Note 44 — Chapter XI

It is not possible to withhold admiration from the tens of thousands of officials throughout Germany who, hating and despising party Socialism, and themselves monarchic in principle by tradition and training, nevertheless stayed at their posts and did what they could to prevent utter chaos. The choice was especially hard for the men in higher positions, since most of these not only had to carry out orders of a revolutionary red government, but also had to submit to having their daily acts controlled and their orders altered and countersigned by a Genosse who was often an unskilled manual laborer. The best traditions of German officialdom were honorably upheld by these men, and it is to them, rather than to those at the head of the government, that credit is due for even the small measure of order that was preserved.