Blood and Soil - Nazi Implementation

Nazi Implementation

The program received far more ideological and propaganda support than concrete changes. When Gottfried Feder tried to settle workers in villages about decentralized factories, generals and Junkers successfully opposed him. Generals objected because it interferred with rearmament, and Junkers because it would prevent their exploiting their estates for the international market. It would also require the breakup of Junker estates for independent farmers, which was not implemented.

The Reichserbhofgesetz, the State Hereditary Farm Law of 1933, implemented this ideology, stating that its aim was to: "preserve the farming community as the blood-source of the German people" (Das Bauerntum als Blutquelle des deutschen Volkes erhalten). Selected lands were declared hereditary, to pass from father to eldest son, and could not be mortgaged or alienated, and only these farmers were entitled to call themselves Bauern or "farmer peasant", a term the Nazis attempted to refurbish from a neutral or even pejorative to a positive term. This was also regarded as the best place to raise infantry, and as having a organic harmony between landowner and peasant, unlike the "race chaos" of the industrial cities. It also prevented Jews from farming: "Only those of German blood may be farmers."

The concept was a factor in the requirement of a year of land service for members of Hitler Youth and the League of German Girls. This period of compulsory service was required after completion of a student's basic education, before he or she could engage in advanced studies or become employed. Although working on a farm was not the only approved form of service, it was a common one; the aim was to bring young people back from the cities, in the hope that they would then stay "on the land". In 1942, 600,000 boys and 1.4 million girls were sent to help bringing in the harvest.