Nazi Germany and the Jews: The Years of Persecution, 1933-1939 by Saul Friedländer Read Free Book Online Page A

May 1925. On March 24, 1933, he submitted the law to the cabinet. On March 31 or April 1, Hitler probably intervened to support the proposal. The atmosphere surrounding the boycott undoubtedly contributed to the rapid drafting of the text. Although the scope of the law was general, the anti-Jewish provision represented its very core. 90
    The definition of Jewish origin in the Civil Service Law was the broadest and most comprehensive, and the provisions for assessment of each doubtful case the harshest possible. In the elaboration of the law we find traces of the anti-Semitic and racial zeal of Achim Gercke, the specialist for race research at the Ministry of the Interior, 91 a man who during his student days at Göttingen had started, with some help from faculty and staff, to set up a card index of all Jews—as defined by racial theory; that is, in terms of Jewish ancestry—living in Germany. 92 For Gercke the anti-Jewish laws were not limited to their immediate and concrete object; they also had an “educational” function: Through them “the entire national community becomes enlightened about the Jewish question; it learns that the national community is a community of blood; for the first time it understands race thinking and, instead of an overly theoretical approach to the Jewish question, it is confronted with a concrete solution.” 93
    In 1933 the number of Jews in the civil service was small. As a result of Hindenburg’s intervention (following a petition by the Association of Jewish War Veterans that was also supported by the elderly Field Marshal August von Mackensen), combat veterans and civil servants whose fathers or sons had been killed in action in World War I were exempted from the law. Civil servants, moreover, who had been in state service by August 1, 1914, were also exempt. 94 All others were forced into retirement.
    Legislation regarding Jewish lawyers illustrates, even more clearly than the economic boycott, how Hitler maneuvered between contradictory demands from Nazi radicals on the one hand and from his DNVP allies on the other. By the end of March, physical molestation of Jewish jurists had spread throughout the Reich. In Dresden, Jewish judges and lawyers were dragged out of their offices and even out of courtrooms during proceedings, and, more often than not, beaten up. According to the Vossische Zeitung (quoted by the Jüdische Rundschau of March 28), in Gleiwitz, Silesia, “a large number of young men entered the court building and molested several Jewish lawyers. The seventy-year-old legal counselor Kochmann was hit in the face and other lawyers punched all over. A Jewish woman assessor was taken to jail. The proceedings were interrupted. Finally, the police had to occupy the building in order to put an end to the disturbances.” 95 There were dozens of similar events throughout Germany. At the same time local Nazi leaders such as the Bavarian justice minister, Hans Frank, and the Prussian justice minister, Hanns Kerrl, on their own initiative announced measures for the immediate dismissal of all Jewish lawyers and civil servants.
    Franz Schlegelberger, state secretary of the Ministry of Justice, reported to Hitler that these local initiatives created an entirely new situation and demanded rapid legislation to impose a new, unified legal framework. Schlegelberger was backed by his minister, DNVP member Franz Gürtner. The Justice Ministry had prepared a decree excluding Jewish lawyers from the bar on the same basis—but also with the same exemptions regarding combat veterans and their relatives, and longevity in practice, as under the Civil Service Law. At the April 7 cabinet meeting Hitler unambiguously opted for Gürtner’s proposal. In Hitler’s own words: “For the moment…one has to deal only with what is necessary.” 96 The decree was confirmed the same day and made public on April 11.
    Because of the exemptions, the initial application of the law was relatively mild. Of the