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12 Austria and the Vatican

Austria has been one of the most Catholic countries in Europe―a country where Catholicism penetrated, very deeply, its social, economic, cultural, and political structure. This was symbolized by the most intimate cooperation of the Church and the Austrian Dynasty, each supporting the other throughout the centuries.

After the close of the Thirty Years’ War, the main responsibility for which lies on the shoulders of the most Catholic Hapsburg, that dynasty became the champion of Catholicism. A special measure of privilege, protection, and support was given to the Catholic Church, which in return continued to bestow all her blessing on the absolute, theocratic dynasty. All her anathemas and moral or religious weapons were employed to fight any potential enemy threatening the Imperial House, such as Secularism and Liberalism during the last century, and Socialism in the first two decades of the twentieth.

Notwithstanding such close collaboration, the Church and the Monarchy did not always walk hand in hand along the road of history.

The Monarchy very often followed an independent path when political aims were at stake; the Hapsburg insisted on the control of the State over the Church. That was not all. In the course of time the absolutism and reaction of both the Austrian rulers and the Catholic Church became so close that the Austrian Emperor could openly and officially interfere in the very election of the Popes. He had, in. fact, acquired the right of “veto, ” by virtue of which the Austrian ruler could suggest or forbid to the cardinals assembled in Conclave any candidate for the Papacy.

The last example occurred just before the First World War. After the death of Leo XIII, while the cardinals were praying to the Holy Ghost for guidance in the election of the new Pope, Francis Joseph charged a cardinal―Cardinal Puzyna―to tell his colleagues that the potential candidate to be elected, Cardinal Rampolla, must not become Pope.

The Emperor had his way. The cardinals who were voting in favor of Rampolla did not know that one of them, Cardinal Puzyna, had the imperial veto in his pocket. At last, just when Cardinal Rampolla seemed on the brink of obtaining the necessary two-thirds majority vote, Cardinal Puzyna read the veto. In spite of the consternation the Emperor was obeyed. Rampolla never became Pope, the good-hearted but reactionary Patriarch of Venice being elected as Pius X. During the first and second part of the last century Austria was an amalgamation of nationalities, races, and religions grouped together under the Emperor, ‘who ruled as absolutely as a mediaeval monarch. The Jesuits were allpowerful and were dominant in the educational and, indirectly, in the political field. Austria at that period might well be described as a solid bloc, impregnable to any idea of progressive social or political changes, thanks to the close alliance and supreme rule of the Hapsburg and the Catholic Church. Austria, in fact, was ruled in both higher and lower spheres by the trinity of Aristocracy, Bureaucracy, and the Catholic Church, linked together by ties of rank, of religion, and of tradition.

Nevertheless, the ideals of the French Revolution had not spread in vain over Europe. Unrest came to life in Austria as well as in other parts of the Continent. Revolutions broke out which were suppressed with the ferocity characteristic of the pious Hapsburg. Gradually, however, Liberal principles took hold of Austria and began to permeate the social, educational, and political life.

We cannot relate this interesting process here: it suffices to say that in the ‘seventies the Taafe Government, which was to last fourteen years, fought with all its might against the heresy of Liberalism, which daily was making new conquests. The Catholic Church was the main-spring of this hostility.

This was the natural sequel to the struggle fought by Catholicism, especially after the revolutions of 1848, when it tried to strengthen its own fervor as an antidote against the democratic spirit then beginning to penetrate into Austria. A Concordat was concluded with the Vatican, and the Catholic Church added new privileges to all those she already possessed. What the Vatican really sought, however, by signing the Concordat was to counteract and destroy the democratic and Liberal ideas which, threatened to captivate youth. Thus, in virtue of this Concordat, the whole educational system was handed over to the Catholic Church, which charged the religious Orders and the village priests to carry on the new counter-revolution.

Although Catholicism has been an integral part of Austrian every-day life, especially among the rural population, the Concordat was received by a considerable part of the population with great hostility. It aroused widespread anti-clerical feeling which had been unknown before Liberalism. The challenge of the Catholic Church was taken up and its absolutism contested in all spheres, and thus anti-clericalism, to the large masses of the populace, became the one attractive thing in Liberalism.

In Vienna anti-clericalism took deep root, became widespread, and remained so until the end of the last century. For decades priests hardly dared to address public meetings in Vienna, but eventually political Catholicism began to enter on the scene in its modern shape. The Concordat, however, was denounced at the beginning of the Liberal era. In spite of all the efforts of the Catholic Church and of the ruling castes of Austria, Liberalism and democratic ideals gained ground. The Catholic Church decided to enter directly into the political arena and fight her enemies on their own ground. A Catholic political movement was initiated.

The Austrian Catholic Party, in order to have a popular appeal, began with a most rabid anti-Semitism. Karl Lueger, the most out-standing man in Austrian political Catholicism, stated that Catholicism, especially in Vienna, could be made into a political movement only through an intermediary stage of mass anti-Semitism. This might sound surprising to modern ears, used to hearing the Vatican speak in favor of the Jews. Yet this is not the only instance of this kind we shall encounter. Lueger’s group for a long time, in fact, called itself simply “anti-Semitic.” Later on it was rebaptized “The Christian Social Party, ” and under this name the Party subsisted until 1934. Lueger created a cult firmly rooted in deep veneration of the Church and of the Imperial House.

The Socialists meanwhile had begun to increase in number and influence. At the instigation of the Socialist Party the workers began to organize and develop trade unions. The result was that the Socialist trade unions drove out the organizations of the Catholics and Nationalists and soon won a practical monopoly of organized labor.

Owing chiefly to the rise of the Socialists, universal suffrage was introduced, which gave the vote to the workers in 1906. A big group of Socialists appeared in Parliament.

Gradually they began to acquire power in local administration as well as in the State machinery. The Socialists, owing to their organization and also to the weakness of the tottering Empire, built almost a State within a State. They succeeded in organizing the workers, not only politically and industrially, but also in all other spare-time activities. They got hold of the worker from the cradle to the grave, nursing him, caring for him, and trying to supply all his moral, spiritual and material needs.

There existed workers’ organizations for gymnastics, for hiking and climbing, as well as for many other sports. Artistic and educational pursuits were not forgotten-for instance, choral singing, listening to music, playing chess, and the provision of book clubs and lectures. Many of these clubs granted to their members substantial financial advantages.

Furthermore, the Socialists, by means of the democratic vote, controlled an increasing number of sick-relief insurance funds and similar institutions and, after the First World War, won control of 47 per cent of the municipalities. The municipalities, when once in the hands of the Socialists, carried out large-scale relief work the effect of this, when combined with the efforts of the various Socialist clubs, being to keep the workers linked up to the Socialist Party in every aspect of their lives.

