Parliment met to consider passing a bill that Adolf Hitler had created called the Enabling Act. It was officially called the 'Law for Removing the Distress of the People and the Reich.' Why were the
German people in such distress? Because their government was in utter chaos, and the German
leaders wanted to reassure the people that everything would be ok. The only fly in the ointment
was that the Nazis had, behind the scenes, caused the distress themselves by creating the crisis, so that they could step in and solve it. Sound familiar?
Hitler promised the German people that the government would "make use of these powers only insofar as they are essential for carrying out vitally necessary measures...The number of cases in
which an internal necessity exists for having recourse to such a law is in itself a limited one." So
the German congress voted on the bill, with the end result being the legal destruction of the
German Democratic Republic. The bill gave Hitler enormous, unprecedented powers to do as he
saw fit for the government of the German people. It was the act that offically created a legal
dictator who was answerable to no one. The people cheered, and National Socialism became the
law of the land from that day forward.
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