From: mars1933@hotmail.com   
      
   Hitler's 1932 Election Campaign 'Stump Speech'   
   How the National Socialists Won Broad Support in Hard-Fought Contests   
   for Votes   
      
   Foreword by Mark Weber   
      
      
   For Germans 1932 was a year of mass unemployment, economic paralysis,   
   and a broken, unresponsive political system. The world economic   
   downturn, known in the US as the Great Depression, had shattered   
   production and business life. This was also a year of intense   
   campaigning in four fiercely fought nationwide elections - two for the   
   Reichstag or parliament, and a two-part presidential contest.   
      
   The most pressing issue in these campaigns was, of course, the   
   economic calamity that had brought widespread misery and put millions   
   out of work. Because the "establishment" political parties were   
   utterly unable to get a grip on the nation's economic ills, growing   
   numbers of citizens turned with hope to the radical Communists or   
   National Socialists.   
      
   During this final year of Germany's liberal democratic "Weimar   
   Republic" system, one inept administration after another tried to   
   tackle the nation's daunting problems. Lacking popular support or   
   backing from a majority in the Reichstag, each President-appointed   
   Chancellor governed only by authority of the constitution's "emergency   
   decree" clause.   
      
   In the 1932 presidential election campaign, Germany's "establishment"   
   parties, including the leftist Social Democrats and several "centrist"   
   parties, supported Paul von Hindenburg - the 84-year-old incumbent who   
   had served as Reichspräsident since 1925. His most formidable   
   challenger was Adolf Hitler, the 43-year-old leader of the National   
   Socialists. No candidate in the March 13 election received an outright   
   majority, although 30 percent voted for Hitler, and 13 percent for the   
   Communist Party leader. This set off a new round of feverish   
   campaigning for the April 10 run-off election, in which von Hindenburg   
   garnered 53 percent of the votes, thereby remaining President. Hitler   
   increased his share of votes, gaining 37 percent of the total.   
      
   Adding to the year's fatiguing round of electioneering were contests   
   for provincial legislatures. In the April 24 elections in several   
   German regions or states, the National Socialists emerged as the most   
   popular party. The victory of Hitler's movement was most significant   
   in Prussia - by far the largest German Land or state, with   
   three-fifths of the nation's population.   
      
   In the fiercely contested Reichstag election of July 31, in which 84   
   percent of eligible voters cast ballots, the National Socialists   
   emerged as the largest party, by far, with 37 percent of the total. In   
   second place came the Social Democrats, with 22 percent, followed by   
   the Communist Party with 15 percent. In the hard-fought November 6   
   Reichstag election, the National Socialists once again came out as   
   Germany's most popular party, with 33 percent of the total. The Social   
   Democrats trailed in second place with 20 percent, followed by the   
   Communists with 17 percent.   
      
   The most dedicated activists in these decisive election contests were   
   unquestionably the supporters of Hitler's National Socialist Party   
   (NSDAP). In countless well organized meetings, through production and   
   distribution of millions of posters, flyers and brochures, and in a   
   wide range of daily, weekly and monthly Party newspapers and   
   magazines, the movement's legions of speakers, artists, writers and   
   other volunteers reached out to voters in cities, towns and villages   
   across the country. "Thanks to the extraordinary talents of its   
   leader, the wide appeal of its propaganda, and the success of its   
   tactics in dealing with the Mittelstand [middle class] organizations,"   
   wrote American historian Gordon Craig, "the National Socialist party   
   exuded strength and confidence ..."   
      
   A crucial factor in the party's appeal was its emphatic call for   
   national unity and unselfish devotion to the common good. This was   
   unusual at the time. "In contrast to almost all of the other parties   
   in the Weimar period," noted Prof. Craig, "the National Socialist   
   party did not direct its propaganda towards a single social or   
   economic class or grouping of interests." By conscientiously reaching   
   out to all Germans - regardless of class, region or religious outlook   
   - the Hitler movement became the country's first "modern" political   
   party.   
      
   Hitler also worked harder than any other political leader. He   
   crisscrossed the country by airplane (the first politician anywhere to   
   do so) to address large meetings, sometimes several in a single day.   
   During 1932 he gave a total of 209 public speeches. On one day, July   
   27, Hitler addressed a rally of 60,000 people in Brandenburg, and then   
   to nearly as many in Potsdam, and in the evening he spoke to 120,000   
   gathered in a large stadium in Berlin, while an additional 100,000   
   heard his voice outside on loudspeakers. On July 20 poor weather   
   delayed his arrival by airplane and auto to address a mass rally in   
   Stralsund, which was to begin at 9:00 in the evening. At midnight the   
   outdoor gathering of some 20,000 people was told that Hitler would   
   arrive at 1:30 a.m. Still they waited. It wasn't until 2:15 in the   
   morning that he was finally able to address the large crowd.   
      
   Hitler's rare ability to present his views clearly and convincingly to   
   both individuals and large audiences, and to win the confidence and   
   loyalty of exceptionally talented men as devoted colleagues, were   
   crucial to his success in building and maintaining a vast,   
   professionally run national organization. "Among all of the prominent   
   figures in the Weimar period," wrote Prof. Craig of Stanford   
   University, "he [Hitler] is the only one of whom it can be said   
   unequivocally that he possessed political genius."   
      
   Hitler has often been portrayed as a ranting demagogue who won support   
   with simplistic slogans, empty promises and crude appeals to feelings   
   of resentment, fear and envy. That image is not accurate. If it had   
   corresponded to reality, the National Socialists would not have won   
   the support of so many German voters - who were among the best   
   informed, best educated and most discerning in the world.   
      
   In fact, the message of Hitler's movement was more substantive and   
   self-consistent than that of any other German political formation. Of   
   the many parties that competed for votes in the 1932 elections, only   
   the National Socialists presented a comprehensive program to tackle   
   the economic crisis that laid out specific measures (which were later   
   implemented after taking power).   
      
   The National Socialists stressed that only a new outlook that rejected   
   narrow, sectarian self-interest and put the needs of the entire nation   
   first would enable the German people to build a healthy new order of   
   social stability, economic security, prosperity, and enduring   
   well-being for all.   
      
   Two weeks before the July 1932 Reichstag elections, the National   
   Socialist Party issued a phonograph record with a recorded address by   
      
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