The Socialist worker generally wanted to have his children born in a municipality ruled by Socialist administration, because there the poorer families enjoyed some financial help at the time of birth. A Socialist town council usually launched an extensive scheme of kindergarten, run on Socialist principles of education, after which the pupil, boy or girl, would enter a preparatory school still under the supervision of a Socialist, town council.

A boy or girl on leaving school would join a Socialistic youth organization. Such youth organizations would reject all the teaching and practice of Catholicism and carry out an equivalent initiation rite of their own, in place of confirmation, a school would join a Socialistic youth organization. Such youth organizations would reject all the teaching and practice of Catholicism and carry out an equivalent initiation rite of their own, in place of confirmation.

The Socialists extended their influence, teaching, and practices in all spheres of life and throughout the worker’s life until his death, when he was buried through the care of a Socialist burial insurance fund, to which he had contributed during his life. All this was strongly opposed by the Catholic Church, which saw that the Socialists were trespassing with the greatest impudence on those spheres hitherto considered her own. Socialistic practice was rapidly being substituted for the principles and practice of Catholicism.

The Catholic Church had fought Socialism from its beginning, and with its continuing increase she deemed it necessary to come out and fight in the open. She declared the Socialist faith to be sinful, condemned Socialist ideas, boycotted Socialist organizations, and preached against anything the Socialists were doing. As a result the workers began to regard the Church as their enemy. The working class became anti-Catholic and Atheistic, while the organizations of the Freethinkers became one of their strongest branches.

The fight against Catholicism developed into one of the most powerful assets of Austrian Socialism for winning the masses.

This state of affairs, since long before the First World War, was due to the fact that, as we have hinted already, Catholicism, in Austria more than anywhere else, has been always a strongly political affair. It had always been closely connected with the Monarchy, and all its care of social problems was consistently subordated to the interests of the Catholic Church and of the Monarchy. The Catholic Church was identified with the dynasty and was, in fact, an integral part of the ruling classes. The Socialists and all their principles were abhorred by the Catholic Church, and in addition they were considered as a nonloyalist element. In consequence, the fight between the Church and the Socialists in Austria attained such bitterness as it had never reached in Germany.

In their dealings with their adversaries, however, the Austrian Socialists ‘were not totalitarian. They had always been strong and convinced democrats. For them a democratic policy was not a matter. of tactics, but of deep conviction.

Immediately after the First World War only two forces remained in the field, the Catholic and the Socialist. Their strength was about equal. The Catholic Party, in 1919, enjoyed the complete confidence of the peasants, although a good number of agricultural laborers had voted for the Socialists.

The Socialists organized the whole working class, and within the next few years increased their membership to the fantastic figure of 700,000 in a country of only 6, 500,000 inhabitants. The Austrian Socialist Party, during the years after the First World War, was the strongest Socialist Party in the world, both in its political influence at home and in the proportion of the total population absorbed in its ranks.

A reaction to, this Socialist power began to take shape. It was led by the Catholic Church with its Hierarchy, supported by the Catholic peasants, the whole bourgeoisie, Jewish and Aryan, and the old aristocracy.

From the day of the formation of the Republic the Socialists had co-operated with the Catholics in a coalition Government. This Government, at first, had been strongly under Socialist influence, but, after the fall of the neighboring Hungarian Soviet Republic, had been reconstructed to the advantage of the Catholics. The masses grew uneasy at the participation of the Socialists in a Government dominated by the Catholics.

In 1920 the Socialists finally left the Government. But in so doing they did not break with the administration. Much of the power of the State was vested in the provincial Governments and in the municipalities and here the Socialists were strong. They completely dominated the provincial Government of Vienna, where they polled more than two-thirds of the vote.

The Socialists made use of the municipal administration for carrying out extensive social reforms. During their ten years of power a great amount of social work was done, including the creation of an efficient hygiene department, a home for consumptives, and the like.

They municipalized housing. The Viennese Socialists constructed large municipal buildings which earned the admiration of conservative reformers all over the world. This great energy in providing healthy and cheap housing for the working class in Vienna was regarded by the Catholics, and all other anti-Socialists, as the best proof of “creeping Bolshevism.” So much was this so that when, later on, the Catholics again took over the administration of Vienna, their first proceeding was to discontinue this building program, which had not yet been completed.

But the most remarkable feature of the Socialist administration in Austria, and especially in Vienna, was that they did not in any sense persecute the Catholic Church, although considering her to be their political enemy. Never were they accused of anything in the nature of “Red outrages.” This was in contrast to the behavior of the Most Catholic Government, which dealt most barbarously with its critics by mass hanging, as we shall see presently.

Meanwhile, the Catholics and all other reactionary elements became active openly and underground. There were rumors that they might try to break the power of the Socialists by undemocratic means, seeing that, as long as democracy existed, the Socialists were bound to become stronger and stronger. To forestall this the Socialists had formed the “Republican Defense Corps”―a strong and well. disciplined armed guard, ready, to fight in defense of democracy and the Socialist Party.

Further, parallel to the closing of the ranks of the reactionary forces at home, reactionary forces abroad had begun to seize power, building up Fascist and semi-Fascist States in many parts of Europe. Affairs were already indicating the direction in which Austria, and indeed the whole of Europe, was going.

Soon after the First World War, Prelate Ignaz Seipel, a theologian, had attained the leadership of the Catholic Party. Minister in the last Imperial Government, and unchallenged head of the clerical party, he set before himself, as his life’s goal, the restoration of political power to the Catholic Church and also to the Hapsburgs.

He was a man of great personal integrity and asceticism, although he possessed a special talent for intrigue designed to further the political interests of the Catholic Church. He ate, prayed, and slept in two little monastic rooms in the Convent of the Sacred Heart of Jesus; throughout his years as Chancellor, Seipel allowed no political stress to curb his religious duties. Daily at six o’clock in the morning he said Mass in the Convent Chapel. He continued to act as the Superior of this Congregation of nuns despite the demands of his office.

Although not a member of the Society of Jesus, Seipel had all the characteristics popularly attributed to the Jesuits. It was impossible, for instance, to tie him down to a clear “yes” or “no.” He had an intense hatred of the Socialists or anything connected with their ideas. Equally repugnant to him were Secularism, Modernism, and Liberalism. His second objective, besides that of furthering the power of the Catholic Church, was the crushing of the Social Democratic Party, which he hated as “the Red Antichrist.” The Socialists called him “The Cardinal without Mercy―”Der Keine Milde Kardinal.” Twice he was almost killed by the infuriated mob.

