Day of Potsdam

The Day of Potsdam, otherwise known as the Tag von Potdam or Potsdam Celebration was a March 21, 1933, ceremony for the opening of the new Reichstag after the German federal election, March 1933.

Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels selected the site as it was the center of the old Kingdom of Prussia of Frederick the Great as well as the Second Reich of Otto von Bismark. The date was chosen because on March 21, 1871 opened the first Reichstag of Imperial Germany.

Among the attendees were Crown Prince Wilhelm, guest of honor and representative of the Hohenzollern dynasty, and his brothers Oskar and Eitel Friedrich, both Stahlhelm members, and August Wilhelm, an Oberführer in the SA.

Broadcast in its entirety on radio, the festivities began with religious services. Protestant members of the Reichstag, including Chairman Hermann Göring, held services at the Church of Saint Nicholas presided over by Otto Dibelius. Catholics held services in Peter and Paul Church. Neither Hitler nor Goebbels attended these religious services, but attended a later state ceremony at the Garrison Church. Speeches were made by Reich President Paul von Hindenburg and the new Reichskanzler, after which the two had a solemn handshake which symbolized the "marriage of the old grandeur and new power". Hindenburg laid a wreath at the tomb of Frederick the Great. Afterwords, parades were held by the Reichswehr, SA, the SS, the Stahlhelm, and others. Finally the deputies convened the new Reichstag at the Kroll Opera House, as the Reichstag building had been rendered unusable in a fire.

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