Pacelli reports to Gasparri about his meeting with new Bavarian Commissar Gustav von Kahr, who says he wants to work gradually with Hitler, viewing the Nazis as overly “ardent” but pursuing a “good cause” - Sept. 27, 1923
Source: Timeline
Sept. 27, 1923 Pacelli reports to Gasparri about his meeting with new Bavarian Commissar Gustav von Kahr, who says he wants to work gradually with Hitler, viewing the Nazis as overly “ardent” but pursuing a “good cause.”
Italian original at www.Pacelli-Edition.de and English translation
Sept. 27, 1923 Pacelli to Gasparri:
Re: Appointment of Mr. von Kahr as Commissar General of the State of Bavaria
Most Reverend Eminence,
Following up my respectful coded communiqué no. 442 of today, I have the honor to report to Your Most Reverend Eminence that the Bavarian Government, having (as Minister of Finance Dr. Krausneck told me yesterday evening) come to the certainty that the radicals of the right with Hitler at their head had already decided to give battle and were preparing political upheavals for the upcoming days, has appointed as Commissar General of the State, with exceptional powers for maintaining order, Mr. von Kahr. Since this appointment has been publicized this morning by the press, I believed (given the good personal relations I have had with the aforesaid gentleman from the time when he was Minister President) that I had an obligation of courtesy to go to his residence this afternoon to leave a letter of congratulations for the high office entrusted to him. Mr. von Kahr, however, having learned of my coming, wanted to see me, and he responded to my congratulations by expressing the grave responsibility that has been placed upon him. The Bavarian Cabinet indeed remains in place, but all powers are in reality in the hands of the Commissar. He had to begin by prohibiting, albeit reluctantly, the fourteen assemblies that Hitler wanted to hold today in Munich; he desires, however, to unite gradually with him and with the aforesaid elements of the right, which, in his opinion, have the defect of being too ardent, defending however in substance the good cause. As a result, he observed, one will see the meetings of the right permitted and those of the left prohibited. Then he added that the Government in Berlin, upon merely being apprised of the appointment of von Kahr, and fearing its influence even far outside the borders of Bavaria, had proclaimed a state of emergency also for the Reich, conferred executive power upon the Minister of the Reich Army, Gessler, and appointed in its turn, based on the principle that the law of the Reich prevails over the law of an individual State (Reich law trumps State law), a special Commissar for Bavaria in the person of General von Lossow (who, however, does not intend to accept). Thus he, von Kahr, however, has decided not to accede to, and not to obey, the decisions of the Reich Government, seeing in this a grave conflict with Berlin, a conflict that could lead even to a separation and to a restoration of the monarchy in Bavaria. The King [i.e. crown prince Rupprecht of Bavaria] – he added – who in recent days was in Munich (whence he has now departed), had a capable posture and played a rather important part in the development of the crisis and in the appointment of the Commissar. General Ludendorff – who had a discussion with the “King” in recent days, during which, while the two personages explained themselves to each other, they did not arrive at an understanding – had sought to become himself dictator for Bavaria, but this was not accepted. These confidential statements by Mr. von Kahr reveal, in my humble opinion, all the gravity of the situation and the most difficult domestic complications that could occur in Germany.
Humbly bowing to kiss the Sacred Purple, with sentiments of profound veneration, I have the honor to prove myself
Your Most Reverend Eminence’s
Most Humble, Most Devoted, Most Obliged Servant,
+Eugenio Pacelli, Archbishop of Sardis
Apostolic Nuncio
Source: Historical Archive of the Secretariat of State (Holy See), Section for Relations with States, AA.EE.SS., Baviera, 1922-1925, pos. 151, fasc. 2, fol. 77r-78r, reprinted in www.Pacelli-Edition.de, Document No. 1089.