Before proceeding farther, let us see what were the ideas and ‘aims of Seipel in the domestic and foreign fields. These are most important, for they continued extensively to guide the Austrian Governments till the end of Austria, especially in the domestic sphere. Their importance is further enhanced when it is remembered that they drew their inspiration from the Catholic Church itself, and were not only approved, but fostered, by the Vatican. It must be borne in mind that Seipel, throughout his life, was in the closest contact with the Pope and his Secretary of State and that he molded his policy according to the dictates of the Vatican.

The outstanding characteristic of his policy was the subordination of political, economic, and social matters to ecclesiastical interests. To him the interests of the Catholic Church were identified with the existing social order; or, to be more correct, with the social order of pre-war times.

He was bitterly hostile to any widespread movement of social reform. He hated the Socialist unions. Once, when arguing with a French Jesuit who had emphasized the necessity for widespread social reforms, he replied: “More capitalistico vivit ecclesia catholica”―”the Catholic Church lives in the form of capitalism.” He took his cue in economic matters from the bankers and industrialists, whose aims coincided with his. To him the ideal state of society for which he was striving was closely identified with the resuscitation of the old hierarchical structure of society, and especially of the power of the clergy. On more than one occasion he openly confessed that he found it impossible to tolerate the limitations imposed upon the power of the Catholic Church within the Republic. We said, before, that the main asset of the Socialists was their anti-clerical which, as soon as they took over the administration of Vienna in 1918, increased greatly. The party fomented sentiments of anti-clericalism and religious indifference.

According to Seipel, the political power of the Socialists was the chief obstruction to the control of the Church over souls. Therefore he set out to crush their power―a task which was accomplished after his death. Seipel formed a close alliance with all the bitterest enemies of Socialism. He hated the Socialists because they were against the Catholic Church, the industrialists, and all other sections of society, and because of the heavy taxation they imposed upon these sections.

Seipel. and the Catholic Party identified themselves wholly and with. out reserve with the cause of big business.

Seipel’s ideas of how society should be constructed were typically ultra- Catholic, and were mainly inspired by the various dicta of the Popes which we have examined in the previous part of this book. His antipathy to Socialism, and his conviction that it was essential to offer the masses a Catholic conception of social order dependent on the resurrection of the mediaeval Guilds or Corporations, was highly esteemed at the Vatican. Accordingly he was asked by the Pope himself to help in drafting that very encyclical which announced officially the Vatican policy sponsoring the creation of the Corporate State in the modern world. Seipel became, in fact, the Pope’s “adviser, ” if it is permissible to use the term, and was largely successful in inserting his ideas into the political doctrines of international Catholicism. Seipel defended industry, capitalism, the banks and their owners. Any obstacle opposed to their economic independence was considered an attempt against the natural order of things. The Seipel Stande, or social grades, were not instruments of social order, but aimed primarily at political domination. According to Seipel, Stande had to elect the representatives to Parliament. They had to counteract the domination of sheer numbers in democratic elections. In short, they were to be created in order to break the strength of the Socialists. By gradually introducing these ideas into the machinery of the State, Seipel succeeded in crushing democracy and the Socialists, but in so doing he paved the way to the most blatant Fascism, which, in its turn, crushed political Catholicism.

In harmony with, and closely related to, this social policy Seipel had also a well-defined foreign policy, similarly endorsed by the Vatican. This foreign policy later on promoted, as we shall see, the disintegration of Czechoslovakia. Seipel was, in fact, dreaming of the creation of a new Holy Roman Empire. Simply stated, this political entity would have consisted in a union of those States, and parts of States, professing the Catholic Faith and belonging to the old Austro-Hungarian monarchy. Vienna was to be the capital and Austria was to form the centre.

From Yugoslavia, Seipel proposed to take the Catholic Croatia, constituting one-third of its territory, this region being antagonized in the religious sphere by the Central Government. Czechoslovakia was to be divided into two, the Catholic Slovakia being taken away from the Hussite heretics and the free-thinking Czechs and united with that part of Hungary placed under Rumania. In Hungary Seipel would have installed a Catholic ruler, possibly a scion of the Hapsburgs, thus preventing Calvinists like the Hungarian Regent and Count Bethlen from ruling a Catholic population. That was not all. If circumstances allowed, the plan was to include Bavaria, which France had tried to separate from Berlin, and Alsace-Lorraine. It must be a Catholic Empire―a Papal Federation―where the Pope might even find a defender and a seat if the worst should happen at the hands of the International Socialists and Red Russia.

Seipel’s project was to work towards the gradual completion of this plan by building a Danubian Confederation, by consolidating a series of friendships and tariff pacts, and by a gradual welding together of a new nation to restore peace in Central Europe under the aegis of the Catholic Church. He prepared his plans to this end in detail, great and small. He had even selected the future Most Catholic Emperor. This was to be the son of the deposed Empress Zita, the young Otto, whose early training had been received at the Benedictine Abbey of St. Maurice in Clervaux, Luxembourg. He allied himself with the legitimists in Hungary and, at the Vatican, influenced the appointment of Dr. Justinian Seredi as Primate of Hungary. That is another instance of the Pope’s participation in the plan.

Such were the conceptions of the Catholic Prelate Seipel, who was carrying on his policy in the closest contact with the Vatican. Now let us consider very briefly how he carried it out.

We have already seen how the reactionary forces, led by the Catholics, had begun to take counter-measures to arrest the power of the “Atheistic Socialist.” These counter-measures were embodied in the gradual emergence of armed, secret, anti-Socialist groupings, who began the systematic killing of prominent Socialists in the small provincial towns.

Early in 1927 a Vienna jury, consisting mostly of anti-Socialists, acquitted Heimwehr men who, for political reasons, had committed several murders. Already, in numerous other cases, anti-Socialists had been acquitted in similar circumstances. The workers thus became convinced that the Law Courts no longer afforded any protection against political murder. A spontaneous mass-demonstration swept the streets of Vienna on the morning of July 15, 1927. Clashes with the police occurred. The infuriated crowds attacked the building of the Supreme Court and burnt it down as a symbol of legal injustice. The leader of the Socialists sent the “Republican Defense Corps” to disperse the masses and save the building, thereby depriving the Catholics of an excuse for using more force. But the Government had already prepared to send troops, who arrived suddenly and began to fire upon the masses, who were completely disarmed. Fighting continued, here and there, for two days. There were over ninety dead and over one thousand wounded.

