Figure 1.--The main NAZI wlfare organization Nationalsozialistische Volkswohlfahrt/ (People's Welfare Organization, NSV). Until the NAZIs seized power, religious groups played a major in welfare and family issues. The NAZIs proceeded, however, to take away the find raising capability of the churches making the NSV the primary welfare organization of the Third Reich. Here is a demonstation with BDM girls and DJ boys emphassizing the family and children's issues the NSV was promoting. Many of the boys are muscians, chosen to draw attention to the demonstration. Their posters read as best we can make out: "Mutter and Kind sind das Unterpfand für die Unsterblichkeil des Volkes. 1. Schutz der werdenden Mutter. 2. Schutz dem Säugling. 3. Geistige körperliche und sittliche Ertüchtigung der heranwachsenden Jugend. 4. Bekämpfung der Erb Krankheiten 5. Kampf der Gefahr 6. Rentner-Fürsorge 7. Alters-Fürsorge 8. Erholungs Fürsorge. Das alles will die NS Volks-Wohlfahrt" German speakers are encouraged to correct our transcription. Some of thewords are difficult to make out. Click on image to see the rest of the group.

The main NAZI wlfare organization Nationalsozialistische Volkswohlfahrt/ (People's Welfare Organization, NSV). Until the NAZIs seized power, religious groups played a major in welfare and family issues. The NAZIs proceeded, however, to take away the fund raising capability of the churches making the NSV the primary welfare organization of the Third Reich. Here is a demonstation with BDM girls and DJ boys emphassizing the family and children's issues the NSV was promoting. Many of the boys are muscians (notice the decorative shoulder epaulettes. The music helped to draw attention to the demonstration. For some reason only flute players were chosen. Their posters read as best we can make out: "Mutter and Kind sind das Unterpfand für die Unsterblichkeil des Volkes. 1. Schutz der werdenden Mutter. 2. Schutz dem Säugling. 3. Geistige körperliche und sittliche Ertüchtigung der heranwachsenden Jugend. 4. Bekämpfung der Erb Krankheiten 5. Kampf der Gefahr 6. Rentner-Fürsorge 7. Alters-Fürsorge 8. Erholungs Fürsorge. Das alles will die NS Volks-Wohlfahrt". The photograph is undated, but we would guess was taken about 1937.

English Translation

As best we can figure out, this translates as something like, "Mother and child are the pledge for the immortality of the nation. 1. Care for the expectant mother 2. Care for the infant 3. Mental, physical, and moral uplift of young people. 4. Combat inherited disease 5. Struggle against danger 6. Care for old age pensioners 7. Care for elderly people 8. Recreation All this is what the NS Peoples Welfare [NSV] organization wants to do."

Discussion of the Eight Points

Most of the posters are easy emough to read, but some are not very clear. The demonstration is useful because it provides an indication as to what issues the NAZI Party wanted the NSF to promote, but not just why. There is also an element as to what might appear to the public which could be reconciled to NAZI objectives.

1. Care for the expectant mother

The NSV put a high priority on children and aiding mother. This was in part a commiment to public health begun well before the NAZIs seized power. The NAZI interestwent way beyond this. The NAZIs were obsessed with the declining German birth rate and the much larger Slavic population to the East. Thus efforts to aid pregnant mothers was a essential tio increasing the bi rth rate and improving the health of expectant mothers and their babies. Middle-classs families did not need alot of help. Low income working-class familes did need aid. The NSF at first helped poor families with financial benefits, a kind of welfare. The NSV gradually shifted to performing services aiding poor families, including pregnant women and various family health and nutrition programs. Germany in 1933 was severely affected by the Depression. Thus these programs were badly needed. The NSV managed several different programs. One of the best known was the Mutter und Kind program which cared for pregant women. This was different than the SS's Lebensborn Program which took the children away from the mothers after oftering pre- and post-natal care. The NSV also supported mothers in various ways, especially in the case of emergencies. This all was influences by the NAZI view on women. Hitler had definite ideas about the woman's role in the Nazi state - she was the centre of family life, a housewife and mother. Hitler even introduced a medal for women who had eight or more children! What he wanted was to require women to have babies, but tghat was beyond the power of Hitler's police state. Ge wanted women once married to stay at home and care for the family. Educational institutions even at the sevcondary level reduced plaves for womem. Pressure began on women doctors, teachers, and civil servants o give up their careers and focus on the home. Even with the war emergency, German women played a more limited role in the military than women in Allied countries and the Soviet Union. The NASI term was the Three Ks--Kinder, Küche, Kirche (Children, Kitchen, Church). Goebbels summarized it all, "The mission of women is to be beautiful and to bring children into the world."

