by Robert Ley
The source: Robert Ley, “Schicksal — ich
glaube!,” Wir alle helfen dem Führer (Munich: Zentralverlag der NSDAP,
1937), pp. 103-114
We have accomplished enormous things in the over three years that we have
been in power. I do not believe this evening would be long enough to list all
the great successes that we have had. Two facts stand out: The German today has
become an entirely different person! Whether worker, craftsman, farmer or
member of the middle class, we are all entirely new people! There are a few
holdovers from past times, there always have to be museum pieces, after all.
They will gradually die out. The broad, large and great mass of our people has
changed thoroughly. They have been transformed.
Look at the workers! Look with me into Germany’s factories. I might remind
some in this room what they thought three years ago, not only about their party
or the government, but of their whole view of life, their views of labor, the
fatherland, their people, their community, or about socialism — all these
things that have always concerned humanity. They will have to agree that they
are of entirely different opinions today.
Germany has been born anew. The Führer said at the last party rally, as he
always says, that for him the greatest miracle of the age is how people have
changed. Once there was hopelessness, today there is joy and affirmation, once
there was general desperation, today there is resurrection and reawakening.
Once each was the enemy of his neighbor. Envy, mistrust, and hatred were
everywhere; today, everyone tries to do something good for the next person,
even if sometimes with too much energy and enthusiasm. Each wants to be a good
comrade, loyal, friendly.
I have said this in other speeches, too: It is not that we have no more
worries, that everyone is happy, and that people have no more troubles or
problems. No, we still face enormous problems, and will continue to face them.
The sacrifices demanded of some may be even greater than before. The work
required of some is certainly greater than it was before.
We are not living in a paradise where no one has any problems or anything
to do any longer, where there are no hurdles, weariness or burdens. The
opposite is true. Those things are even greater than before, yet people once
again take pleasure in life, in their community, and in what a people can
accomplish.
Germans today sacrifice gladly, and rejoice in it. We have only now
understood the meaning of struggle, and therefore of life. This people has
become a different people. That fills us with joy. It gives us an attitude
toward life, and a joy in life.
My fellow Germans! The second miracle: This people have received
leadership! You may not understand me, you may ask: Did not the people always
have leadership? Certainly there have always been states and forms of
government, and types of societies and types of economies. However, a true
people’s leadership is wholly new. Our people lacked it in the past two
thousand years. Our people did establish governments, and had Kaisers, kings,
counts, republics, and other forms of government. Our people had every sort of
economic system. Occupations, classes and such came and went. But a popular
leadership, the feeling of the individual that someone cares for me, is
personally concerned about me, that is unique. The feeling of the individual,
whether high or low, that other people are responsible for them, that their
problems are the problems of the leadership, this is unique.
That is why we love Adolf Hitler so much. The German worker has the feeling
that this man, our Führer, works on his problems day and night! This type of
popular leadership is unique. We demand such leadership. We will not surrender
it, we will not share it with anyone.
The German nation and its soul belong to Adolf Hitler and his party.
When one makes a total claim on the soul of a nation, it is not enough to
preach. One must also understand organization. It is important to build an
organization that includes everyone. A sure instinct on the part of the
leadership is necessary. That is why these millions of men, the block leaders
and block wardens, the cell leaders and cell wardens, the local group leaders
and all the others in the local groups, come from the broadest range of the
population. Instinct is most important. The men must be able to sense what the
people want, what moves their souls. They must feel the resonance, they must
find the right words to reach the soul of the nation. The relationship is
reciprocal, and it is not to be found through reason, only through instinct.
Earlier leaders did not understand this at all. Once people laughed at us and
said: “What do these Nazis want? They speak of instinct, of racial instinct.
These are outdated ideas. The understanding is the important thing. Knowledge
is all, one must study at the universities.” No, my friend, one can’t study it!
It is a question of race, of blood, of inheritance. Either you feel your
people, or you do not. Either fate was kind enough to give you this instinct,
or not. All the learning in the world cannot replace instinct. If you do not
have it, you are lost to our people. The most important thing for the
leadership is not to lose that instinct. Earlier leaderships believed they
could replace instinct with brainwashing! No, my friend, if one wants to lead a
people and has the honor to do so, one must always be careful to follow one’s
instincts. It is necessary to constantly return to the people. There is only
one place to sharpen instinct: the people. A leader who loses his connection to
his people soon loses the ability to lead them.
