existing elected landtage were to be reconstituted on the basis of each party's share of the votes received in the Reichstag election of 5 March 1933, that had given the Nazis nearly 44% of the vote. In this manner, the Nazis, in conjunction with their allies the conservative German National People's Party who had polled nearly 8%, were able to control all the state parliaments. This was followed in short order by the "Second Law on the Coordination of the States with the Reich", similarly decreed by the Reich government under its emergency powers on 7 April 1933. This law provided for the appointment by the Reich President, on the advice of the Reich Chancellor, of a Reichsstatthalter (Reich Governor) to oversee the government of each state. These new central government officials were charged with ensuring that the policy guidelines formulated by the Reich Chancellor were observed. They were empowered to preside over meetings of the state government, and to appoint and dismiss the minister-presidents of the state governments as well as other officials and judges. They also could promulgate state laws, dissolve the state parliaments, call for new elections and grant pardons. With these new powerful officials in place by May 1933, soon all the state governments were in the hands of loyal Nazi politicians. The law also specifically prohibited motions of no confidence by the state parliaments against the minister-presidents or other members of the state governments. The next step in the plan to seize total control of the states was to be accomplished by the complete elimination of the state parliaments. Text The brevity of the proposed law was in striking contrast to its extraordinary historical and constitutional significance. With only a few sentences, it proposed wiping away the people's representative assemblies in all the länder and would centralize all government sovereignty with the Reich government in Berlin. Law on the Reconstruction of the Reich The popular referendum and the Reichstag election of 12 November 1933, have proven that the German people have attained an indissoluble internal unity transcending all internal political borders and differences. Consequently, the Reichstag has enacted the following law which is hereby promulgated with the unanimous vote of the Reichstag after ascertaining that the requirements of the Reich Constitution have been met: ARTICLE I Popular assemblies of the states shall be abolished. ARTICLE II (1) The sovereign powers of the states are transferred