Harzburg Front

   label attached to the so-called National Opposition against Heinrich Bruning's* government. Comprised of the NSDAP (Hitler*), the DNVP (Alfred Hugenberg*), the Stahlhelm* (Franz Seldte*), the Pan-German League, and the Vaterlandische Verbande, the members convened at Hugenberg's invitation on 11 October 1931 in Bad Harzburg, two days after Brüning announced a new cabinet. They were joined by Hjalmar Schacht,* Fritz Thyssen,* Hans von Seeckt,* and other notables, thus providing Hugenberg with a broad-based public demonstration. The gathering issued demands for Bru-ning's resignation, the termination of emergency decrees, and new elections in Germany and Prussia.* But while they voiced a desire to assume control of the state, the attendees held no common political program. By the presidential elec-tions of April 1932, the Harzburg Front had disintegrated.

   Although Hitler went to Harzburg with misgivings, he profited from the meet-ing without needing to commit to Hugenberg's political program, as the latter had desired. With the public already viewing the NSDAP as part of the hon-orable" Right, Hitler used Harzburg to initiate active courtship of industry, the military, and the Junkers.* Karl Dietrich Bracher claimed that the coalition Hitler formed in January 1933 was largely a revival of the October 1931 affiliation. Without the Harzburg precedent, Hindenburg* would have found it infinitely more difficult to appoint Hitler Chancellor.

   REFERENCES:Bracher, German Dictatorship; ETR; Eyck, History ofthe Weimar Re-public, vol. 2; Taddey, Lexikon.