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Hitler appointed chancellor
The National Socialist German Workers' Party , more commonly known as the Nazi Party, assumes control of the German state when German President Paul von Hindenburg appoints Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler as Chancellor at the head of a coalition government. The Nazis and the German Nationalist People's Party are members of the coalition. -
Reichstag Fire
The government blamed the Communists. They exploited the Reichstag fire to secure President Hindenburg’s approval for an emergency decree that suspended individual rights and due process of law. The Decree permitted the regime to arrest and incarcerate political opponents without specific charge, it also gave the central government the authority to overrule state and local laws and overthrow state and local governments. The decree was a key step in the establishment of the Nazi dictatorship. -
Anti-Jewish boycott
The boycott was presented to the German people as both reprisal and an act of revenge for the bad international press against Germany since the appointment of Hitler’s government in January 1933. The Nazis claimed that German and foreign Jews were spreading “atrocity stories” to damage Germany's reputation. Nazi Storm Troopers stood menacingly in front of Jewish-owned department stores and retail establishments, and outside the offices of Jewish professionals holding signs and shouting slogans -
Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service
The German government issues the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service , which excludes Jews and other political opponents of the Nazis from all civil service positions. The law initially exempts those who had worked in the civil service since August 1, 1914, those who were veterans of World War I, or those with a father or son killed in action in World War I. -
Law Limits Jews in Public Schools
Adolf Hitler's appointment as Chancellor the government began to adopt laws and policies that increasingly restricted the rights of Jews in Germany. This new law limited the number of Jewish students in any one public school to no more than 5 percent of the total student population. However public schools also played an important role in spreading Nazi ideas to German youth. Educators taught students to love for Hitler, obedience to state authority militarism racism and antisemitism. -
Law for the “Prevention of Offspring with Hereditary Diseases”
The German government passes the “Law for the Prevention of Offspring with Hereditary Diseases”, mandating the forced sterilization of certain individuals with physical and mental disabilities. This new law provides a basis for the involuntary sterilization of people with physical and mental disabilities or mental illness, Roma, “asocial elements,” and Afro-Germans. -
Death of German President von Hindenburg
German President Paul von Hindenburg dies. With the support of the German armed forces, Hitler becomes President of Germany. Later that month Hitler abolishes the office of President and declares himself Führer of the German Reich and People, in addition to his position as Chancellor. In this expanded capacity, Hitler now becomes the absolute dictator of Germany; there are no legal or constitutional limits to his authority. -
Hitler Abolishes the Office of President
Hitler abolishes the office of President and declares himself Führer of the German Reich and People, in addition to his position as Chancellor. In this capacity, Hitler’s decisions are not bound by the laws of the state. Hitler now becomes the absolute dictator of Germany; there are no legal or constitutional limits to his authority. -
Nuremberg Race Laws
The Nuremberg Race Laws did not identify a “Jew” as someone with particular religious convictions but instead as someone with three or four Jewish grandparents. Many Germans who had not practiced Judaism or who had not done so for many years found themselves still subject to legal persecution under these laws. Even people with Jewish grandparents who had converted to Christianity could be defined as Jews. -
German Annexation of Austria
On March 11–13, 1938, German troops invade Austria and incorporate Austria into the German Reich in what is known as the Anschluss.A wave of street violence against Jewish persons and property followed in Vienna and other cities throughout the so-called Greater German Reich during the spring, summer, and autumn of 1938, culminating in the Kristallnacht riots and violence of November 9-10. -
Law on Alteration of Family and Personal Names
The government required Jews to identify themselves in ways that would permanently separate them from the rest of the German population. In the new August 1938 law, authorities decreed that by January 1, 1939, Jewish men and women bearing first names of non-Jewish origin had to add Israel and Sara respectively, to their given names. All German Jews were obliged to carry identity cards that indicated their heritage, and in the all Jewish passports were stamped with an identifying red letter “J”. -
Kristallnacht
The rioters destroyed hundreds of synagogues, many of them burned in full view of firefighters and the German public and looted more than 7,000 Jewish-owned businesses and other commercial establishments. Jewish cemeteries became a particular object of desecration in many regions. Almost 100 Jewish residents in Germany lost their lives in the violence. In the weeks that followed, the German government promulgated dozens of laws and decrees designed to deprive Jews of their property .
