The Leadership of the NSDAP

The Political Leadership Hierarchy and The National Socialist German Workers Party-NSDAP

The Reichsleiter

The highest body of the Party was formed by the Reichsleitern, most of whom held at the same time leading State positions. Seventeen Ministers or Reichsleitern held office, their function included, amongst others, the following:

Police and Ministry of the Interior, Propaganda, Ministry of Armaments and War Production, The Press, Finance, Justice, State Labour Service, Education of Youth, Agriculture.

Each Reichsleiter was responsible to Hitler as President, Chancellor and Leader of the Nazi Party.

Beneath the Reichsleitung the Party was organised into Gaue, Kreise, Ortsgruppen, Zellen and Blocke.

The structure of the National Socialist Party was based on forty-two Gaue (Regions) which included thirty-two in Germany proper and ten in the annexed and occupied territories. An additional Gau - the 43rd - was created to encompass those German nationals living abroad in foreign countries. This was known as the Auslandsorganization (AO).

The Gauleiter

The Gau or Region was the original basic unit of the Nazi Party's geographical organisation as well as the largest unit in the local organisation of the Party membership.

Each Gau was headed by a Gauleiter who was appointed by, and if the need arose was removed, by Hitler. The Gau was created in the early years of the Party's history and corresponded roughly in extent with the Reichstag (German Parliament) electoral districts. It had therefore a traditional as well as a functional importance. This functional importance had been increased by war-time legislation which first gave the Gauleiter the responsibility (under the Central Government) for all matters concerning the mobilisation of labour and subsequently nominated Gaue as civil defence regions, over which the Gauleiter wielded a wide and varied authority (see the section on the National Militia - the Volkssturm).

Apart from these powers, the Gauleiter was a highranking Party official who was usually also the Reichsstatthalter for a Land, and moreover controlled the Gau Wirtschaftskammer (Economic Chamber) which coordinated and supervised every form of trade and industry in the Gau. These additional responsibilities, entrusted to the Gauleiter by legislation, greatly increased the power of the Party and marked a distinct step in the gradual displacement by the Party Gaue of the traditional Linder or administrative regions.

Affiliated formations and organisations such as the SA, the SS, the Hitler Youth movement etc. had their main regional offices at Gau level and acted in close concert with the Gauleiter's office. Each of the forty-two Gauleiters worked under the direction often Landesinspekteure, nine in Germany and one in Austria. Each inspector was charged with the responsibility for carrying out Party policy within the Gaue under his direction and with supervising the work of the Party representatives in State and Provincial legislatures. These officials controlled by the central officers of the Reichsinspection constituted the liaison between the Reichsleitung and the Gaue.

The Kreisleiter

Each Gau was divided into a number of Kreise or 'Circles', each headed by a Kreisleiter. The Kreisleiter was the lowest of the paid officials of the Party. He was directly responsible to his Gauleiter and who, on the recommendation of the Gauleiter, was nominated to this post by Hitler. The Kreisleiter's office was independent of the administrative machine and he had no direct control over the Landrat (Prefect or Head of a Distict) or the Oberburgermeister of the very large town or the Burgermeister of the smaller towns, although his influence was considerable.

The Ortsgruppenleiter

Beneath the Kreisleiter was the unpaid Ortsgruppenleiter or Local Group Leader appointed to the position by the Gauleiter on the nomination of the Kreisleiter.

Each Kreis consisted of a varying number of Ortsgruppen. The Ortsgruppenleiter had control over an Ortsgruppe with a population averaging approximately 40,000 and whose territory comprised one or several Communes or, in a town, a certain district. The Ortsgruppenleiter had an office of his own and controlled up to 3,000 Party members and the organization was designed to be small enough so that he could be personally acquainted with all the members.

Most of the affiliated organisations already referred to had their lowest level representation in the Ortsgruppe and often had their local office in the Ortsgruppenleiter's headquarters.

They were expected to co-operate with the Ortsgruppenleiter who, however, had no disciplinary jurisdiction over them.

The Ortsgruppen were the smallest units in the rural areas but were sub-divided in a large metropolitan centre into Street Cells and Blocks (Zellen und Blocke).

The Zellenleiter and Blockleiter

The Zellenleiter and the Blockleiter were Party officials of the lowest rank. The latter was responsible for forty to sixty households, whether or not they contained Party members;the former controlled four or five Blocke with the assistance of Social Welfare (NS-Volkswohlfahrt -NSV) and Labour Front (Deutsche Arbeitsfront -DAF) officials.

People living in the area controlled by a Zellenleiter were encouraged to consult him, rather than higher Party officials, on any personal or technical problems. The Blockleiter was appointed to keep an eye upon the activities and political attitudes of the families under his control and to keep a card index system, containing Haushaltskarten, providing detailed information about them. Regular reports were sent from the Blockleiter to the Zellenleiter who in turn reported to his Ortsgruppenleiter and so on up through the chain of political leadership. Any unrest was dealt with swiftly and at source. Small wonder therefore that the Party found it necessary to state on repeated occasions that the Blockleiter was not employed as a Party spy.

An accurate assessment of the total membership of the NSDAP is almost impossible. By December 1943 the Party claimed that their membership included some 6,500,000 male members and 85,800 full-time officials; however a reasonable estimate of the numbers of members towards the last year of the war would have been more in the region of 7,000,000. It should not be forgotten that whilst membership of the National Socialist Party was not compulsory for the average German there were considerable advantages to be enjoyed by being a Party member. For those Germans who sought advancement in public or professional fields, Party membership was a necessary qualification for all higher governmental and professional appointments.

Brian Leigh Davis, GERMAN UNIFORMS OF THE THIRD REICH 1933-1945, Arco Publishing, 1980