German American Bund

TABLE OF CONTENTS

                                                                                   

 

Introduction

 

Part One:  The German American Bund in the Context of the Extreme Right

 

            Section I.   The American Extreme Right vs. the Bund

 

            Section II.  The Emergence of the German American Bund

A.     The Significance and Influence of Deutschtum

 

B.     German-American Fascist Movements to the

      German American Bund

 

Part Two:  Fritz Kuhn and the German American Bund

 

Section I. Fritz Kuhn and the First Americanization of the

    Bund

 

Section II.  The Bund’s Ideology, Membership and Americanization

A.     Kampfendes Deutschtum- the anti-Communist and

      anti-Semitic Ideology of the Bund

 

B.     Membership and Americanization of the Bund

 

C.  Youth Groups and Bund Camps

 

            Section III.  Dual Rejections and Intensified Americanization

A. Dual Rejections from America and Germany

 

                        B.  Americanization Intensified

 

                        C. Attacks against the Bund

 

Section IV. The Zenith and Downfall of the Bund

A.     The Zenith of the Bund:  Madison Square Garden  

       Rally

 

B.   The Downfall of Fritz Kuhn and the German

                    American Bund

 

Conclusion

 

Bibliography

 

Introduction

On Washington’s Birthday in February 1939, a crowd of approximately 20,000 attended a “Pro-American Rally” at Madison Square Garden in New York City.  Throngs of police formed skirmish lines to protect the participants from an anticipated 50,000 angry rally protesters.  The protesters’ fierce indignation was directed at the party hosting the event; the German-American Bund, an American political organization which modeled itself after Hitler’s Third Reich.  Inside the rally, the Bund boldly displayed swastika flags alongside the stars and stripes. A thirty-foot tall portrait of George Washington dominated the center of the stage.  After a parade of uniformed OD men (the Bund version of the storm troopers), the 20,000 attendees recited the Pledge of Allegiance and sang the Star Spangled Banner.  Bund speakers spewed anti-Semitic vitriol and railed against the evils of Communism and the New Deal.  They glorified the ideals of National Socialism and praised the Third Reich for its success in fighting the Jewish-Bolshevik menace.  Yet they vehemently denied that they themselves were Nazis.  While they were of German extraction, they proclaimed themselves to be an American group fighting to “Free America!”  The Bundists pledged their undivided allegiance to the United States and swore to uphold and defend the Constitution and the laws of the United States and to respect and honor the flag and institutions of America.  At the same time, they called for a “socially just, white Gentile-ruled America” and a return to the democratic values and diplomatic policies of George Washington.  In attempting to combine National Socialism and democracy, the Bund proved itself to be a unique anomaly in American political history. 

The German-American Bund was formed from a merger of three previous German-American organizations in 1935: the National Socialist German Workers Party and the National Socialist Teutonia Association which both later merged into the Friends of New Germany.  The Friends’ proclaimed goal was to promote peace and friendship between the United States and Germany.  Yet an investigation by U.S. Congressman Samuel Dickstein concluded that the pro-Nazi Friends with its overtly foreign connections were little more than a subversive organization operating within the United States for the benefit of a foreign nation.  Back in Germany, fearing strained relations with the United States, Deputy Fuehrer Rudolf Hess ordered all German nationals to leave the Friends, and the group’s leaders were recalled to Germany.  Shortly afterward, a new organization was formed in its place; the German American Bund.  Headed by the naturalized German-American Fritz Kuhn, the Bund took an entirely new direction and evolved into an unprecedented political phenomenon in American history.  

Unfortunately, there exists a relative paucity of scholarly work devoted to the German American Bund, and within those studies, many scholars are quick to inaccurately label the German American Bund as “American Nazis.”[1]  The Bund’s aping of German fascism with their swastika flags, marching uniformed men, Hitler Youth-style camps and grandiose rallies certainly made it easy to view them simply as Nazis in America.   I, however, argue that these authors do not adequately differentiate between Germany’s National Socialism and the unique anomalous ideology of the Bund.  While the Bund may have emerged from overtly Nazi organizations, they were not merely an offshoot of Nazism. Bundists were not simply German Nazis in America, and their program was not necessarily typical of European models of fascism.  While the group originated as an outpost for Nazism in America, it unmistakably evolved into an entirely different organization with a singular hybrid ideology. As historical circumstances precluded Bundists from being Nazis (edicts from Germany forbade German nationals from participation in American political groups and simultaneously prohibited membership in the Nazi Party to foreign nationals), their ideology transformed into something entirely new and unprecedented.  Though fundamentally committed to the ideals and values of Deutschtum and National Socialism, the Bund was also deeply invested in American values, ideals and symbols.  Moreover, the German American Bund could cleverly contort their ideology to reconcile the two seemingly opposite ideologies of Americanism and Nazism.

