The German Reich Party, a neo-Nazi grouping, received a setback in West Germany’s parliamentary elections Sunday, an official recapitulation of the vote today established. The party polled only 0.8 percent of the total vote as compared to 1.0 percent in the 1957 Federal elections, and its pre-election expectations of winning 7,0 percent of the vote.
Numerically, the neo-Nazi group polled 264,186 votes, a drop of 32,167 from the total it amassed in 1957. The party will not have a single seat in the Bundestag, the Lower House of Parliament, since it failed to obtain a minimum of 5.0 percent of the vote cast.
The party’s greatest strength was shown in the Rhineland-Pfalz, Lower Saxony and Bremen areas, German leaders have frequently considered seeking a ban on the German Reich Party because, despite its protestations of loyalty and tolerance, it was generally regarded as being anti-democratic and anti-Semitic.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
