Berlin, March 7, 1934
The Government will be persistent and rigorous in
continuing the program announced last year. It will give to the entire
automotive sector the strong impulse it needs to overcome the general
preconceptions on the one hand and the lethargy on the other. It will attempt
to continue to directly and indirectly decrease taxes for the automobile owner.
In addition to extending the tremendous Autobahn road network, the Reich is
determined to devote practical attention to improving the existing major roads.
The Reich Government will provide every possible support to the development of
the automobile industry. Above all, it will continue its endeavors to establish
a close and profitable link between this most recent means of transportation
and the large existing transportation institution of the Reichsbahn. The
problem of securing and producing fuel on a national basis will be solved!
Gentlemen, I do not need to paint a picture for you of the consequences of the
existing attitude and the measures which have resulted from it.
There is no clearer proof of the effectiveness of our actions in the past
year than the international Automobile Exhibition of 1934 in Berlin, which was
organized literally as fast as lightning and which has become such a wonderful
success.
Above all, it gives me the indestructible confidence that the commercial
adroitness of our great plants, the ingenuity of our technicians and the
miraculous productivity of our German manual laborers and precision workers
will doubtless succeed in accomplishing the great tasks which still lie before
us.
And these tasks are not small.
Gentlemen, if we really want to increase the number of automobile owners in
Germany to a figure in the millions, this is only possible if we adapt the
price to the financial capabilities of the mass of millions of potential buyers
in question.
The German Government desires that the German Volk take an animated
interest in motorized vehicles, and it follows that the economy must design and
build the right vehicle for the German Volk.
Only a few months ago, German industry succeeded, by fabricating a new Volksempfänger
(people’s radio), in introducing and selling an enormous number of radio
sets on the market. I would cite the most significant task of the German
automotive industry as that of increasing production of the one car which will
necessarily open up a class of buyers numbering millions, for only if we are
able to win over the broadest possible masses for this new means of
transportation will its economic and social advantages be indisputable.
What German industry has accomplished in the years behind us is admirable.
There is no country in the world showing greater progress in the construction
of new automobiles than Germany. All the way from small models to the most
modern racing cars, from trucks with diesel engines to motorcycles: everywhere
we see new paths being taken and truly ingenious ideas becoming reality. It
should be noted that this Automobile Show is not the product of long planning,
but shows a random sample of our industry’s products.
When I invite the German Volk to review and inspect this random sample, I
am doing so with the conviction that it will acknowledge with joyful pride this
further proof of what its engineers, merchants and workers have once again
accomplished. But I do not wish to let this opportunity pass without once more
drawing the attention of every German to the many millions of those who even
today have not yet found a way to earn their daily bread by their own labors.
It is the duty of every German to declare his solidarity with these
Volksgenossen and to contribute, by his every action and his behavior, towards
giving the new spiritual and physical workers of our Volk employment and thus a
means of existence.
March 17 is the 100th anniversary of the day upon which the builder of the
first automobile first glimpsed the light of day. In addition to Benz, we must
also regard Daimler not only as the inventor of the first automobile engine,
but also as the founder of the first and hence oldest automobile factory in the
world.
What a tremendous development has taken place between that fateful December
16, 1883, when an automobile engine was patented for the first time in the
world, and today! Who can doubt that we will succeed in carrying on this
wonderful development for the benefit of our entire German Volk? And
furthermore, we perceive in this new means of transportation an element of
human cooperation which, extending far beyond the borders of an individual
nation, ties nations together.
At a time when all of us have but the one earnest desire to heal the wounds
of the past decades in peaceful cooperation with the other nations, we are
happy to give to the world a visible demonstration of the background of the
problems which concern us today and proof of the skill with which we master
them.
Thus, I am happy and proud to declare the International Automobile
Exhibition of 1934 in Berlin open to the public.
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