Nuremberg Rally
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The Nuremberg Rally (officially, Reichsparteitag, literally "imperial party congress") was the annual rally of the National Socialist German Workers Party in the years 1923 to 1938 in Germany. Especially after Hitler's rise to power in 1933, they were big propaganda events by the state. The Reichsparteitage were held annually in Nuremberg from 1934 to 1938 and are thus usually referred to in English as the Nuremberg Rallies.
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The Nuremberg Rallies
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The first rallies by the NSDAP took place 1923 in Munich and 1926 in Weimar. From 1927 on, they ran exclusively in Nuremberg. Nuremberg was selected for pragmatic reasons: It was situated in the center of the German Reich and the local Luitpoldhain was well suited as a venue. In addition, the NSDAP was able to rely on the well organized local strand of the party in Franconia, then lead by Gauleiter Julius Streicher. The Nuremberg police were sympathetic to the event. Later, the location was justified by putting it into the tradition of the Reichstag in the Holy Roman Empire. After 1933, they were held in the first half of September under the label of Reichsparteitage des deutschen Volkes ("imperial party congress of the German people"), which was meant to symbolize the solidarity with the people in accordance with national socialist ideology. This point was further emphasized by the yearly growing number of participants, which finally reached over half a million members from all sections of the party, the army and the state.
Every rally was given a programmatic title, which related to recent national events.
- 1933 The title "Rally of Victory" (Reichsparteitag des Sieges) relates to the seizing of power and the victory over the Weimar Republic.
- 1934 This rally initially did not have a theme. Later it was labeled "Rally of Unity and Strength" (Reichsparteitag der Einheit und Stärke), "Rally of Power" (Reichsparteitag der Macht) or, relating to the movie by Leni Riefenstahl, "Rally of Will" (Reichsparteitag des Willens).
- 1935 "Rally of Freedom" (Reichsparteitag der Freiheit). 'Freedom' refers to the reintroduced compulsory military service and thus the 'liberation' from the Treaty of Versailles.
- 1936 "Rally of Honor" (Reichsparteitag der Ehre): The invasion of the demilitarized Rheinland, in the eyes of the NSDAP leadership, constituted the restoration of German honor.
- 1937 In the "Rally of Labor" (Reichsparteitag der Arbeit) what was referred to was the reduction of unemployment since the rise to power.
- 1938 Because of the annexation of Austria to the German Reich, this event was called "Rally of Great Germany" (Reichsparteitag Großdeutschland).
- 1939 The name "Rally of Peace" (Reichsparteitag des Friedens) was to reiterate the German will to peace, to the population and other countries. It was cancelled on short notice, as one day before the planned date on September 1st, Germany began its offensive against Poland.
Procedure
The primary aspect of the Nuremberg Rallies was the almost religious focus on Adolf Hitler. As national redeemer and leader of providence he faced the gathered masses. They listened to his speeches, sweared by his name and marched in front of him. Representing the Volksgemeinschaft as a whole, they were to demonstrate the might of the German people. The visitors of the rallies by their own free will were subordinate to the discipline and order in which they should be reborn as a new people.
An important part of the Nuremberg Rallies also were the numerous deployments and parades of all the organisations of the NS-state (Wehrmacht, SS, SA, Hitler Youth etc.) and proclamation of important cornerstones of national socialist policy. As such, the Nuremberg Race Laws were made public in 1935 to "protect German blood". However, the demonstration of power was not limited to the off-site rally grounds: The formations also marched through the center of the old town, in front of Hitler and an oftentimes enthusiastic crowd. On the Marktplatz ("market place", Adolf-Hitler-Platz since 1933), wooden tribunes were erected. The rows of people walking through the flag-decorated historic town reinforced the intended connection between the Reichtag in the Roman Empire and the rallies of the Third Reich. The long history of Germany replaced the lacking history of the national socialist movement.
Between 1935 and 1938, the event also included a presentation of Richard Wagner's Meistersinger on the evening of the first day. Hitler was a great admirer of Richard Wagner and the opera then stood for the heroic-German worldview.
Propaganda movies
For each of the rallies of 1933 and 1934 Leni Riefenstahl created one documentary movie. Relating to the theme of the rally, she called her first movie Sieg des Glaubens. However this movie was taken out of circulation after the Röhm-Putsch. The propaganda event of 1934 was worked into the movie Triumph of the Will (Triumph des Willens), using 16 teams of cameramen. For the effective and energetic pictures she was rewarded with the German Film Prize (Deutscher Filmpreis) and a golden medal in Venice. After the war, the presentation of the feature was prohibited in Germany, due to its glorifying view of the Nazi regime.