2. Care for the infant

Aiding pregnant mothers of course was only the first step. The NSF also ininiated programs to help mothers and young children, both infants and pre-school children. The NAZIs achieved some minimal increases in the birth rate. But Hitler and the NAZIs would have to conduct their war with the population they had had. So it was important to make the most out of the babies being born. The NSF organized and managing day care centers and other child care programs. There were also arange of youth programs. A major effort was day care for worker's families. Here there was some competition with day care programs run by churches. A major slogan at NSV day care centers was 'Hände falten, Köpfchen senken - immer an Adolf Hitler denken'--Hands folded, head lowered - always of Adolf Hitler thinking“. With the advent of the War, the NSV became the principal national effort devoted to children and youth welfare efforts.

3. Mental, physical,and moral uplift of young people

To increse the birth rate, the NAZIs needed healthy young people, in this case especially girls. This was the task of the Bund Deutscher Madel, the Hitler Youth girl's program. The boys and girls programs were very different, but both sressed physical activity designed to help build strong bodies. As for moral uplift, as the HJ programs brgan to talke children away from family and churc activities, it began to inplant NAZI moral values and standards. We are not sure just what role the NSF played in this process.

4. Combat inherited disease

Inherited disease was another obsession with the NAZIs. They even accused Jews of transmitting diseases. Thus racial hygene became an issue, addressed in the Nurembrg Race Laws by prohibiting marriange ans sexual relations with Jews. But medical technology at the time hd no way of treating inherited disease. So what the NAZIs adopted to a greater degree than any othr country was eugenics/ Theu did not crete the eugenics movement, but adopted it more than any other country. This meant a huge network of racial hygene courts ordering enforced sterilizations of the handicaped. This eventually led to the T-4 Eutenasia program. We are not entirely sure if the NSV's role in all of this, but the NSV once seizing fund rasising capability from churches took over many of the facilities where the T-4 killings took place. As the major welfare organization in Germany, the NSV had aeach into german families that brought them in contact with handicapped children and adults.

5. Struggle against danger

We are not sure what the NSV was getting at here. We suspect it was Communists and Jews--the NAZIs arch enemies, or at least the two groups they most hated. As the NSV was primarily focused on health issues, it is likely the focus here was on Jews. Part of the NAZI campaign against the Jews was to present them as disease carriers, although it is interesting that they are not specified.

6. Old age pensioner care

When we first saw this we thought it meant assistance to renters because of the similarity to the English word, meaning working-class people renting apartments. The German urban working class mostly lived in apartments which they rented. The Socialist Goverments which ran Germany after World War I during the Weimar era adopted ecomomic programns designed to aid the working class. This was an attempt to regulate the economy reather than rely on market forces. Some of the wage and price control policies adopted including rent controls. The reaction to rent controls was to limit private invesment in housing, creating housing shortages. The NAZIs when they seized power continued these Weimar policies, only with much greater regulatory interference. Hitler's huge arms program created a serious problem. The massive expenditutures were potentually highly inflabyionary and inflation would have brought military spending to a screeching halt by making it virtually impossible for the Government to borrow money. So Hitler used his police state powers to enact strict wage and price controls. Thus thge serious housing shortages continued, forcing the government to offer construction subsidies and public housing. The NSV was involved in some of these efforts. A German reader tells us, however, that 'Rentner' refers to old age pensioners. We have no information at this time, however, just what NSV programs offered assistance to old age pensioners.

