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The 24th of February is always, and rightly so, a day of vivid memories for us. On this date and from this very hall began the Movement's amazing march to victory, which bore it to the helm of the Reich, to leadership of the nation and its destiny. This day is a great day for me too. Surely, it is seldom that a political leader can stand before the same band of followers that hailed his first great public appearance twenty-one years before, and repeat the same program. Seldom can a man proclaim the same doctrines and put them into practice for twenty-one years without at any time having had to relinquish a single part of his original program. In 1920, when we met for the first time in this hall, many of you must have asked yourselves: "Dear me, a new party, another new party! Why do we want a new party? Don't we have parties enough?" If the new movement had been or had intended to be nothing but a continuation of the old parties or an addition to existing parties, such an objection would indeed have been justified. There were certainly more than enough parties in those days. But, after all, our movement was something quite different from all the existing and incipient parties of the time. It was a movement that declared for the first time and from the very outset that it had no intention of representing the definite, clearly outlined interests of individual classes. It did not stand for town or farm. It did not represent Catholic or Protestant interests; nor did it represent individual sections of the country. This was a movement which was definitely centered upon the concept of the German people. It was not a class party, sworn to uphold the right or the left, attempting to divide the nation, but one which from its very beginning had no thought for anything but the German people as a whole. Thus began a heroic struggle, opposed at its inception by nearly all. Nevertheless, the essential objects of the movement embraced the decisive element. Its clear and unambiguous aim did not allow the movement to become the tool of definite and limited individual interests, but raised it above all special obligations to the particular obligation of serving the German nation in its entirety, of safeguarding its interests regardless of momentary dissensions or confused thoughts. Thus, today, after 21 years, I again stand before you. In those days, we were in the middle of a great collapse; Versailles oppressed us all heavily. With heavy hearts individuals throughout the entire German Reich began to try to find a way out of this profound misery. There were many different views as to the reasons for the collapse. Political mistakes of the most serious kind had undoubtedly been made, not during the war years but many years before. It had been apparent that a storm was brewing. Certain warmongers throughout the world-the very ones who are doing the same thing today-were mobilizing the whole of Europe against Germany. Although favorable opportunities of opposing these warmongers-and, moreover, of opposing them in good time-had presented themselves, the German government of that time proved a political failure. At the beginning of the Great War, too, the political leadership in both internal and external affairs was as clumsy as possible and, from the psychological point of view, utterly wrong. However, in one particular sphere no reproach could be leveled against them: They had not wanted the war. On the contrary, had they wanted the war they would certainly have prepared for it differently, and they would have chosen a more favorable time for it. No, their greatest crime-if a mistake can be called thus-was that, although they knew that war was inevitable, they failed to act at the decisive hour and, consequently, at a more propitious time. Military mistakes were made too-many military mistakes. Yet despite all this, one fact remains: the German soldier, unconquered, defied his enemies for over four years. A unique epic was enacted during these four years. Regardless of the greatness of our present victories or of our victories in the future, the German nation will always look back with deep emotion and inexpressible feelings to the great days of the World War when, alone and forsaken by the whole world, it fought a heroic struggle against an overwhelming superiority in numbers and an overpowering mass of armaments, yet never yielded one inch until the collapse occurred for which not the man at the front but disintegration at home was responsible. This brings us to the really fundamental and decisive reason, to the actual cause of the collapse which took place at that time. The German nation had for several decades been exposed to gradual internal disintegration. It was divided into two worlds. We are only too conscious of them today, we old National Socialists, for we fought and struggled against them. We stood between these two worlds, and it was out of them that our movement gradually came into being. You have not forgotten the political conditions of those days, my old party members-the conditions of our political life. You still remember the placards of the two great conflicting ideas-the bourgeoisie on the one side and the proletariat on the other; on the one side nationalism, on the other socialism. Between these two there yawned a gulf which, it was asserted, could never be bridged. The nationalist idea of the bourgeoisie was exclusively bourgeois, and the socialist ideal was exclusively Marxian. The bourgeois ideal was limited to a class; the Marxian ideal was unlimited internationally. But, fundamentally both movements were already sterile. When I first stood before you here, no sensible person believed that there would ever be any clear decision on this point. This, after all, was the decisive issue. This struggle was inevitable if our nation were not to disintegrate completely. One side would have to emerge from it as the decisive victor. But even this was out of the question at the time, for the movements were already beginning to dissolve and to split up. They had lost their youthful "lan. On the one side, the bourgeoisie was gradually dividing itself into countless parties, societies, groups, associations, bodies representing municipal and rural interests, house and land-owners, etc. On the other side were the Marxian movements, which were likewise disintegrating more and more rapidly. Majority Socialists, Independent Socialists, Communists, Radical Communists, the Communist Labor Party, Syndicalists, and so forth: Who can still remember the struggle of all these groups against one another? Every placard was a declaration of war, not only against their opponents but often against their own world as well. The two camps that faced us then must finally have led to the complete dissolution of the German community, and naturally, therefore, to the waste and misuse of the German people's entire strength. Regardless of the decisions to be made, whether they related to internal matters or foreign policy, whether they were economic or purely internal questions, none of them could be successfully solved unless the whole nation stood solidly united for the purpose. Versailles confronted us at that time. When I made my first appearance in this hall, my whole political conscience imposed upon me the duty of protesting against this subjection, the most ignominious of all times, and of calling upon the nation to take up arms against it. From the point of view of foreign policy, the dictate deprived the German nation of all its rights and rendered it defenseless. The foreign situation, moreover, also demanded a clear decision. The shameful dictate was intended to enslave the German nation forever. No limits had been set to this slavery. From the very outset they said: "We won't state a definite sum for you to pay, because we ourselves do not know what you are able to pay. From time to time we will fix fresh sums; but you must pledge yourselves immediately to pay everything we determine." And that is what the German governments of those days did. The fulfillment of these obligations would have reduced Germany to complete ruin forever. And when a Frenchman said that the aim was really to annihilate 20 million Germans, that was by no means mere imagination. It was entirely possible to calculate the time when the German nation would actually number 20 or 3o million less. This enslavement-disastrous even from the purely economic point of view-was now opposed by the Germans, divided into two great camps. Their points of view were completely different; but both placed their hopes in international ideals. The more intellectually inclined camp said: "We believe in a world-conscience, in world justice. We believe in the League of Nations at Geneva." The others were more proletarian and said: "We believe in international solidarity," and things of that sort. But they all believed in something outside their own people-were ever ready to take refuge in the hope that others would come and help them. The conception of the new Movement, whose fundamentals can be expressed in a single sentence: "The Lord helps those who help themselves," opposed this. That is not only a very pious phrase, but a very just one. For one cannot assume that God exists to help people who are too cowardly and too lazy to help themselves and think that God exists only to make up for the weakness of mankind. He does not exist for that purpose. He has always, at all times, blessed only those who were prepared to fight their own battles. We have seen what can be expected from the help of others. An American President appeared and solemnly declared that if we laid down our arms we should receive this, that and the other thing. We laid down our arms, and the oath was broken and forgotten. When the gentlemen were reminded of it they became very unpleasant. It did not matter how much democratic Germany begged and prayed, she was granted not the slightest relief, n