nazi germany

You should be able to find lots on fascism online.

Fascism arose in Italy. I think your teacher wants you to compare Hitler's Nazism with Italy's Fascism. Were they the same?

An odd fact you may want to work in- Fascism is named after "Fasces", an ancient Roman (Italian) symbol of authority, consisting of an axe tied inside a bundle of rods. A fasces appeared on the back of the US Mercury-head dime, the dime used during both world wars. It is ironic that our coin included a fasces at the same time we were fighting Fascism.

oh, no he doesn't really. he wants us to outline particular aspects of german life that were effected by fascism such as youth and education and the role of women in german society. but he also said that if you want higher marks then a good comparison between mussolini and hitler should get you them. anyway here's what i've got
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From 1933 to 1939 a Nazi regime that largely resembled that of a fascist regime was implemented throughout Germany in numerous ways affecting many different aspects of Germany society and government. The chief architects of these changes were Adolf Hitler and other key Nazi figures such as Heinrich Himmler and Joseph Goebbels. After coming to power in 1933, when he was appointed Chancellor by President Hindenberg, drastic changes were made in order to facilitate the change from a liberal democracy to a fascist nation-state.

To understand the importance of this, "fascist regime" must first be defined. Fascism is a political philosophy or ideology that places higher value on the needs and success of the nation and on nationalism rather than on the individual's rights and needs. Under a fascist regime, the individual's rights are considered subordinate to that of the state/nation/race. Chief characteristics of fascist states include a strong sense of patriotism/nationalism, such as that seen in Mussolini's Italy and the archaeological fiction of his New Roman Empire, totalitarianism and authoritarianism vested in a highly charismatic figurehead, autarky, autocracy, glorification of militarism, and purity. These are all prominent characteristics found in the Nazi regime and although there are small discrepancies between a "Fascist" regime and the Nazi Regime, they will be accepted as the same thing for the sake of this essay.

The fact that the political party in Italy which used the fasces as a symbol and therefore became known as the fascist party was using a symbol which appears on the Mercury dime in the United States is coincidence, and nothing more than coincidence.

Benito Mussolini became in socialism in his 20s, and became a labor organizer for local socialists in an Italian portion of the Austro-Hungarian empire. He got himself in trouble for his editorials, and was deported, and then served in the Italian army in the Great War. He was wounded in an explosion in the trenches in 1917, and was discharged. He returned to his former métier as an editor of a socialist newspaper. But he had come to the conclusion that socialism was dead, and said that it only continued to exist "as a grudge." He called for the emergence of a "strong man" who could revive Italy. The Fascist Party was, ostensibly, a party which derived its authority from organized labor, and was organized along socialist lines as the party of the proletariat, and therefore, the only political party which should be allowed to exist. The form, the symbolism of the party was that of an organ of socialism and organized labor. The substance, however, the true form of the party, was based on syndicalism only insofar as was necessary to form a power base through organized labor, and otherwise sought to secure its primacy through nationalism, "corporatism" (i.e., the idea that capitalists should contribute to and take a hand in the party's governance of the nation), opposition to Bolshevism (that is to say, communism), anticlericalism (on the phony basis that the Church was the handmaiden of oppression of the working classes), and the promotion of social progress.

Therefore, Mussolini's use of the fasces as symbol was a particular form of symbolism. It was meant to represent the absolute authority of the party which derived from the consent of the proletariat. Of course, the National Fascist Party was about as a socialist as my Aunt Fanny's backside--it was a marriage of cordial convenience between capital and a dictatorial political organization which would tolerate no political competition. The same, of course, was true with the "Nazis," the NSDAP. NSDAP stands for Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, or National Socialist Workers' Party. But the Nazis were no more socialist, and no more the party of the proletariat than were the fascisti in Italy. National Socialism was also a morganatic marriage of capital and a dictatorial political party. If one follows the sequence of events from Hitler's failed campaign against Hindenberg for the office of President, through the several elections by which the Nazis became the largest (though still minority) party in the Reichstag, through the passage of the enabling act, one can see how Hitler used the funds and support of capitalists, and the fiction of a nationalist party devoted to the welfare of the proletariate, combined with anti-communism, to establish the ssupremacyof the NSDAP.