The political balance was quickly upset. Seipel declared publicly: “Do not ask mildness from me at this moment.” A tremendous wave of political passion took possession of the working-class districts. Within the next five months, over twenty-one thousand people officially left the Catholic Church as a protest against the priest who had said “No mildness.”

As a consequence of this tragic event the Socialists lost their last influence in the Army and Police, which by now were instruments of the Government. Furthermore, the Catholic, anti-Socialist, and semi-Fascist movement, which had been preparing itself with varying fortunes, came suddenly into the open. This movement arose chiefly among the peasants. The Catholic peasants, influenced by their priests and by their fear of having their lands confiscated by the Reds, had hated “Red Vienna” since 1919. On July 15 they thought that Vienna had become the victim of a “Bolshevik” rising.

The Heimwehren had one definite aim only-to smash the Reds. Seipel, who had helped them, speedily employed them as an instrument to overthrow democracy. He shaped the ideas of this body and directed it not only against the Reds, but against democracy as such. His slogans assumed the tune of “Away with Parliament” and “We need an authoritarian State.” Such slogans, of course, were in opposition to the Catholic Party, of which Seipel was the leader, as well as the Socialist Party. But there was no contradiction in the now openly declared policy. The same sequence of events which had occurred in Italy was now occurring in Austria-namely, the liquidation of the Catholic Party as a political instrument and the substitution of a more powerful instrument to further Catholic policy. This instrument was Fascism, embodied in this case in the Heimwehr. The policy of the Vatican, to sacrifice a Catholic Party if thereby dictatorship could be attained, had again triumphed.

The Heimwehr, however, remained always under strength. Its battalions were recruited mainly from the peasants, who are not generally available for political action outside their own region or beyond their immediate interests. If Italian Fascism, and Nazism, had relied solely on the Catholic peasants and on anti-Socialistic sentiment, they could never have triumphed. They relied mainly on the middle stratum of the urban population, the lower middle classes. This stratum in Austria was actively Fascist, but it was very small. The Fascist Heimwehr could never find compensation for the absence of the middle classes as an aid to Fascism and Nazism.

In the October that followed, Seipel instructed the Heimwehr to organize under his banner, giving an assurance of protection from State action, of immunity from interference by foreign Governments, of enough money for uniforms and weapons and of wages when necessary. A year later the ex- Chancellor, believing the time to be ripe for his return to power on the crest of the Fascist wave, openly proclaimed himself a Fascist. (Seldes, The Vatican: Yesterday-Today-Tomorrow.) Owing to this support and to the support of the Catholics and other reactionary elements, coupled with the encouragement of the Vatican as well as that of Mussolini, the Heimwehren were strong enough to attack the Socialists and democracy four times in the following autumn.

Subsequent history shows that the following years of the Republic pivoted mainly on these attacks. The first attempt was planned in imitation of Mussolini’s march on Rome. In October 1928 the Heimwehren organized a big demonstration, gathering armed troops from all over Austria to meet in an industrial area south of Vienna. The workers, who also possessed arms, prepared themselves to fight. Nothing, however, happened.

By now the military aristocratic elements had given more uniformity to the Heimwehren. With the help of these armed forces, Seipel, who had resigned early in the spring of that year, compelled his successor to resign. Schober, the Chief of Police, who had ordered the troops to fire on the Socialists in 1927, became Prime Minister.

Seipel was to receive two major blows. First, Schober expelled Scipel’s right-hand man in the Heimwehr, Major Waldemar Pabst. Pabst was a professional counter-revolutionist, implicated in political assassinations in Germany and a go-between of Hitler and Prince Stahremberg, the chief of the Heimwehr. The second blow to Seipel’s political plan was the election of a Labor Government in England.

Ramsay MacDonald and Arthur Henderson were close friends of the Viennese Socialists. Henderson, when informed of the arming of the Heimwehr, caused an interpellation in the House of Commons. The charge was that the Peace Treaty had been broken, that a secret army was being organized, and that the secret army was being supplied from Government sources. The British Government demanded that the Heimwehr should disarm. The French Government made the same demand. This intervention from the two Governments saved Austria from imminent civil war between the Heimwehr and the Socialist Republican Army and led to the retirement for the time being of Monsignor Seipel.

The Heimwehr meanwhile, having seen their direct attack fail, tried indirect methods. With the help of the Catholic Karl Vaugoin, the Vice-Chancellor, an attempt was made to break the Socialist control of the railwaymen. The Government was split on the issue of selecting the man appointed to break down the Socialist resistance, and resigned. Vaugoin was appointed Chancellor, and his first act was to dissolve Parliament. In this he was passionately supported by the Heimwehr, which pronounced for dictatorship. The Government itself stated that from now on it would govern only by “authoritarian” methods. Seipel, in the meantime, resigned the chairmanship of the Catholic Party, a move full of meaning so far as the use of the Catholic Political Party to the Catholic Church was concerned. He next entered Vaugoin’s Government as Foreign Minister. Of the two Heimwehr leaders, Prince Stahremberg became Home Secretary and Dr. Hueber went to the Board of Trade. Dr. Hueber was an outspoken Nazi, who later on was to become a member of the fourdays’ Nazi Government of 1938, which handed over Austria to Germany. Prince von Stahremberg openly boasted of his alliance with Hitler, who by that time was marching quickly towards absolutism.

The Socialists, however, made it clear that if the election should be cancelled, or if the New House were to meet, they would fight resolutely. In the election the Vaugoin-Seipel and Stahremberg group failed to secure a majority. Meanwhile, England and France clearly stated that they expected Austria to produce a constitutional Government. The three would-be dictators resigned.

After these resignations the Heimwehr rapidly disintegrated. In Germany Hitler had now become a political power, through the general election of 1930. The Austrian election at the same time had not given the Nazis a single seat. Nazism began to exert a strong attraction for the members of the defeated Heimwebr. They approached Hitler, who propounded to them three conditions: no restoration of the Hapsburgs, but Anschluss; absolute opposition to parliamentarianism; unquestioning acceptance of his personal rule. What was left of the Heimwehr split on these three conditions. Stahremberg supported Monarchism, but the Styrian Heimwehren joined the Nazis. On September 13, 1931, they attempted a military rising, which, however, was quickly suppressed.

Parliament continued to drag on very uneasily, the Catholic Government striving to rule with a minority. In the end a new Cabinet was formed under Dr. Dollfuss, with a one-vote majority in Parliament.