7. Elderly care

Here the NSV is saying that it is concerned about the elderly. This was mot the case The NAZIs were concerned about young people because they were the future. Their health and well being was essetial to carry out Hitler's wars. The elderly were just the opposite, seen of as no real value to the society. They were consumers, bt non workers. During the Weimar era, a debate over elder care developed. The SPD introduced the welfare state to Germany. The SPD publicized its efforts to aid the elderly. The KPD attcked themn, saying that conditions in state facilities were so poor that the elderly were being driven to suiside. The NAZIs took another tack, saying that using state funds to support the elderly were wasted. We are not sure that Hitler ever spoked publically on this effort, but NAZI spokesmen criticused what they called excessive expenditures on the elderly and infirm. A NAZI spokes was quoted in the Baden Landtag during 1930. "It is ... not right that millions of marks are extracted from the genberal public for criples, the infirm, and the incurable, while ... tens of thousands of healthy people have to put a a bullet in their heads because of economic distress. It is not right thgat healthy lives, healthy occupation groups must restrict their birth rate because of economic distress while the welfare system ... allows the sick to increase." The sick hre was a veiled reference to the handicapped and elderly. A horific statement of the NAZI world view more specifically about the elderly appeared in a postcard sent to a welfare group, "You ... are one of those who stuffs your belly at the state's expense .... We demand that you commit suiside as soon as possible. Save us the work and the bullets in the coming months, dig your own grave. You are devouring the state. If you unecessary peoplke don't get rid of yourselves rhen we are goung to have to slaughter [abschlachten] you ourselves. Because we National Socialists are coming and we don't want any unemployed and pensioners. In the Third Reich, we can only use strong and healtyy people. Everyone else has to disappear, if not volunarily, then with violence! Make this clear to your local branch organization. Naturally, family members have to disaapear as well, insofar as the women or the children are not in service or working in factories. Pnly people who perform productive work can live in the Third Reich. Everyone else has to go if the state is to be mnade healthy again." [Crew, p. 103.] Hitler of course was too much of aolitican to publically say anything like this. And the postcard here might be dismissed as the sick ravings of a lunatic had the NAZIs not killed people in the millions and especially targeting non-workers.

8. Recreation

We do not yet have a detailed assessment of NSV recreation activities, nor are sure to wht extent it foicused on children. We do notice a summer camp program Jugenderholung. We think it was for younger children before they joined the HJ at age 10 years. It was established before Hitler Youth membership became mandatory. We see some older children involved. It appears to be for working-class children to get them out into the contryside where they would benefit from fresh air and sunshine as well as good food. We note propaganda film strip. [NSV--Jugenderholung] A NAZI band played as the children boarded a train and mothers and children waved goodbye. They engaged in a variety of activities, including phyical conditioning, sport, dancing, games, and nature study. They were given instruction in hygiene, the value of community, and nutrition. We also see some children receiving UV treatment. The number of children involved appears to have increased from 0.1 to 0.8 million chuldren from 1933 to 38, just bedore the War. The NAZIs also had a recreation program for adults--the Karft durch Freude (Strength through Joy, KdF), but this was the Labor Front (DAF) program.

Sources

Crew, David F. Germans on Welfare: From Weimar to Hitler (Oxford University Press, 1998), 304p.

NSV. "Jugenderholung durch die NSV" (Rest and Recreation for Nazi Youth Sponsored by the NSV). Lesson Number 8 in a series of filmstrips published by the NSDAP Reichsleitung, Hauptamt für Volkswohlfahrt, Propaganda-Amt (Nazi Party Leadership, Main Office for Public Welfare, Propaganda Office).

Created: 10:45 PM 11/24/2016
Last updated: 10:45 PM 11/24/2016