When Is Our Reichstag Fire Coming, And Will We Be Prepared For It?

A few weeks after Adolf Hitler was sworn in as Germany’s Chancellor, a fire destroyed the Reichstag Building in Berlin on February 27, 1933. The identity of who set the fire has been in dispute ever since. Several communist activists were arrested, and all but one were exonerated in the courts. Was that one person responsible? Was it more? Or was it actually members of the Nazi party themselves? What is unquestionable is that Adolf Hitler used the fire to sign into law the “Reichstag Fire Decree,” which suspended many civil liberties in Weimar Germany, including freedom of expression, free press, freedom of association, habeas corpus, and various forms of privacy like the mail system and telephone. Anti-Nazi publications were banned. Hitler asked President Hindenburg to use Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution to establish this Decree. Hitler used Germany’s own constitution to cripple its democracy.

Germany was in the grip of fear of communist takeover. Hitler used this fear to sow panic. Nazi-leaning newspapers fanned flames of anti-Communism. Thousands of German citizens were arrested under the pretense of “state security,” and Hitler suppressed any political parties that might challenge the rise of the Nazis. When the next election took place on March 5, 1933, the Nazis and their supporters won a majority share of the vote, allowing the passage of “The Enabling Act” on March 23, 1933, that made Hitler dictator of Germany. All this change took place fewer than 30 days after the Reichstag Fire.