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The National Socialist German Workers' Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei; NSDAP), 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 (Deutschnationale Volkspartei; DNVP) are members of the coalition. -
Outside the town of Dachau, Germany, the SS (Schutzstaffel, Protection Squads) establishes its first concentration camp to incarcerate political opponents. -
German Jewish organizations establish the Central Organization of German Jews (Reichsvertretung der deutschen Juden) in an effort to better represent the interests of German Jews through a unified response to escalating Nazi persecution. -
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. -
The German Ministry of Justice revises Paragraphs 175 and 175a of the German criminal code with the intent of 1) expanding the range of criminal offenses to encompass any contact between men, either physical or in form of word or gesture, that could be construed as sexual; and 2) strengthening penalties for all violations of the revised law. The revision facilitates the systematic persecution of homosexual men and provides police with broader means for prosecuting them. -
The Summer Olympic Games open in Berlin, attended by athletes and spectators from countries around the world. -
SS authorities open the Buchenwald concentration camp for male prisoners in east-central Germany. -
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.