Doctor Goebbels: His Life & Death

and notHindenburg, represented the state in this courtroom. The judge disagreed; he tooacquitted Dr Goebbels, finding that his statements had been made in the public interest.Goebbels could see that the newspapermen were stunned at this renewedvictory.19196 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICHStill a free man he prepared for the third day in the courthouse at Moabit on Fridaythe fifteenth. The plaintiffs here were the Reich government and ex-chancellorHermann Müller, charging that in Angriff in December 1929 he had labelled theSocial Democrats a bunch of hired traitors. The elderly judge Dr Toelke invited himto justify the words, and Goebbels did so with relish, emphasizing how the SocialDemocrats had signed away Germany’s birthright in the postwar treaties while deceivingtheir own people. His lawyer read out devastating quotations: from the SocialDemocrat newspaper Vorwärts , triumphing in 1918 that the munitions workersstrike was a telling blow, though not devastating enough; and from the plaintiff himself,Müller, declaring that the strike’s purpose was to end the war by force. Goltztold of how the Social Democrat governments of Saxony, Thuringia, and Prussia hadsabotaged the government’s postwar struggle for the Ruhr, how Saxony’s prime ministerhad betrayed government secrets to France, how the Social Democrats hadthwarted attempts to rescue Schlageter from execution, and how their PhilippScheidemann had betrayed details of the Reichswehr’s violations of Versailles.Judge Toelke was aghast. ‘If we are to hear evidence for all these claims,’ he stammered,‘—well, I have two months from nine A.M. to six P.M., but—’’Dr Goebbels,’ interrupted Goltz, ‘has stated openly what millions think. He wantsto justify his allegations. He is at the court’s disposal. We have the time!’Goebbels had already brought a platoon of military witnesses into court. The judgerefused to allow them. Goltz solemnly picked up his crutch and hobbled out. Theprosecutor asked for a six month sentence on Goebbels. The court reserved its judgement,and moved on without a break to the Grzesinski libel action.20That Saturday, August 16, Goebbels expected to go to prison. Instead the courtstipulated modest fines of six hundred and four hundred marks for libeling the governmentand Müller, and four hundred for Grzesinski. This was cheap publicity indeed.‘These demanded court actions are doing my gut no good,’ wrote Goebbels. ‘It’senough to throw up.’GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH 197Three down: the court moved on to the next charge, of incitement to violence,and handed down another petty fine, of three hundred marks.‘Let them give their verdict,’ wrote Goebbels grimly on the seventeenth. ‘We shallutter our verdict on September 14,’—election day.He visited his mother at Rheydt. Berlin phoned him there—four more courtsummonses had arrived. By the time of his return the number had doubled to eight.Braun and Grzesinski had both appealed for stiffer sentences; Goebbels was now alsoaccused of having, in a speech at Prerow in July 1929, called the Reich’s war standard‘a Jewish flag, a dirt rag,’ and any republic that it stood for a ‘Jew republic.’21 Hedecided to ignore these fresh trials. Court officials demanded to see him. He refused—he was now planning the biggest Sport Palace meetings of the campaign.‘The courts,’ he recorded, ‘are now hounding me with summonses. I’ve got a thickskin. I won’t budge.’22BY the late summer of 1930 there were signs that his diaries had begun concealing histrue anxiety about the S.A. The incriminating notebooks might have been snatchedat any time by communists, the S.A., or the police. Thus the diary avowed that heshared the S.A.’s indignation. In reality he got his office manager Franz Wilke to takeprecautions against them. This became more urgent as rumours multiplied that Stenneswas planning to issue an ultimatum to Munich. Dr Leonardo Conti, the S.A.’s chiefphysician, warned both Hitler and Goebbels that Stennes was up to no good.23 Stennesand his staff routinely referred to their gauleiters as incompetent, and griped aboutthe Verbonzung, the top-heaviness, of the party leadership in Munich. He was dissatisfiedwith the party’s infuriating new legalism. At the end of August, realizing that hecould not curb his underlings’ revolutionary passions, Pfeffer resigned in Munich.24Stennes waited until Goebbels was away in Dresden, then called his commanderstogether. Melitta Wiedemann, features editor of Angriff, could see him through thewindows one floor below standing in a white cap at the head of a table round whichcrowded Berlin’s S.A. commanders. There were growls of approval as Stennes pro-198 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICHposed they go on strike immediately unless Hitler accepted their demands for abigger slice of the action.25By telephone Goebbels heard from Berlin that the S.A. commanders had collectedtheir ragged regiments (Standarten) for a confrontation with both Berlin (Goebbels)and Munich (Hitler). Later that night Dr Conti arrived from Berlin with a similarreport. This put the big Sport Palace election meeting on Friday the twenty-ninth atrisk. Back in Berlin on Thursday Goebbels found Stennes demanding three Reichstagseats and more funds. Otherwise, in best trades-union jargon, he could not guaranteethat his S.A. lads would not break up Goebbels’ meeting, an ‘unparalleled impertinence’in Goebbels’ view.It was an ugly situation. He phoned Munich and advised them to play for time.They could appear to yield to Stennes’ demands, fight the election, then take revengeon him. Hitler however said he did not propose yielding anything. Goebbels swoonedwith rage: Hitler had lost touch with reality: fifteen thousand S.A. in Berlin werethreatening violence against him and his embattled HQ. He left for Hamburg thatevening. In his absence thirty S.A. men appeared at the Hedemann Strasse HQ withthe intention of giving Franz Wilke the kind of head massage in which they specialized.Only the intervention of Stennes himself, according to his diary, prevented arough-house. ‘The S.A. commanders,’ he dictated, ‘left no doubt that, far from protectingtoday’s Sport Palace meeting of General [Karl] Litzmann, Dr [Wilhelm] Frick,and Dr Goebbels, the S.A. men of the Gau Sturm intended to smash it up.’ Stennesordered them to assemble in a beer hall at Hasenheide instead, to receive specialorders from him (which his diary does not specify).Wilke reacted by moving a reliable S.S. guard unit into the HQ building. Goebbelsdiscreetly left by car the next morning, Saturday the thirtieth, for Breslau. Stennesordered his commanders