Führerprinzip

The Führerprinzip (German pronunciation: [ˈfyːʀɐpʀɪnˌtsiːp] ^ⓘ, Leader Principle) was the basis of executive authority in the government of Nazi Germany. It placed the Führer's word above all written law, and meant that government policies, decisions, and officials all served to realize his will. In practice, the Führerprinzip gave Adolf Hitler supreme power over the ideology and policies of his political party; this form of personal dictatorship was a basic characteristic of Nazism. The state itself received "political authority" from Hitler, and the Führerprinzip stipulated that only what the Führer "commands, allows, or does not allow is our conscience," with party leaders pledging "eternal allegiance to Adolf Hitler."

According to Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess, the Nazi German political system meant "unconditional authority downwards, and responsibility upwards." At each level of the pyramidal power structure the sub-leader, or Unterführer, was subordinate to the superior leader, and responsible to him for all successes and failures. "As early as July 1921," Hitler proclaimed the Führerprinzip as the "law of the Nazi Party," and in Mein Kampf he said the principle would govern the new Reich. At the Bamberg Conference on 14 February 1926, Hitler invoked the Führerprinzip to assert his power, and affirmed his total authority over Nazi administrators at the party membership meeting in Munich on 2 August 1928.

The Nazi government implemented the Führerprinzip throughout German civil society. Business organizations and civil institutions were thus led by an appointed leader, rather than managed by an elected committee of professional experts. This included the schools, both public and private, the sports associations, and the factories. Beginning in 1934, the German armed forces swore a "Führer Oath" to Hitler personally, not the German constitution. As a common theme of Nazi propaganda, the "Leader Principle" compelled obedience to the supreme leader who—by personal command—could override the rule of law as exercised by elected parliaments, appointed committees, and bureaucracies. The German cultural reverence for national leaders such as King Frederick the Great (r. 1740–1786) and Chancellor Otto von Bismarck (r. 1871–1890), and the historic example of the Nordic saga, were also appropriated to support the idea. The ultranationalist "Leader Principle" vested "complete and all-embracing" authority in the "myth person" of Hitler who, as Rudolf Hess declared in 1934, "was always right and will always be right."