Hitler had been appointed Chancellor on January 1st, 1933. That's a god start. When President Paul von Hindenburg died on August 2, 1934, Hitler thought it would be a good idea not to have any president anymore. This would make decision making way easier and quicker. What a great idea! What a practical mind he was!
Hitler's easy-to-follow tips & tricks:
Trick 1 - pretend to try to get a majority by making a coalition. Meet the Centre party head on January 31st and make him feel he's got to proclame that he doesn't agree with your proposals and that therefore a government cannot be formed so that an election is needed and set it to March 5th.
Trick 2 - be sure that every political opinion gets satisfaction in the early stages of the election campaign but don't let the Communist Party become too strong by arresting several leaders thanks to laws passed recently making state threatening a capital crime. At the same time, arrange a meeting with the big business leaders and the conservatives on February 20th to convince them that mixing democracy and capitalism is a bad idea, that the Communist Party has to disappear and that the Wehrmacht would be officially restored and strenghtened. This will mean fewer labour problems for the big business owners and will sound really nice to the ears of the arms industry leaders. Sweet!
Tip 3 - lead your political campaign like a battle. Gain virtually unlimited funding by the industry and trade leaders and take control of radios and newspapers. This will eventually provoke reactions from opposing parties that you will easily be able to present as helpers of the Bolchevik Revolutions. The rest is automatic: political murders and violence through your devoted (S)A-Team. Easy one! But be careful; being too violent will eventually end up in not having enough opposition to justify such means.
What works pretty well too is flying two of your own civil airplanes into very tall buildings symbolising your economic power... Hitler didn't like planes a lot and he did not have a lot of really tall buildings in his country.
Paul Ludwig Hans Anton von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg,second President of Germany 1925-1934)
Step 5 - Go find President Hindenburg on the following day, convince him that the Communist Revolution has started in Germany and persuade him to sign a decree which, for the protection of the people and state of course, suspends a total of seven clauses in the constitution covering civil liberties and personal freedom. This decree alone will already gives you absolute power but you can still enhance the legitimacy of your acting by setting up a popular vote. All that in 29 days only.
Trick 6 - Outlaw Communists and immediately arrest 4000 of them. Suspend newspapers of the centre and detain a couple of Social Democrates of the parliament to make votes a bit easier. Order your (S)A-Team to break into houses, to arrest, to torture, to beat...the result will be super! Turn your political campaign into a brain-washing exercise with rallies, parades and posters until March 4th. The average people likes this and it's a great way to warn everybody about the consequences of supporting the Communists or only defending them.
Tip 7 - hold the necessary election on March 5th. Keep it free and secret and let the people make their feelings known. There is no reason to piss off the people too much at this point as it's too late for them to change anything anyway at this point. You just don't want them to be an additionnal source of resistance. If your Nazi party only gains 44% of the votes, ask the Nationalists to join you. They'll be easy to convince to join the majority coalition with their ridiculous 8%. 44+8=52. That's enough in theory but still not "absolute". If 48% of the people doen't want to give you absolute power, you'll have to convince the guys at Reichtag in some way. Remember, you still have 2 tricks you've not used yet!
Trick 8 - one of the hardest to perform, but my personal favourite: The Reichstag would have to be asked to give up their power and pass an 'enabling' act which would hand the power to the Cabinet. A two-thirds majority would be needed but a good start would be that the 81 Communist seats would be vacant. Be confident that the still powerfull Catholics would vote for the act as you've proven the sincerity of the Nazis in their wish to protect and preserve all that is German, jawohl! Announce the Grand Reopening of the Reichstag for late March in the Potsdam Garrison Church where Freddy the Great is buried and where the Hohenzollern kings came for worshipping. Chose March 21st, day on which Bismarck had opened the 1st Reichtag of the Second Reich to show that you're willing to incorporate every bit of Christian an German tradition. You will than be able to reach the climax of cynicism by stepping down from the podium and by bowing low before President Hindenburg having the scene photographed purposely and the pictures sent to all still active German newspaper and to the rest of the world. This fainted act of submission might calm down a lot of worried minds around the planet because maybe you've been acting a bit too enthousiastically during the last weeks...
Grand Final Trick, number 9 - Day 52, it's March 23rd. The 'Law for Removing the Distress of People and Reich' is the only business before the house. The whole power of parliament, making budgets, foreign treaties, amending the constitution is to be handed over to the Reich cabinet for 4 years. The Chancellor is to be authorized to draft laws that might be unconstitutional but no acts affecting the Reichstag itself are to be passed (how could they when the members had already, if they passed the act, immolated themselves!) and the powers of the President still are undisturbed. You'll also have to speak and promised that the rights of the federal states would remain, the rights of the churches would be respected, and that the powers conferred by the act would only be used for 'vitally necessary measures'. I swear! Only 2 voices are heard against the act: the leader of the Catholic Centre party has a request demanding a promise, in writing, that the President's right of veto would be preserved. This you have to agree to, these guys have the votes you need. The other voice is from the leader of the Social Democrats, Otto Wells, a brave man using strange words such as 'humanity' and 'justice'. Ok there, you are allowed to lose your cool and you'll eventually scream some bizarre speech in front of the assembly. After that we're having the vote, 441 vote for it, 84 (Social Democrates) against and all go to lunch.
Ok, ok...the arrests of the Communists and several Social Democrat deputies are not legal, but everything else was. If one could overlook the fact that the major factor for the individual members of the Reichstag to finally give in was the use of terror, constantly - phisically and mentally; leading people to do anything to get away from it, the technical means are 100% legal. The Reichstag will end up thinking that they are buying themselves out of their responsibilities but it is more probable that the death of democracy will be due to the sustained use of terror. You know terror is good for your cause! Keep it going! It shouldn't be too much of a long time until the old Hindenburg dies from his raging lung cancer, leaving the President's chair available...