Dollfass was the illegitimate son of a peasant. He had been destined for the ecclesiastical profession, and had been educated in a seminary with the assistance of an ecclesiastical grant. At the age of nineteen, however, be changed his mind. After the War he gradually became an important official of the various Catholic organizations, first among the students, and later among the peasants. He started as an outspoken member of the democratic wing of the Catholic Party, but afterwards he became a member of the “Authoritarian” faction. He assumed power shortly after Seipel’s death on September 2, 1932, and can be regarded as the executor of the political testament of that prelate.

Relations with the Catholics in power became every day more strained, and also with the Socialists. Once more Dollfuss sought to strengthen the discredited Heimwehr. Simultaneously he declared his intention of transforming Austria into a “Corporate Authoritarian State.” The State, he said, would resemble that of Fascist Italy, but would take its guidance from the instructions issued by the Pope himself to Catholics throughout the world. These instructions were embodied in the encyclical Quadragesimo Anno, issued in 1931, in which Pius XI called upon Catholics to set up a Corporate State wherever they could. DollIuss was continuously in intimate contact with the Catholic authorities, the Hierarchy and the Vatican, from whom he often took advice.

On January 30, 1933, Hitler assumed power in Berlin. A little incident which developed into an international issue meanwhile occurred. Railway trade unionists discovered that an armament factory at Hinterberg, in Lower Austria, was producing rifles, not, as was believed, for the Austrian Army, but for reactionary Hungary. Important officials of the Government were helping in the smuggling of such armament. Furthermore, it was discovered that the officials involved were mostly Catholics of semi-Fascist or even openly Fascist sympathies. One such official, knowing that a certain railway man had knowledge of what was going on, with the consent of Dollfuss offered him a large sum of money as the price of his silence. The man refused, and this double secret was made known by the newspaper of the Socialist Party.

The scandal made a sensation; but that was not enough. The issue became wider. The rifles were not for Hungary, but for Fascist Italy. They had not been ordered for the Hungarians, but were directed to Hungary only as a temporary store-house. They were destined for the Catholic Hapsburg monarchists in Croatia, who were plotting a rising in order to detach themselves from Yugoslavia (Seipel’s “planning for a Catholic Federation” is to be remembered).

The Hinterberg plot was part of an international plan, which culminated in the assassination of King Alexander of Yugoslavia and of the French Foreign Minister by a Croatian partisan of the Hapsburgs, in 1934. At that time Fascist Italy was in bitter enmity with Yugoslavia, and Mussolini was seriously contemplating intervention with force. The aspiration of the Catholic Monarchists for the detachment of Croatia from Yugoslavia suited him well. In this project Mussolini, the semi-Fascist Hungarian Government, the leaders of the Heimwehr, and Dollfuss were alike implicated. More than that, the Vatican had knowledge of the whole affair. Several years afterwards Count Grandi, Fascist Ambassador in London, stated that Dollfuss as well as Mussolini had approached the Pope regarding the plan. The Pope, while not encouraging it, expressed the wish that when Croatia had been detached from “schismatic Yugoslavia” the rights of the Catholic Church should be restored. He promised to ask the Catholic clergy in Croatia to support the movement, and said that he would certainly have the aid of numerous Catholic countries in the League of Nations if the matter were now on a serious footing.

Thus the Socialists, by their discovery of a serious Catholic Monarchist plot, involving Croatia, Hungary, and Austria, had obstructed the path of the Catholic Dollfuss, of the Vatican, and of Mussolini. From that day onwards Catholics in Austria were Sworn to destroy the Socialists. Dollfuss promised Mussolini, who was eager for the immediate crushing of the Socialists, that he would do everything in his power to annihilate them.”The Socialist watch-dog had to be suppressed.” Dollfuss turned openly Fascist. Within ten days he had formed his anti-Socialist Cabinet, comprising members of the Catholic Party, the Farmer Party (Catholic), and of the Heimwehr. The Social Democrats, constituting the largest and most compact party in the country, were not even consulted.

The first act of Dollfuss was the abolition of Parliament. Then he proclaimed that Austria had gone Over to Fascism on the Italian model. He concentrated into his own hands the most vital port. folios, namely those of the Army, Police, Gendarmerie, Foreign Affairs, and Agriculture. He decided that all parties must disappear, including the Catholic Party, whose disappearance, as he well knew, was in accordance with the wishes of the Vatican. The new dictatorship would rule in accordance with Seipel’s conception of the Corporate State, based on the Stande. Anti-Semitism received official recognition, the Press was muzzled, opposition Suppressed, and concentration camps were opened. Trade unions were gradually dissolved. Dollfuss proposed to create Catholic unions, himself nominating their leaders.

During the year 1933, after the suppression of Parliament, Doll. fuss issued over, three hundred illegal and unconstitutional decrees. He used his power mainly to diminish the social and economic rights of the workers and to increase the value of property and the security of its owners. The peasants, his followers, were subsidized at the expense of the Socialist workers in the towns. He restricted, the right of trial by jury, destroyed the freedom of the Press, and abolished the right of assembly. He ordained that the secrecy hitherto observed by the Postal Service was no longer to be in. violable. He abolished almost all the cultural and sporting organizations that were not Catholic, dissolved the Republican Defense Corps, and at the same time armed, so far as he could, the Catholic and Fascist Heimwehr. Then he established “Lightning Courts, ” and restored the death penalty, although the only persons to be hanged were invariably Socialists accused of resistance to the Heimwehr. These steps he initiated, significantly enough, after a visit paid to Mussolini and the Vatican.

All these measures were later, in 1934, to be crowned by a Concordat between the Vatican and the Austrian Government by which Rome made into a reality his slogan “A Catholic Austria.” The principles of the encyclical Quadragesimo Anno were enforced, wherever possible, with more care than before. The Concordat established the Catholic Church in a legal, official position, which she began to use to the fullest extent. The Catholic religion became the religion of the State, education was directly and indirectly subject to her, and all traces of non-Catholic influences were systematically destroyed. The clergy became a privileged section of society and an enormous volume of Catholic literature, in the form of books and newspapers, extolled the blessings of the Corporate authoritarian State as expounded by the Pope and as adopted by Mussolini and the Austrian State. The various Evangelical and Protestant Churches began to suffer systematic persecution, and their ministers were boycotted, arrested, and imprisoned.

