that the only alternatives would the Marxist parties in the form of the SPD and KPD and the right-wing "national" parties. The failure of the Prussian referendum helped to win Duesterberg away from his strategy of attempting to co-opt the moderate right into the "national" camp, and instead to work for the destruction of the moderate right as Hugenberg advocated. In October 1931, Duesterberg allied Der Stahlhelmm with the Nazis, DNVP, and other right wing groups in order to form the Harzburger Front. The Harzburger Front attempted to bring about the downfall of Heinrich Brüning and the Weimar Republic, but it eventually dissolved due to Adolf Hitler's unwillingness to subordinate the Nazi Party to such a vast right wing coalition on a long-term basis. After the dissolution of the Harzburger Front, Duesterberg continued to lead Der Stahlhelm and maintained the organization's alliance with the DNVP. 1932 presidential election In 1932, Duesterberg was nominated by Der Stahlhelm and DNVP to run for President of Germany, but the Nazis ultimately destroyed any chance Duesterberg had of gaining mass support from the German people when they revealed he had Jewish ancestry. In April 1932, the deeply anti-Semitic Duesterberg learned for the first time that his grandfather was a Prussian Jewish doctor who converted to Lutheranism in 1818, a revelation that caused Duesterberg to suffer a nervous breakdown and to submit his resignation in shame from Der Stahlhelm. Several of Duesterberg's friends persuaded him not to resign, and in an attempt to stay on as Der Stahlhelm deputy federal leader, he suggested new requirements for every member, namely that: That Der Stahlhelm members present notarized copies of church records proving that their parents, grandparents and great-grandparents had no "Jewish blood". That Der Stahlhelm members swear on their word of honor that they had no personal, familial or business dealings with Jews in any form or way. That Der Stahlhelm members present proof that their ancestors had fought in the "wars of liberation" against Napoleonic France and/or the wars of unification and on what side. That Der Stahlhelm members present proof that they had fought in the World War and in what capacity. The revelation of Duesterberg's Jewish ancestry caused Duesterberg to poll poorly in the first ballot of the election, and he withdrew from the runoff election that followed. During the 1932 presidential elections, the Nazis went out of their way to taunt Duesterberg