The coordination of the Party and State functions started at the top. The Chief of the Party Chancellery was designated a Reich Minister and endowed with plenary powers in the preparation and approval of legislation. He acted as liaison officer at the highest level between Party officials and cabinet ministers. He was given also the duty of passing on the appointment of all the more important civil servants. (_2787-PS_)
Many of the same powers were bestowed upon the other _Reichsleiter_ (Leaders composing the Party Directorate). The official Nazi exposition of their position is as follows:
“It is in the Reich Directorate where the strings of the organization of the German people and the State meet. By endowment of the Chief of the Party Chancellery with the powers of a Reich Minister, and by special administrative directives, the penetration of the State apparatus with the political will of the Party is guaranteed. It is the task of the separate organs of the Reich Directorate to maintain as close a contact as possible with the life of the nation through their sub-offices in the Gaus. Observations at the front are to be collected and exploited by the offices of the Reich Directorate.” (_1893-PS_)
On the regional and local levels, the _Gauleiter_, _Kreisleiter_, etc., were also empowered to control the purely governmental authorities on political matters. Hess issued the following order shortly after the war began:
“I, therefore order that the bearer of sovereignty (_Hoheitstraeger_) of the NSDAP (_Gauleiter_, _Kreisleiter_, _Ortsgruppenleiter_) in the scope of his authority is responsible for the political leadership and the frame of mind (_Stimmung_) of the population. It is his right and his duty to take or to cause to be taken any measures necessary for the expeditious fulfillment of his political duties and for the elimination of wrong within the Party. He is exclusively responsible to his superior bearers of sovereignty (_Hoheitstraeger_).” (_2383-PS_)
In the later years, the functional coordination of Party and State offices became much more common. The appointment of Himmler as Reichsfuehrer SS and Chief of the German Police is a typical example of the way in which State and Party functions became inextricably merged so as to render any clean lines of demarcation impossible. (_2073-PS_)