This persecution was due to a feeling of resentment experienced by the Catholic Church; and this feeling of resentment was aroused by the fact that, notwithstanding the Church’s enormous political power and her hold on the life of the nation, thousands of Austrians began to join Protestant Churches, especially the Evangelical Church. The converts took this step as a protest against the religious, social, and political tyranny of the Catholic Church. Within a few months, in fact, over 23,000 Austrian Catholics had sought membership of the Evangelical Church alone. In addition to that astonishing figure, in Vienna alone another 16,000 persons abandoned Catholicism. Within a very brief time the number in that city who had repudiated the Catholic Church amounted to over 100,000. The middle classes, significantly enough, provided the greatest number of converts. (Churches Under Trial.)

Dollfuss thought that the Nazis would become more friendly with him after he had destroyed “those cursed Social Democrats.” The Nazis, however, behaved in a manner which did not promise any closer collaboration. Thus the policy of Dollfuss at this time was the devotion of all efforts towards putting new life into Austrian patriotism.

Although he desired a Fascist State, he wanted totalitarian Austria to be independent. Many sections of the population supported him. The leading groups of Catholic politicians had always disliked the idea of the Anschluss. The clergy were opposed to it. So much was this the case that there was a time before Dollfuss, and even after, when the bishops proclaimed from their pulpits, and the village priests in sermons and in private conversation strongly impressed upon their flocks, that Nazism aimed at destroying Austrian independence. Furthermore, they proclaimed-and this was most important-that Nazism was the sworn foe of the Catholic Church. An important contributory cause to hostility against union with Germany was the hatred of Prussia innate in all Austrians, and a dislike for the North and, above all, for Protestantism. The Catholic Hierarchy, hoping at this time to establish a totalitarian State in Austria, were opposed to the Anschluss. If the Anschluss had come into being, they would never have been able to form a “Catholic Austria” under Hitler, remembering the stronghold which Protestantism was obtaining in the life of Austria. This last consideration was now so powerful that when Catholics acknowledged their attachment to National Socialism in the confessional, the priests condemned it as a sin.

Dollfuss began to organize a Heimwehr State, transforming his storm troops into a Totalitarian Party. This step was desired by Stahremberg and Mussolini. Once more the Heimwehr was well provided with funds. Dollfuss and the Catholic Party were, how. ever, well aware that a full- fledged Heimwehr Fascism would incur the hostility of at least 90 per cent of the population, besides the Socialists, the Nazis, and even a section of the Catholics.

Arms were not enough to support a dictatorship. The Catholic leaders decided not to rely entirely on the guns of the Heimwehr, but to utilize another element which they thought was very strong-namely, the Austrian clergy. Thus it was decided, after obtaining the consent of the Vatican, to make the Catholic clergy the backbone of the new dictatorship in the political field, as the Heimwehr was in the military field. The higher ranks of the Austrian clergy had meanwhile received instructions from Rome to support wholeheartedly the Dollfuss regime, and to strengthen it to the best of their ability. From them instructions went out to the whole Austrian clergy in every village and parish to become pillars of the new Catholic authoritarian State. In the end, however, the Catholic Church failed, and that decided the fate of Austria.

In Austria, as we have seen, the Catholic Church had identified herself continuously with a political reactionary regime, usually disliked by the masses. The average Austrian peasant, although a Catholic, disliked the intrusion of the clergy into what he rightly considered secular affairs. The priest, concerned with the religious needs of his parish, ought not to aim at political leadership. Doll. fuss was striving to make the Catholic Church the ruler of Austria. Besides this, the Catholic Church and Dollfuss were sponsoring the resuscitation of the Hapsburgs and the traditions of the aristocracy, and although in certain parts of Austria this idea was not unpopular, it was distasteful to the great majority of Austrians.

The revolt of the peasants against the Church, the continually multiplying adherences to Nazism, and the staggering number of conversions to Protestantism, filled the Catholic Church with ever. increasing alarm. The bishops asked Dollfuss to act, and to forbid these transferences of allegiance. Dollfuss started to sentence persons spreading Nazi propaganda, which in the case of most of them assumed the form of conversion to Protestantism. Such measures, of course, strengthened the spirit of rebellion. While this process was going on in the countryside, Dollfuss continued the destruction of Socialism and the building up of his own dictatorship. He proceeded gradually by taking away the rights of the Socialists one by one, but under continuous pressure from the Hierarchy, the Heimwehr, and from Mussolini.

When at last, on February II, 1934, the Dollfuss police occupied the Socialist Party headquarters at Linz, the Socialists began to fight at Linz, in Vienna, and in other districts. The fight lasted four days, and in some parts even longer. Dollfuss allowed to a Heimwehr leader a repetition of “the joyous hangings of war-time.” He gave orders that every prisoner should be court-martialed and hanged. Dollfuss said that there were only 137 “rebels” killed. One man severely wounded was carried on a stretcher to execution. After the seventh hanging, Major Fey was compelled to stop, owing to the protest of a Foreign Power and to the indignation of every civilized community, though, significantly enough, not a single word of mercy or of protest came from the Vatican. Dollfuss had lied. At a conservative estimate there were between 1,500 and 1,600 Socialists killed and 5,000 wounded; 1,188 were imprisoned, and eleven were hanged. (Osterreich, 1934.)

The attitude and methods of the Catholic regime towards its adversaries should be compared with the methods of the Socialists, who, during their revolution of 1919 and during their years of power in Vienna, had not “hurt a hair of anybody’s head, ” as one historian says.

The Socialist Party was dissolved, the union closed, and a Commissar took over the administration of Vienna. Many Socialist leaders had to flee abroad. The official Socialist Party was driven underground and those daring to support it were sent to jail. By the end of 1934 there were over 19, 051 Socialists in the Austrian jails, imprisoned without trial. They were treated with the utmost brutality. Some journalists, desiring to investigate their conditions, were not allowed to visit them. Furthermore, the Catholic clergy compelled Dollfuss to refuse relief funds from abroad in order “to force those in distress to apply to Catholic Organizations” (Annual Register). We shall see presently how Dollfuss’s successor followed the same line.

The most appalling religious persecution of the Socialists and all enemies of the Catholic Church ensued. The splendid system of education, being totally absorbed by the Catholic Church, was completely destroyed and the economic position so deteriorated that millions again became semi-starved. The great building scheme, which had edified Europe, was entirely stopped. The Vatican was pleased, and so were Dollfuss and Mussolini, but most pleased of all was Hitler, who saw a tremendous increase in the number of his adherents all over Austria, consequent on “the suppression of the Socialist watchdog.”