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The fasces comes in two forms. The first is a bundle of staves, bound with ribbon, which does not contain an ax. This was carried before the consuls when they went about the city of Rome in their official capacity. The office of Consul was created after the "Kings" of Rome were expelled in the person of the seventh and last Tarquin "King," Lucius Tarquinius Superbus ("Tarquin the Proud"). The consuls were, in effect, co-regents, a pair of "kings" elected each year by the Senate and the people of Rome. They were preceded everywhere they went when on official business by lictors, who carried staves to open a path for the Consul, and to keep back the crowd. One of them carried before him the fasces, a bundle of staves, which was an outward symbol of the authority of the consuls. It did not contain the ax, because consuls did not have the power of life and death while in the city.

But in times of grave emergency which threatened the city, the Senate was empowered to appoint a Dictator, whose authority was only temporary, for the duration of the emergency, but which was absolute for as long as was necessary to resolve the problem. Both Lucius Cornelius Sulla and Giaus Iulius Caesar were to use the fiction of national emergency to appoint themselves dictator, with no term to their power. But in the early history of Rome, the office of Dictator was used on several ooccasions and used to good effect. The most famous of the Dictators was Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus (Cincinnatus is a cognomen, a "nickname," which means "the curly-haired one"). Titus Livius tells us that Cincinnatus was five times appointed Dictator. When the Dictator entered the city, the lictors carried before them the fasces with an ax in the bundle of staves, which symbolized the absolute power of the Dictator, the only man who had the power of life and death within the city.

Shortly after L. Tarquinius Superbus was expelled from Rome, the nephew of L. Quinctius Cincinnatus was impeached for treason, on an allegation that he was plotting with the Veiians and L. Tarquinius Superbus to return him to the throne in Rome, and to overthrow the republic. The Veiians were a Tuscan people of southern Etruria (they were, then, Etruscans) who were Rome's nearest neighbors and her bitter enemies. As the head of the gens Quinctii, an ancient and honorable patrician family, L. Quinctius Cincinnatus had considerable influence and wealth, and he pledged his properties within the city to bail his nephew, reserving his ready cash and the home farm of the gens on the Janiculum Hill. As soon as the papers were signed, and the nephew of Cincinnatus was released, he took his first opportunity to abscond, because, he was in fact in treasonable intercourse with the Veiians. Therefore, by the letter of the law, Cincinnatus was stripped of all of his properties in the city, which were forfeit to the republic. Cincinnatus retired to the home farm on the Janiculum and, at least symbolically, put his hand upon the plow to become a farmer and husbandman, while his wife took up the distaff to spin and weave the wool for the families clothes. It is likely that Cincinnatus did not actually do the plowing himself--he was still wealthy, and probably relied either upon hired labor or slaves--although slaves were still relatively uncommon in Rome at that time (they were still a poor, if proud and bellicose people). His wife, as a good Roman matron, probably did spin and weave, but they would have relied upon the other women of the household to produce the considerable amount of wool cloth needed to clothe everyone.

So, in the Roman republic, there arose a symbolism of Cincinnatus as a true virtuous republican, leaving his fields to lead great armies or punish great wrongs at need, and returning to his pursuit as a humble tiller of the soil when the emergency had passed. And in the early history of the American republic, the same symbolism was important, too. The settlement of Fort Washington was started by former officers in the Revolution who were members of the Society of the Cincinnati, employing the symbol of L. Quinctius Cincinnatus, which was well-known in those days to educated men. When Washington refused to engage in political canvassing for their society, they changed the name of their settlement on the Ohio River to Cincinnati. So, in the early history of the United States, the fasces was a symbol of the citizen-soldier, who leaves his humble pursuits to take up arms in defense of his nation, and who puts aside his arms when the need is passed, and returns to his quotidian pursuits.

So, it is mere coincidence that the fasces was a popular symbol in the United States, and it was used long before the National Fascist Party was formed. For Americans, it took the embarrassment of the Second World War and the rise and fall of Italian and German fascism to convince them to quietly stop using the fasces symbol.



The statue of L. Quinctius Cincinnatus in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Cincinnatus is shown in the simple garb of a Roman farmer, and he is offering to the viewer the fasces, the symbol of his absolute power, which he gladly surrenders with the passing of the threat to the state. His other hand is on the plow, symbolizing that he will return to his farm as a humble tiller of the soil, and seeks no aggrandizing power for himself.