Why was bruning called the hunger chancellor

Unemployment was rising and Russia had been in a similar situation that had lead to the first revolution in March The feeling of hopelessness could only benefit the extreme parties that existed in Weimar. The theory behind this plan was simple:. And Schleicher was now at work behind the scenes to further undermine him.

On November 17, Papen went to Hindenburg and told him he was unable to form any kind of working coalition, then resigned. Two days later, Hitler requested a meeting with Hindenburg. Once again Hitler demanded to be made chancellor. Once again he was turned down. This time however, Hindenburg took a friendlier tone, asking Hitler, soldier to soldier, to meet him half way and cooperate with the other parties to form a working majority, in other words, a coalition government.

Hitler said no. On November 21st, Hitler saw Hindenburg again and tried a different approach. He read a prepared statement claiming that parliamentary government had failed and that only the Nazis could be counted on to stop the spread of Communism.

He asked Hindenburg to make him the leader of a presidential cabinet. Hindenburg said no, and only repeated his own previous requests. Meanwhile, a group of the country's most influential industrialists, bankers, and business leaders sent a petition to Hindenburg asking him to appoint Hitler as chancellor.

They believed Hitler would be good for business. Hindenburg was in a terrible bind. He called in Papen and Schleicher and asked them what to do. Papen came up with a wild idea. He would be chancellor again and rule only by decree, eliminate the Reichstag altogether, use the Army and police to suppress all political parties and forcibly amend the constitution. It would be a return to the days of Empire, with the conservative, aristocratic classes ruling. Schleicher objected, much to Papen's surprise.

Schleicher said that he, not Papen, should head the government and promised Hindenburg he could get a working majority in the Reichstag by causing a rift among the Nazis. Schleicher said he could get Gregor Strasser and as many as 60 Nazi deputies to break from Hitler. Hindenburg was dumbfounded and finally turned to Papen and asked him to go ahead and form his government. After Hindenburg left the room, Papen and Schleicher got into a huge shouting match.

At a cabinet meeting the next day, Schleicher told Papen that any attempt by him to form a new government would bring the country to chaos. He insisted that the Army would not go along and then produced a Major Ott who backed up his claims. Schleicher had been at work behind the scenes to sway the Army to his point of view. Papen was in big trouble. He went running to Hindenburg, who, with tears rolling down his cheeks, told Papen there was no alternative at this point except to name Schleicher as the new chancellor.

But I am too old and have been through too much to accept the responsibility for a civil war. Our only hope is to let Schleicher try his luck," President Hindenburg told Papen. There now began an incredible amount of behind-the-scenes political intrigue and backstabbing that would put Hitler in power in only 57 days.

To begin with, Schleicher made good on his promise to try to split the Nazis. He held a secret meeting with Gregor Strasser, a Nazi who had been with Hitler from the start, and offered him the vice-chancellorship and control of Prussia.

To Strasser, the offer was quite appealing. The Nazi Party's recent decline, losing millions of votes and now experiencing terrible financial problems, seemed to indicate that Hitler's rigid tactics might not be the best thing for long-term success. Strasser had also acquired a distaste for the brutal men who now made up Hitler's inner circle.

Through Papen, Hitler found out what was going on. Strasser insisted that Hitler and the Nazis cooperate or at least tolerate the Schleicher government. Hitler sided with them against Strasser. Two days later, Strasser and Hitler met again and wound up getting into a huge shouting match. Strasser accused Hitler of leading the Party to ruin.

Hitler accused Strasser of stabbing him in the back. The following day, Strasser wrote a letter to Hitler, resigning all of his duties as a member of the Nazi Party. Hitler and the Nazi leaders were stunned.

One of the founding members and most influential leaders had abandoned them. The Nazi Party seemed to be unraveling. Hitler became depressed, even threatening to shoot himself with a pistol. And I tell you the last is the worst of them all. This is Satan in human form," declared Gregor Strasser in Hitler assigned his trusted aid, Rudolf Hess, to take over Strasser's duties.

Over the Christmas season, Hitler became quite depressed over the failing fortunes of his Party. By this time, support for the Nazis had dropped. In the November elections the Nazi vote fell from But they were still the biggest party.

He offered Hitler the role of Chancellor in a government provided von Schleicher was in charge of defence. Hitler refused. Without Nazi support, von Schleicher was unable to gain parliamentary support for his government. Von Papen wanted revenge on von Schleicher. He plotted with Hitler to have him ousted. But the authors note that Germany's debt was mostly not repaid; US President Herbert Hoover announced a moratorium on the payments in , and then they were suspended by the Allies in the Lausanne Conference in That's where austerity comes in.

He raised income taxes on high earners by an average of 10 percent, and slashed unemployment, pension, and welfare benefits. The economic consequences were horrific. GDP fell by 15 percent, as did government revenue. Unemployment increased from Britain, by contrast, actually increased government spending during this period. And, the authors find, areas that saw bigger increases in their average tax rates also saw larger vote shares for the Nazi Party in the July , November , and March elections.

They find similar results if you define austerity as state and local spending cuts, or use a measure combining both spending cuts and changes in income or wage tax rates. According to one estimate, a 1 percent increase in spending cuts is associated with a 1.

The results are even stronger if you look only at cuts to municipal pensions, unemployment support, and health care, and they hold up if you use Nazi party membership as the dependent variable, rather than Nazi vote share. The difference between being 8 percent short of a Reichstag majority and 11 percent short might not seem very large. His rise to power was not purely electoral: the election was characterized by widespread violent intimidation, especially targeting Social Democrats and Communists, by Nazi militias.

At the time of the election, German President Paul von Hindenburg had already issued the Reichstag Fire Decree, giving Hitler vast powers to suppress dissent.