The Vatican authorities, meanwhile, were playing a double game with Dollfuss and Hitler. They were watching and waiting. Pope Pius XI had given Hitler to understand that if he adhered to his word regarding the treatment and privileges granted to the Catholic Church in Germany, then the Church would help him to “achieve his political aims” in Austria. By doing this the Vatican hoped to compel Hitler to observe the clauses of the Concordat, some of which he was already beginning to forget. In addition to that, the Vatican wanted to see whether the Catholic victory was likely to last or whether the danger of “revolutions” was still present. In the latter case it was of paramount importance to the Vatican to ensure that “the Red danger” should be kept underground by an even stronger hand, and that stronger hand would eventually have been that of Hitler. To achieve its aim the Vatican had to make still further sacrifices. Besides the sacrifice of the Austrian Catholic Party, the Vatican would have to sacrifice the Austrian Catholic regime and its dreams of “Papal Confederations” envisaged by Seipel.

Meanwhile, Dollfuss candidly believed that his great service to Hitler, in destroying the Socialist Party, would render Hitler more amenable. Hitler hoped that it would be easier for him to secure his aims now that the Socialists had been removed. Dollfuss was ready to admit Nazis to his Cabinet, but he desired Austria’s independence. The Nazis wanted the Anschluss and the rule of Hitler. Negotiations broke down and the Nazis began a campaign of bomb-throwing. Dollfuss proclaimed martial law, and finally the death penalty was instituted for the illegal possession of dynamite. But, significantly enough, not a single death sentence was carried out.

At the same time serious dissensions concerning the demands of Hitler were threatening to disrupt the Dollfuss Government. Major Fey was accused of actually conspiring with the Nazis. Anton Rintelen, the second man in the Catholic Party and until a few months before Governor of Styria, was won over to them. On July 25, 1934, the Nazis attempted to seize power. A group of Nazis entered the Chancellery, attempting to seize the Government. Only Dollfuss and Major Fey were captured. Dollfuss was mortally wounded and died shortly afterwards. Troops were called out and proved reliable. Mussolini, seeing that his dream of being overlord of Austria and Hungary was in danger, sent two divisions to the Brenner Pass. Hitler, who was not yet ready for a fight, left the conspirators to their fate. Had the plot succeeded, no danger of international war would have arisen.

Then Herr von Papen, the Chamberlain of the Papal Court, was sent to Vienna in order to effect a conciliation. Dollfuss was followed by Herr von Schuschnigg. He was a Catholic of the deepest religious feelings. He had received a thorough education from the Jesuits, and even in bearing he had the air of a studious priest rather than of a politician. Schuschnigg wanted an “authoritarian” Austria, but on milder lines than those laid down by Dollfuss. His task was rendered easier by the changed policy of Hitler, who, seeing the alarm he had created in Europe, was compelled to apply the soft pedal to his moves. All Europe, in fact, seemed to unite against German aggression. The result was the Conference of Stresa.

At first the new regime varied little from that of Dollfuss. Gradually, however, Schuschnigg realized that to obtain popular support he must relax the dictatorship which weighed so heavily on the people, and especially on the working class. Thus he began gradually to grant modest concessions now and then, but promising more in the future.

He slowly rid himself of the most hated and notorious extremists in his Government-Major Fey and Stahremberg, the leaders of the Heimwehr. Then he incorporated the Heimwehr itself with the military organization of the Government.

The Catholic Church, which at first had retired into the background, again sought to exert strong pressure on the political life of the country. She continued to fear the “Red danger and the dangerous ideas of Protestantism and of religious indifference.” The Church wanted to get some degree of control over all the workers, whether they were Socialist, Atheist, or Bolshevik. The Law and the Army, which had driven them underground, were not enough. The Catholic Hierarchy wanted to obtain an even tighter hold of them by compelling them to come under its direct control.

Negotiations with the Government continued for some time, until at last agreement was reached. Schuschnigg passed a law requiring every citizen to be a member of a Church. The political character of this move was received with the greatest hostility in many quarters, not only among the workers, and what happened under Dollfuss was repeated on a larger scale. A mass movement from the ranks of the Catholic Church ensued. Thousands of Roman Catholics, workers and people of the middle classes, began in disgust to enter the Protestant Churches, where their votes were not dictated by the religious body to which they belonged. During this period the number of Protestants reached the figure, unheard of in Catholic Austria, of 340,000―a happening which overwhelmed the few Protestant pastors still left at liberty. (Churches Under Trial.)

Matters went on fairly quietly for some time, and the internal situation seemed to be reasonably stable. Although the Catholic Church was continuing to press the Government for more drastic measures against “the Red peril which was rumbling underground, ” there was no internal trouble for Austria. But then disquiet recurred, and once more it started from abroad. The Abyssinian War broke out. Fascist Italy, seeking German friendship, would no longer support Austria and advised Schuschnigg to deal directly with Hitler. Austria thereupon signed a treaty with Nazi Germany (July 1936). Austria promised to subordinate her foreign policy to that of Hitler, and further undertook that, should war break out, Austria would side with Germany.

In Austria the prohibition of the Nazi Party continued, but Nazis were allowed to gather unmolested. A Nazi leader became Home Secretary. The truce with Nazism lasted about eighteen months. Meanwhile, Germany had become stronger in the international field, the Axis firmer, and her armament had seriously increased. Owing to these factors and to the bogy of the Red peril, whose recrudescence seemed imminent, the Austrian Hierarchy, instructed by the Vatican, decided to strike a bargain with Hitler. Only by his iron hand could the Red be utterly destroyed. If Hitler had promised to respect the Church’s rights in Germany as well as in Austria, his co-operation with the Catholic Hierarchy would have been possible. Hitler, aware of this new attitude, began to act by starting a persecution in Germany of the Catholic Church. There were strong domestic reasons for Hitler to act thus, as we have had occasion to see, but his Austrian aims provided an additional reason of no mean order. He made it known to the Vatican that the persecution would be discontinued provided that the Vatican instructed the Austrian Hierarchy and leading Catholics to support the Anschluss. Once that was done, he would respect the rights of the Church, not only in Germany, but also in Austria.

The Vatican consented. Through the agency of von Papen and Cardinal Innitzer, negotiations were continued with the aim of persuading Schuschnigg to hand over Austria. Schuschnigg, however, was opposed to the Anschluss, knowing that it would have been the end of Austria. He stubbornly refused. Hitler summoned him to Berchtesgaden and ordered him to hand over the Home Office to a most devout Catholic, a fervent Nazi, Dr. von Seyss-Inquart. Hitler showed Schuschnigg the marching-orders to be given to the German troops should he decline. Schuschnigg had to obey.

Seyss-Inquart had had many secret interviews with von Papen and the Cardinal before this happened. Seyss-Inquart, of course, accepted, knowing who was supporting him inside Austria. Seyss-Inquart was a Viennese barrister who, after the First World War, had opened a modest office in Vienna without attaining any success. His connection with the Catholic Party was very close. This was due chiefly to the fact that he was a supporter of many Catholic organizations of all kinds. He had become an ardent Catholic propagandist and he was frequently heard in Vienna as a lecturer propounding Catholic principles. He was very pious and, with his family, was assiduous in frequenting the services of the Church. His zealous and sincere efforts to serve the Catholic cause brought him into personal contact with the Chancellor, Dollfuss, and from that moment his advance was rapid. Even after he had become a political figure, and Hitler had made him Reich Commissar for Austria, he continued to go almost daily to church.

Schuschnigg returned from Berchtesgaden, having learned many things, amongst which were several closely connected with the Vatican. This led him to a reshaping of his policy towards the Socialists. He wanted their friendship, counting on their support to preserve the independence of Austria.

At that time the situation still presented a three-cornered contest between Catholics, Nazis, and Socialists. In the days of Dollfuss the Government had tried to join forces with the Nazis in order to crush the Socialists. After him the new Government tried simultaneously to subjugate both parties, yet to make friends with them. But, when the decisive hour came, Schuschnigg saw that he could rely neither on the Nazis nor on the Catholics. The main support came from the Socialists. After his interview with Hitler, Schuschnigg reshuffled his Government. Besides the Nazi Seyss-Inquart, he included a representative of the democratic elements as well as of the Socialists. He next negotiated with the workers in the factories, and soon he began to grant concessions. Before the end the workers organized a great meeting unmolested, for the first time in many years, by the police. At this conference the Socialists pledged themselves to defend Austria’s independence. In doing so, the Socialists acted not only from hatred of Nazism, but because they thought they were winning back their own independence. This was the most open confession of the failure and bankruptcy of the policy of Seipel and Dollfuss. It was clear that at the last and gravest moment of Austria’s independence the Catholic Government could rely only on the Labor Movement, which it had so consistently persecuted.

Having made these many concessions, the Government began to hesitate. Catholics inside and outside the Government, the influence of the Catholic Church, of the Austrian Hierarchy, and even of the Vatican were strongly opposed to these concessions.”What, so many fights, so much bloodshed, so many risks, in order to go back again to democracy and thus let the Reds come out in the open? Never! ” Thus every measure was delayed. In spite of continuous promises, Labor received no real concession; the workers were never allowed even to have a single newspaper under their own control.

Throughout this time Cardinal Innitzer continued to press Schuschnigg and the Government to favor complete submission to Hitler.”The Anschluss is inevitable, ” was his advice. He told Schuschnigg that the Vatican desired the Austrian Government to adopt this policy. Schuschnigg, after much doubt and hesitation, stood firm, but several Catholics who knew what was going on behind the scenes became bitter. These continued to oppose fusion with Germany, desiring their country’s independence. They saw clearly that the Government could not count upon the support of the Church, for whom it had done so much.

In Vienna popular feeling and enthusiasm reached a high pitch. It was thought that Nazism had been defeated, and the ideal of fighting for Austrian independence had become very popular with the masses owing to the leniency extended to them by the Government. Hence the workers, formerly eager for the Anschluss so long as it was conceived as a democratic measure implying great regional rights for Austria, were bitterly opposed to it now that the Nazis were in power. Thus, paradoxically, they supported the Catholic Schuschnigg hoping thereby that they would return to democracy and liberty. In Vienna, great mass-demonstrations clamored for Austrian liberty, shouting and singing the old Socialist slogans. Socialists, Communists, Monarchists, and even many Catholics, marched side by side for days. Austria had risen to its feet ready to fight. Never had the Nazis seemed so weak as at that moment. Hitler, as well as Schuschnigg and Cardinal Innitzer, became alarmed, for no one could tell where that mass movement would lead. It was felt that even if all that enthusiasm did not lead to “Bolshevism, ” it might perhaps result in a mass drive against Fascism. If such a popular and formidable demonstration against Fascism had occurred, it might not have been confined to Austria alone.

The Government meanwhile was preparing. The plans for action were complete and the troops were ready to march. The Austrian Government was determined to fight for its independence. Schuschnigg, hoping to avoid bloodshed, played his last card. He announced that, if the Austrian people really desired the Anschluss, the Austrian people should show its will by a plebiscite.

This decision went against the plans of the Vatican. Accordingly, Cardinal Innitzer, who was already in direct touch with Hitler, once more opened up negotiations with him. The Cardinal well knew that a plebiscite would reject the Anschluss, in which case the Reds might get out of control. The Church could not allow this to happen. Before promising the unstinted help of the Catholic Church in Austria and of the Vatican, Cardinal Innitzer required a promise that once Hitler had incorporated Austria he would respect the rights of the Church. (The Universe, March 1, 1946.)

Hitler was fully aware that if the plebiscite preceded his entry into Austria, the Austrian people would reject the Anschluss. He therefore proposed this incredible plan to the Cardinal-that not the Austrians, but the German people, should decide whether the Austrians were to become Germans or not. That a cardinal should even have listened to a proposition so cynical sounds incredible. Yet the Cardinal not only acquiesced, but promised that he would do everything in his power to secure that the Austrian people should welcome Hitler and give him their votes.

The ninth day of March had been announced as the date of the Austrian plebiscite, which, however, did not take place, as Hitler forbade Schuschnigg to carry it out. During the afternoon of March 11 almost all the population of Vienna was demonstrating against Nazism and Fascism, hailing political freedom and national independence and singing Socialist songs. At seven o’clock that very evening the Nazi storm-troopers suddenly appeared in Vienna Herr von Schuschnigg had resigned without a blow. Within an hour the Austrian police were wearing the swastika. Vienna was flooded with Nazi troops. Cardinal Innitzer welcomed the Nazis with swastikas in the churches and with the ringing of bells. He ordered his priests to do likewise. Not content with this, he ordered all Austrians to submit to the man “whose struggle against Bolshevism and for the power, honor, and unity of Germany corresponds to the voice of Divine Providence. ”

Then, a few days later (March 15), he went to see Hitler again, and once more asked for his assurance that he would respect the rights of the Catholic Church. That was not all. The Cardinal and his bishops, with the exception of the Bishop of Linz, after having talked about the “voice” of the blood urged all Austrians to vote for Hitler at the plebiscite. Under his own signature he then wrote the sacred formula “Heil Hitler.” Thus ended Austria.