When fate has given someone sound instincts, it usually gives the necessary
understanding to combine in a way that leads to good sense. The combination of
instinct and understanding is good sense. If I have good sense and act
reasonably, the people will love me, it will look to you and me. If you add to
that strength and manliness and assurance, then you are prepared for any
crisis. Let us not deceive ourselves! Fate will not lead us through a rose
garden. There will be hard times. Our upward path is steep and hard. The past
has made us hard. That is why the people love us.
The people understand our language. It may be new, but they understand it.
It came from the heart, from the understanding. It was true. It was no lie, but
the truth. It was the language the people themselves speak. Thus we can speak
with powerful assurance that makes the people secure.
We are a young people. We have all the weaknesses of a child. A child wants
a father to hold it. When there is thunder and lightning, the child is afraid
and hurries to its father, for it wants to be safe. That is like the leadership
of a people. You, block leaders, block wardens, cell leaders, cell wardens,
must be that if there are storms again in Germany, you must be a refuge for the
people, if sacrifices are again demanded. You must say: “Citizens, stay calm!
The Führer is always right!” They may ask: “How do you know that?” You will
answer: “I believe it.” “And who tells you that?” “The Führer is always right.
I sense it. I can prove it from the successes of the past, the things this man
has done. He rose from a lowly worker and soldier to the Führer of Germany.” If
you persuade the people of this, that the Führer is always right, then our
people’s sacrifices will never be fatal, but will only make it harder, stronger
and greater. If cowardice and unreasonableness have been defeated, if the
people are confident, and if true popular leadership is present, the Führer
will be able to do whatever he wants with the nation. He will be able to make
important political decisions. The people will obey him blindly and follow him
blindly. The Führer is always right. Every last citizen must say this.
The order of life will be the same. We have dissolved the unions and
employers’ associations. We have fought everything that divides the nation.
Unfortunately, we have not been able to eliminate everything. Religious class
hatred is still present. But I am convinced that this nation’s desire for unity
will succeed in ending this split in the nation as well, though it has existed
for centuries. I am convinced of it.
A firm is a unit that we will not touch. This is holy to us. The firm must
remain unified. Firm leaders and workers should organize things themselves as
much as possible, They should work things out and be comrades together. We have
given people’s fate into their own hands. We have said: “We do not want to
control your fate. No one can do that for you. We can only teach you how to master
it. We can give you the weapons you need for your struggle. But no one else can
wage your battle for you.”
No one can stand aside from the struggle, pouting or playing the coward.
Whether you are a worker or a manager, merchant or doorman or errand boy,
whether you are young or old, man or woman, all who are members of a firm share
a common fate. Your fate is dependent on the success of this firm.
When the firm operates well and earns money, everyone earns, and when the
firm goes poorly, it does not go poorly for just one person, but for everyone.
It is a living community of fate. It is so simple, so straightforward, so
clear. But one has to preach the simple things over and over again. If someone
tells me I say the same thing in every speech, I answer: “Yes, my friend, but
the Church has preached the same thing for two thousand years. Why should not I
do the same?”
People forget what is simple and reasonable and chase after phantoms. One
has to tear these people away from confusion and lies, and preach to them the
simple truths. If someone says to leave him in peace, I reply: “No, my friend,
I will not leave you in peace. I won’t even think about it. There is rot under
such silence, and decay, and Marxism. As long as I have the honor to stand here
and preach, I will not leave you in peace.”
I always say that workers and managers belong together, and we will not
leave you along whether you want us to or not, whether you like it or not. If
the manager says: “It is ridiculous that I always have to participate in
employee meetings, I won’t do it,” we reply “You must do it! Ten thousand
workers are marching. The best German blood! It should be an honor for you to
march at their head. If you do not want to do that, we will have to put you
back in the ranks where the man behind you can tread on your heels until you do
it properly. We will teach you, believe me. We will not give up.” Some people
say that is Marxism. My God, that has nothing to do with Marxism.
What I am preaching here is genuine German military virtue. If that is
Marxism, then our army was Marxist for centuries. But it was not. No, it was
the most German thing we had. I want firms to be like the army. A camaraderie
forged together. That is life. It is no dead construction that is pleasant to
look at, but that on closer examination is dead. No, one always takes pleasure
in what is alive.
I was pleased to hear manager Bolhm speak of this joy, a joy he shares. I
know that the larger part of our managers think the same way. It is a pleasure
today to be a manager and to go through the factory. We are proud of it! We are
proud of the German worker, but also proud of the German owner. We are proud of
every German person who cheerfully joins our community.