While the German American Bund employed many of the symbols and trappings of German fascism, its fundamental platform was in many ways congruent with numerous right-wing movements in the United States during the 1930s. Extremism flourished in America amidst the uncertainty and fear associated with the Depression and violent reaction against the quasi-socialist policies of the New Deal was common. The Bund in many ways represented the “preservative thrust” of American right-wing extremism for a key component of Bund rhetoric was the desire to preserve traditional American institutions rather than to enact any significant revolutionary program in the United States. The Bund passionately stood for the preservation of American democracy, the Constitution and American laws and institutions.  It did not call for an authoritarian

revolution of any sort, and nowhere in any of its literature can be found calls for violence or overthrow of the American government.  Consequently, in contrast to the continuous charges by its detractors that it was a dangerous and subversive organization and thus threatened the security of the United States, it was an almost entirely law-abiding organization. 

While the Bund revamped its ideology throughout the decade of the 1930s, some of the basic themes espoused early in the movement remained constant.  The Bund sought to repair the tarnished image of Germany and German-Americans and to repudiate the attacks on the “German character” which were ubiquitous during the war years.  They also invariably aimed to reinvigorate German culture in America which had been all but destroyed in the wake of America’s entry into World War One.  In fact, Bundists believed that their Deutschtum, their unique German character and consciousness of German-ness would strengthen America from within.  Similarly, they unwaveringly sought to unify the German-American element in America into a cohesive political force which would foster friendly relations with Germany. 

However, the Bund’s ideology proved to be extraordinarily malleable as political circumstances forced the group’s goals and ideals to evolve and transform throughout the decade.  Rejected by the government of Nazi Germany and detested by the bulk of the American public, the Bund became something of an orphaned political movement, impelled by historical forces to constantly modify and transform its ideology as a mechanism for survival.  Ultimately, its ideology would remain strongly influenced by the tenets and spirit of National Socialism, while simultaneously maintaining a central theme of “Americanism.”  The Bund presented itself as a fighting organization.  Its

members saw themselves as a patriotic unified block of German-Americans battling the chief subversive elements in America, i.e., Communism and the influences of Jews in the United States.  By the end of the decade, the Bund was portraying itself as the vanguard of the “true Americans,” fighting to preserve democracy and the American Constitution amidst a tide of political, racial, and social forces which sought to destroy these sacred institutions.  Under the controversial leadership of Fritz Kuhn, it blended historical notions of Deutschtum (German-ness) with National Socialism and nativist-rooted Americanism to formulate its own unique ideology. 

 It is important to note that because the Bund evolved from earlier German-American fascist organizations which were overtly loyal to Germany and definitively Nazi in their ideology, its Americanization in the years 1935-1941 is often viewed as little more than a red herring.  However, it is essential to differentiate the Bund from the earlier National Socialist Teutonia Association and the Friends of the New Germany movements of the 1920s and early 1930s.  I will show the two movements to be radically different from the Bund.  Although the Bund mimicked virtually every symbol and institution of the German Nazi movement, it was not necessarily entirely “Nazi.”  The group proclaimed to be comprised solely of American citizens who unequivocally pledged their foremost allegiance to the United States.  Yet, it simultaneously clung to its  German heritage and the ideology of National Socialism, two components which Bundists contended made them “good Americans.”  Thus, in its own bizarre way, the German American Bund viewed itself as a genuine patriotic “American” movement.  What made the Bund so singular was that its ideology was the product of the amalgamation of three seemingly conflicting sources: Deutschtum, Nazism, and Americanism.  It was a peculiar ideology never seen before and never repeated in American history. 

This unique American character of the Bund is the focus of this thesis which I will explore in two parts.  Part One probes the background of the German American Bund in three sections.  First, I examine the political climate of the 1930s in America in order to compare the German American Bund to the broad array of American fascists and right-wing extremists during this tumultuous period.  Secondly, the unique German conception of Deutschtum is explored in order to demonstrate how a great deal of the Bund’s ideology was inextricably connected to this deeply-rooted and pervasive cultural phenomenon.  Thirdly, the origins of the Bund are traced so that its ideology can be more easily contrasted to the earlier movements associated with the group.  

Part Two will explore the German American Bund under Fritz Kuhn’s leadership.  First I will outline the ideological transformation of the Bund under the leadership of Fritz Kuhn from its formation in 1935 to its heyday in 1939.  Under his direction, I will show how the Bund was revamped from a German outpost of Nazism in America to a genuine American movement with a bizarre amalgamated pro-American agenda. Secondly, the Bund’s ideology, organization, and Americanization will be analyzed by examining Bund newspapers, literature, pamphlets, speeches and testimony.  Thirdly, the Bund experienced duel rejections from the Nazi government and especially the American public, which resulted in the Bund’s intensified Americanization.  The multitude of government and public attacks against the Bund along with the group’s defense of their actions and motives prove to be enormously illustrative of the group’s true nature, ideology, agenda and character.  Fourthly, as soon as the Bund reached its zenith at the

Madison Square Garden Rally in 1939, it experienced its downfall.  An analysis of the group’s downfall sheds much light on the nature of the German American Bund within the larger context of American history.