Jessen & Richter (Eds.) (65 page)

results gained were a cascade of positive votes. In order not to make the

oppositional votes obvious in the ballot boxes, in the elections for the

Reichstag
of November 1933, called at the same time as the plebiscite, like the election-plebiscite of March 1936, the German people were confronted

with a ballot paper that only had a space for the
Ja
vote, which meant that anyone who wanted to vote
Nein
had to spoil the ballot paper. Such practices had already been used by Fascism. For the two plebiscites, the

affirmative ballot papers were printed in the colors of the Italian flag, a

reminder of the patriotic duty to vote favorably, while the negative ballot

papers were dull, flimsy and black-and-white. Besides, the voter who

posted the ballot paper20in the slatted, and therefore transparent, ballot

box would be almost certain that his choice would be noted by the officials

and ever-present Party members at the polling station by means of a com-

plicated mechanism, which has been revealed by recent research on new

sources (Dal Lago 1999, 136–39). As for those who tried not to vote at all,

the Fascist Party had created a system whereby the electorate was divided

into small groups, according to residence, each of which had a leader, the

aim of which was to ensure that everyone voted.

From such examples, it is clear that, for both regimes, one of the most

important aims of the people’s vote was to convey at home and abroad the

feeling of complete unity between governors and the governed.

However, if we take a look behind this granite-like image—“Achieve

one hundred per cent!” was the order telegraphed to the Fascist provincial

secretaries in 1929 (Fimiani 2002, 191)—we can see that the reality was

much more variegated than the two regimes would have admitted. Pockets

of non-conformity still managed to exist, making the
consensus
less widespread than it officially appeared to be. In Italy in 1929 (despite the impact

of the years since 1922: the repressive control, the lack of secrecy sur-

rounding ballots), popular legitimization of the regime revealed shady areas

——————

19 DHM: www.dhm.de/lemo/objekte/pict/98001899/index.html; IZG: www.dade.at/-

gug-bildein/museum4.htm (“Reunification of Austria with the German Reich”).

20 See ASMIL (“Documentario Luce” No M136, March 1929, Abruzzo); De Felice (2001, cd II, “I plebisciti”).

250

E N Z O F I M I A N I

of opposition to the logic of the plebiscite.21 Over ten per cent of those on

the electoral roll—over a million Italians—did not vote. There were ap-

proximately 145,000 ballot papers cast that were either
No
votes
,
or were spoiled, blank or contested (figures often underestimated in historiographical interpretations).22 There was a concentration of
No
votes in the central northern area of Italy, which demonstrates the existence of Italians who

did not fall easily into line in areas where political awareness was histori-

cally greater. There were almost three million non-aligned Italians who

were denied the right to vote due to the drastic revision of the electoral

roll.23 Women were denied the suffrage, despite the repeated promises to

grant them the vote. All this meant that no more than one Italian out of

every five expressed “unanimous consensus” with the single list and with

Fascist politics as a whole. Indeed, while it is true that the second and final

plebiscitary consultation, in 1934, simply increased formal popular support

for Fascism, it was received almost with indifference by the majority of

Italians; and, in fact, by the Fascists, too, who by now had revealed a

“weary disillusionment [with] the mortification of politics as a free activity”

(Aquarone 1995, 167–68).

In Nazi Germany, despite the harsher totalitarian set-up, it was pre-

cisely some of the electoral results that revealed signs of timid non-con-

formity. For example, in the plebiscite and in the election of November

1933, almost eleven per cent of Germans entitled to vote expressed their

dissent through not voting (almost two million), through voting
Nein
,

through posting a blank ballot paper, or through spoiling the ballot. (The

NSDAP list attracted less consensus than that concerning the plebiscitary

issue, linked as it was to nationalistic themes of wider appeal). The 1934

plebiscite, moreover, had “a relatively unsatisfactory outcome […] from a

Nazi perspective” (Kershaw 2001, 68–9). These forms of dissent totaled

almost 16 per cent (that is, over seven million Germans), causing great

——————

21 Archive sources in ACS, MI,
DGPS, DAGR,
Category F1, file 23.1, 238; G1, f. 535.1

(leaflets); Section II, 1929, envelope 50 “Elezioni plebiscito”; c. 2, e. 51 (anti-fascist leaflets); S. II, c. 2, e. 5, “Propaganda per il no”; S. II, 1929, c. 2, e. 5, “Movimento sovversivo antifascista”. The best-documented communist publication on the repressive atmosphere of the first Fascist plebiscite is Leonetti (1929).

22 ACS, MI,
DGPS, DAGR,
S. II, 1929, c. 2, e. 51.

23 Camera dei Deputati (1929, 156): there was a 25 per cent reduction, from the 12,424,183

voters in the 1924 polls to 9,460,727. According to Ballini (1988, 215, 224) and Dal Lago (1999, 19-20), the reduction was certainly huge, but not so marked, with approximately two and a half million electors.

E L E C T I O N S , P L E B I S C I T A R Y E L E C T I O N S , A N D P L E B I S C I T E S

251

consternation within the Party. This probably occurred because Hinden-

burg’s death made a definite break, unhampered by constitutional scruples,

with the old Wilhelm-style, nineteenth-century Germany. As Victor Klem-

perer (2000, 90–1) wrote in his diary in the fear of future tragedies, that

dawn of non-unanimity

meant much more, from an ethical point of view, than a mere ninth of the elec-

torate. It took courage and conscience. The electors were dazzled and intimidated by the slogans and Party-spirit. One third voted
Ja
out of fear, a third out of drunkenness, and another third out of fear and drunkenness. […] We voted
Nein
out of desperation in the end, but not without fear. However, despite his moral defeat, Hitler is the unchallenged winner, and I can see no end to it.

Abbreviations

ACS: Archivio centrale dello Stato, Rome.

ASL: Archiv der Stadt, Linz.

ASMIL: Archivio storico mediateca, Istituto Luce, Rome.

DAGR: Direzione Affari Generali e Riservati.

DGPS: Direzione Generale di Pubblica Sicurezza.

DHM: Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin.

GPA: German Propaganda Archive, Calvin College, Michigan, USA.

IZG: Institut für Zeitgeschichte, Vienna.

MI: Ministero dell’Interno.

NSDAP: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei.

PNF: Partito Nazionale Fascista.

RGB: Reichsgesetzblatt.

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