I must also dispel the myth that it is unpleasant for a National Socialist
to be an owner. People speak of materialism, of owners as materialists! Well,
my friend, without material I can’t live, and neither can you. We do not hold
material things in contempt. There were once prophets who preached a separation
between body, soul and spirit.
One cannot separate these three things. If you remove the body, nothing is
left of the soul and spirit. If you remove the soul, you have a lifeless, cold
being, and if you remove the spirit, you are left with a tragic idiot. These
three things belong together. We do not despise materialism, but want to
struggle each day with ourselves so that materialism does not dominate us. God
gave us understanding and creative souls to form and use material, to invent,
to make new things and discover new things. That is wonderful. To realize these
new things, however, we need material resources. To found a firm and create
wealth is not contemptible. I must make that clear. What good would all our
socialist desires do if there were not people to figure things out, to
organize, to build a firm?
One sometimes finds those in business who tell us that business and
idealism are in conflict. That is not right. The opposite. I say that a true
idealist who does something truly good for humanity must have both feet on the
ground, else he is a dreamer and a romantic. All his idealism has no meaning
and no value. I do no one any good with it, it is false. I say that in the long
run, a sound businessman can found a firm and lead it to success only when he
is a true idealist. Everything else is illusion.
No, businessmen and idealists are not enemies, but in the end one and the
same. No true idealist lacks good business sense, and no sound company can
survive without idealism.
My friends, it is all a matter of education, of education toward community.
Socialism is not given to us. Socialism is not a matter of dead points in a
program, but rather socialism is justice. One may demand it because it is
right, and it is right because it is good for the nation. That is right. What
is good for Germany is right, and everything that harms Germany is wrong. In
the last analysis socialism is not a consolation or refuge for the individual,
but rather socialism asks this question: “What is good for Germany? What benefits
this nation?”
As we began our fight with the Führer, we all shared one firm belief. A
remarkable faith filled us all. Our hearers sensed it too. The people sensed
it. We believed what we said. My German friends, the same must be true today.
Understanding sometimes is not enough to explain something. Only faith is
sufficient. The Führer in Nuremberg said: “Woe to him who does not believe!” He
who does not believe has no soul. He is empty. He has no ideals. He has nothing
to live for. He has no sunshine, no light, no joy in life. He is a poor, poor
man. What is wealth? What are possessions? What does it all mean? Problems come
despite them, only faith is left. Woe to him who does not believe!
I urge you, my German people, to share this faith. The Führer has given us
a new task for the next four years, a big task that will demand enormous
sacrifices. We know that the Four Year Plan before us now will not be the last
such plan. Things will not get easier, no, there will always be new tasks, new
sacrifices to make. I believe that the size of these new sacrifices and new
tasks will increase as the strength of the nation increases. We may not hope
that the struggle will cease. It will continue. All the new factories will
increase our strength. Each new construction project advances our nation’s
development. That is true socialism. Build new wealth to improve your life.
That is German socialism, that is our struggle!
My friend, we walk hand and hand toward the future of our nation, toward
eternity. We look back into the dim past. Generation has followed generation.
We can look back on one thousand years, two, three, five, ten thousand years of
our people’s culture. We have Germanic structures that must be at least ten
thousand years old. We suspect they might be twenty thousand years old!
Generation after generation has come and gone, passing its inheritance to the
next generation. The next generation in turn has fought and struggled to pass
it on again. The chain of generations was nearly broken in our day. The people
nearly perished. Catastrophe was only narrowly averted. It was all due to the
faith of one man! Yes, you who called us godless, we found our faith in Adolf
Hitler, and through him found God once again. That is the greatness of our day,
that is our good fortune!
Now our people’s chain of
fate continues. We are becoming a link stronger than those before us. We are
forging a link that includes many generations. We are laying a foundation that
the next generation and the one after that will not be able to eliminate, even
if they wanted to. So strong is that that we are building! Isn’t that splendid?
Isn’t that wonderful? You, block leader and block warden, you cell leader and
cell warden, you may say: “I, too, was there! I too helped.” You, citizen from
the firm, you can say: “I, too, lived during that time, I, too, believed in
Adolf Hitler.” And you, and you, and every one of you! Isn’t that wonderful?
That is the eternity of our nation, that is our faith, that is our socialism!
