Blood purity was very important to the leaders of Nazi Germany.
According to Hitler, blood purity would ensure the survival of the Aryan race and the ‘1000 Year Reich'
Laws were introduced to ensure blood purity within Nazi Germany and anyone who acted outside of
these laws was deemed to have committed the crime of ‘rassenschande’, which translates roughly as
‘racial pollution’ or ‘racial crime’.
Roland Freisler, the future head of the feared People’s Court, stated in 1933 that any Aryan who had
a relationship with any non-Aryan was guilty of ‘blood treason’ ; his comment was specifically
targeted against the Jews
In the early days of Nazi rule, such a view did not receive wide support – not even from Hitler. Many
were wary as the Nazis had yet to state what exactly a ‘blood crime’ was. Some were more cautious
in their approach and argued that legislation might penalise those who simply were unaware that
they might have distant Jewish blood in their family.
Local Nazi officials took it upon themselves to ban those who wanted to proceed with what they
deemed to be mixed marriages. But even in 1934, more than a year into power, a senior Nazi, William
Frick, ordered these local officials to be more cautious. It was only in 1935 that Frick gave his support
to those officials who used their local authority to delay such marriages.
The 1935 Nuremberg Laws finally gave clarity to ‘blood purity’ when mixed marriages and any form
of relationship between Aryans and Jews was outlawed. Anyone classed as an Aryan who was caught
engaging in a relationship with a Jew after the passing of the Nuremberg Laws faced a prison
sentence. Any Jew caught breaking the laws faced a lengthy sentence in a concentration camp with
no guarantee that he/she would be released.
However, the Nuremberg Laws created a problem that Frick had been concerned with in 1934. What
about Aryan/Jewish marriages that had taken place before the Nuremberg Laws were passed? The
laws did not nullify such marriages but under Nazi ideology any children born in such marriages
could not be pure Aryan. The Nazi government approached this issue very simply: for a regime that
preached the importance of marriage and family, it encouraged the Aryan partner in such a marriage
to divorce.
The Nazi propaganda constantly pushed home the importance of blood purity. All avenues
of the media were used to spread the message. The Office of Racial Purity frequently wrote about
the “honour of the German people” and how it could be diluted by “unacceptable relationships”.
Films shown across Germany portrayed male Jews as sexual predators who abused the young
women of Germany. There was a constant push to remind all those in Germany about the
importance of blood purity and the consequences of ‘racial crimes’ or ‘blood treason’.
Education played an important part in spreading the message of ‘blood purity’. School teachers were
given a very specific brief to teach. The Nazis assumed that by the time young children had grown up,
they would accept blood purity as a normal and natural part of life. Older girls were warned about
the dangers of engaging in a relationship with a non-Aryan. A pamphlet titled “The German National
Catechism” was widely available in all schools. It gave a stark warning to girls who ignored the advice.
It warned that a child born into a "mixed-marriage" would be a “lamentable creature, tossed back
and forth between the blood of his two races”. It continued that “a woman defiled by a Jew can never
rid her body of the foreign poison she has absorbed. She is lost to her people.” Children were taught
to memorise poems about blood purity. They were told “keep your blood pure” as it is “your eternal
life”.