideas and projects and methods.
Naturally their noble aim and ideal were always the formation of a committee which could
pretend to be an organ of control in order to be able to sniff as experts into the regular work
done by others. But it is offensive and contrary to the spirit of National Socialism when
incompetent people constantly interfere in the work of capable persons. But these makers of
committees do not take that very much into account. In those years I felt it my duty to
safeguard against such annoyance all those who were entrusted with regular and responsible
work, so that there should be no spying over the shoulder and they would be guaranteed a
free hand in their day's work.