Between 1924 and 1929, the SA had to be content with playing a minor role on the German political stage. As the reverberations of the Depression hastened the enfeeblement of the moderate parties, the emphasis increasingly focused on the extremes of the Right and the Left. When the election successes of the early thirties gave new importance to the NSDAP, the SA ceased to be a member of the supporting cast and became a major participant. Aided by the prestige that success at the polls gave the party and drawing strength from the economic and political turmoil of the period, the ranks of the SA rapidly swelled from 1930 onward. Those who had from the start regarded the Weimar Republic with suspicion but had been unwilling to join the relatively small Nazi movement in the midtwenties now began to see it as a meaningful alternative to the allegedly moribund moderate parties. The real or potential victims of the Depression offered another source of support. Within two and a half years, the Nürnberg SA grew to more than seven times its pre-Depression strength, numbering twenty-five hundred men by the end of 1932.

The growth of the Nürnberg SA during these years was both a cause and a result of the growing polarization of Germany's political spectrum. The more pronounced the radicalization, the more did the SA attract new members. At the same time, the SA became a more frequent and active participant in violent clashes with its opponents, thereby fueling the flames of extremism. The masses of destitute unemployed provided one major reservoir from which the paramilitary organizations of the extreme Left and Right drew strength.