The DVFP was founded on 16 December 1922, when Wilhelm Henning, Reinhold Wulle, and Albrecht von Graefe broke from the German National People's Party (DNVP).

[1] Leading right-wing figures, such as Ernst Graf zu Reventlow, Artur Dinter, and Theodor Fritsch, joined the party on its foundation.

[3] This alliance was not a success, plans for a full merger fell through in August 1924, and Graefe and Wulle re-formed the DVFP, now named the German Völkisch Freedom Movement, as a rival to the Nazi Party in February 1925.

The DVFP positioned itself with the NSDAP in the extreme right of the Weimar party spectrum: the republic was to be overthrown in favor of a "völkisch dictatorship", the Reichstag was to be replaced by a professional parliament of the estates.

In contrast to the early days of the NSDAP, the DVFP, which had emerged from the rather conservative DNVP, initially relied on elections despite the rejection of parliamentarians, but also took part in coup attempts in the course of the process.

A report by the Reich Governor in Mecklenburg blamed the work of German nationalists for the comparatively high proportion of no votes in the so-called plebiscite in November 1933.

While Graefe died of natural causes just a few months after the transfer of power to the National Socialists, Wulle was arrested by the Nazis in 1940 and held in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp.