Der Fuehrer - Hitler's Rise to Power (1944) - Heiden

502 DER FUEHRERavoid a conflict with the Reichstag.' Schleicher would have preferred togovern by a straw man, but Hindenburg and Papen forced him into theopen and explicitly commissioned him to form a government whichwould have the Reichstag's confidence. Schleicher was quite unaware ofit, but by this act his fate was sealed.Whom of the National Socialists would he ask to enter his cabinet?For the policy he had in mind it could only be Strasser. Schleicher madehim, in a confidential talk on December 3, the best offer which theNational Socialists in their situation could expect. Strasser was to enterthe government as Vice-Chancellor. At the same time he was to becomePremier of Prussia, not appointed from above by force, but regularlyelected by the votes of the National Socialists and the Center in thePrussian diet. If Strasser wished, he could administer Schleicher's greatre-employment project; the Voluntary labor service' would be in hishands; he could put the S.A. in charge of the labor service and burdenthe state treasury with its expenses and debts. To be sure, he would havehad to find a basis of understanding with the Social Democratic unions.Strasser thought well of Theodor Leipart, and the understanding wasconceivable.'We are agreed,' wrote Theodor Leipart at the end of 1932 in amessage to the trade-union functionaries, 'that the ultimate aim of theworking class is the realization of socialism. But you know that thetrade unions were established in order to improve the situation of theworking class in the framework of the present economic order.' He tolda French press correspondent that Schleicher was really trying to relaxthe tension with the unions, in order to remove their resistance to hisgovernment; hence Schleicher should not be reproached for his past. Ifhis rearmament speeches had inflamed public opinion in France, saidLeipart, the only possible reply was that Schleicher's demand forequality had only expressed the view of all Germans.'Betrayer of the workers!' the Communists shouted back. In a partyproclamation of their own, the Communists, in an effort to take the windout of the sails of the Nazis, had declared that the 'fetters of Versailles'must fall. The official Social Democrats, in turn, condemned Leipartand forced him to make retractions.