the old-Prussian Union, claiming the counter-constitutional situation were healed. Since the day Müller had become leader of the Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union he systematically abolished the intra-organisational democracy. On 4 August Müller assumed the title State Bishop (), a title and function non-existing in the constitution of the Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union, and claimed hierarchical supremacy over all clerics and other employees as is usual for Catholic bishops. In the campaign for the premature re-election of all presbyters and synodals on 23 July the Nazi Reich's government sided with the German Christians. Under the impression of the government's partiality the other existing lists of opposing candidates united to form the list Evangelical Church. The Gestapo (est. 26 April 1933) ordered the list to change its name and to replace all its election posters and flyers issued under the forbidden name. Pastor Wilhelm Harnisch () hosted the opposing list in the office for the homeless of his congregation in Mirbachstraße # 24 (now Bänschstraße # 52). The Gestapo confiscated the office and the printing-press there, in order to hinder any reprint. Thus the list, which had renamed into (), took refuge with the Evangelical Press Association (), presided by Dibelius and printed new election posters in its premises in Alte Jacobstraße # 129, Berlin. The night before the election Hitler appealed on the radio to all Protestants to vote for candidates of the German Christians, while the Nazi Party declared, all its Protestant members were obliged to vote for the German Christians. Thus the turnout in the elections was extraordinarily high, since most non-observant Protestants, who since long aligned with the Nazis, had voted. 70–80% of the newly elected presbyters and synodals of the Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union were candidates of the German Christians. In Berlin e.g., the candidates of Gospel and Church only won the majority in two presbyteries, in Niemöller's Dahlem Congregation, and in the congregation in Berlin-Staaken-Dorf. In 1933 among the pastors of Berlin, 160 stuck to Gospel and Church, 40 were German Christians while another 200 had taken neither side. German Christians won a majority within the general synod of the Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union and within its provincial synods – except of the one of Westphalia –, as well as in many synods of other Protestant church bodies, except of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria right of