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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 September 2013
Although the ultimate form of the National Socialist political system in Germany is not yet clear, certain institutions are emerging which bid fair to make more than a passing claim to perdurance in that system. Among these, surprisingly enough, is the popular referendum. Apparently doomed to obsolescence towards the end of the republican period because it was proving to be superfluous in a representative régime and too radically democratic, it has suddenly been accepted as a leading constitutional practice in a Germany which is dedicated to the extirpation of political democracy. In somewhat more than ten months, the Hitler cabinet has twice requested and received popular verdicts at the polls, a record of nation-wide popular consultations which is exactly equivalent to that of the fourteen years of the Republic.
1 See Reichsgesetzblatt (cited hereafter as RGB), Part I, 1933, 141.
2 RGB, Part I, 1933, 479; this law, in English translation, is included, with other decrees of the Hitler cabinet, in Pollock, and Heneman, , The Hitler Decrees (Ann Arbor, 1934), pp. 13–14Google Scholar.
3 See Constitution, Arts. 73–74.
4 Initiative petitions from private sources, accompanied by draft laws, had first to be sent to the Reichstag, whence, in case of rejection, they were automatically submitted to the electorate. For a discussion of this procedure and the operation of the referendum in Germany under the Republic, see the author's Experiment With Democracy in Central Europe (New York, 1933), pp. 95–105Google Scholar.
5 See Ordinance of October 14, 1933, on the Popular Referendum, RGB, I, 1933, 732Google Scholar.
6 See author's op. cit., p. 103; also Greene, Lee S., “Direct Legislation in the German Lander,” in this Review, Vol. 28, pp. 445–454Google Scholar.
7 Constitution, Art. 76.
8 Art. 2 of Law of July 14,1933, on the Popular Referendum, RGB, I, 1933, 479Google Scholar.
9 Constitution, Art. 75, and Para. 21, Sec. 2, Law of June 27, 1921, on the Popular Referendum, RGB, I, 1921, 790 ff.Google Scholar
10 See Ordinance of October 14,1933, on the Popular Referendum, RGB, I, 1933, 732Google Scholar, and Law of June 27, 1921, on the Popular Referendum, RGB, I, 1921, 790Google Scholar.
11 First Ordinance of October 14,1934, on the Reichstag Election and the Popular Referendum, RGB, I, 1933, 733–736Google Scholar.
12 RGB, I, 1933, 732Google Scholar.
13 RGB, I, 1933, 742Google Scholar.
14 RGB, I, 1933, 747–748Google Scholar.
15 Ordinance of Aug. 3,1934, on the Popular Referendum, RGB, I, 1934, 759Google Scholar. The provisions of this ordinance also appear in the New York Times, Aug. 5, 1934.
16 For a description of this event, see New York Times, Aug. 17, 1934.
17 Following is a summary of official returns in the two referenda:*
* These figures are derived from official results. Cf. Die Wahlen zum Reichstag und die Volksabstimmung am 12. November 1933, Wirtschaft und Statistik, Vol. 13 (July-Dec., 1933), p. 684Google Scholar, and Die Volksabstimmung über das Staatsoberhaupt des Deutschen Reichs am 19. August 1934, ibid., Vol. XIV (July-Dec., 1934), p. 552. The results of the referendum on the Fuehrerschaft may be obtained also from the Deutscher Reichsanzeiger for Sept. 6, 1934. As given in this publication, they vary somewhat from the above.
18 New York Times, Aug. 13, 1934.
19 Law of Jan. 30,1934, for the Reorganization (Neuaufbau) of the Reich, RGB, 1, 1934, 75Google Scholar.
20 Edict of the Reich's Chancellor and Resolution of the Reich's Cabinet of Aug 2, 1934, RGB, I, 1934, 751, 752Google Scholar.
