The stories of the individual men and women who led German Social Democracy's failed efforts to fend off the Nazi onslaught have largely been lost in the wake of the cataclysmic war, the Holocaust, and the division of Europe that followed Hitler's 1933 victory. Confronting Hitler recovers their stories and places them at center stage. In a series of biographical essays focusing on the experiences of ten leading Social Democratic activists, William Smaldone examines their defeat in 1933 from the perspective of individuals enmeshed in political struggle. This study reveals the aspects of these activists' lives that were most important in shaping their political outlook during the republic's final crisis, illustrates the key factors that guided their actions in the effort to keep the republic alive, and raises the important issue of the degree to which the defeat of German Social Democracy in 1933 is comparable to the experiences of other democratic socialist movements in the twentieth century. Book jacket.