Gun Control in the Third Reich

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by Stephen P. Halbrook


  —John R. Lott, Jr., author, More Guns, Less Crime; President, Crime Prevention Research Center

  “In Gun Control in the Third Reich, Stephen P. Halbrook gives a decisive historical answer to a question which has generally been discussed without much evidence in the political discourse of recent years. Now there is no doubt: Halbrook shows that the Nazis relied on gun control to carry out its totalitarian program. Indeed, by means of painstaking historical research, he shows that the weapon confiscations and punishments of the Third Reich relied very much on the earlier registration measures of the democratic Weimar Republic. This pioneering book tells an essential story that is central to the history of the modern Leviathan state. Highly recommended!”

  —T. Hunt Tooley, Professor of History, Austin College; whose books include Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth-Century Europe, The Western Front: Battleground and Home Front in the First World War, and National Identity and Weimar Germany

  “For Jews left trembling in their homes, powerless to defend against Nazi Stormtroopers, the right to possess a gun took on special meaning in the 1940s. In Stephen Halbrook’s extraordinary book, Gun Control in the Third Reich, the consequence of disarming a population, making them vulnerable to imprisonment and annihilation, is told with frightening detail. It is a history with poignancy. With gun controllers in our midst today, who either do not understand the Second Amendment or choose to redefine it for their own ends, it would serve them well to read and digest the powerful arguments in this pathbreaking book.”

  —Herbert I. London, President, London Center for Policy Research; former President, Hudson Institute

  “In Gun Control in the Third Reich, Stephen Halbrook has uncovered and thoroughly documented a long-overlooked aspect of Hitler’s rise to Power and ultimate genocide of German Jews—the disarming of the citizenry made possible by gun registration and confiscation laws adopted during the Weimar Republic. The parallels to today’s gun control debates in the United States are bone-chilling, and ought to raise a red flag call to action for all freedom-loving Americans.”

  —John C. Eastman, Henry Salvatori Professor of Law and Community Service, Chapman University; Founding Director, Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence

  “Stephen Halbrook’s Gun Control in the Third Reich provides a stark example of why defenders of liberty must oppose any attempts to limit our ability to defend ourselves from private and public criminals. Halbrook’s work is especially timely since so many in Washington are once again trying to convince the people they have nothing to fear from gun registration and other infringements on our Second Amendment rights.”

  —Ron Paul, former U.S. Congressman and candidate for President of the United States

  “The fascinating book Gun Control in the Third Reich deals with firearms regulation in Germany from the beginning of the Weimar Republic in the early 1920s, when guns began to be heavily regulated, through the early days of World War II when gun ownership was punishable by death, through the Third Reich in 1945 when the government began to allow Germans access to weapons to fend off the Russian invaders…. Professor Halbrook does not claim that Hitler and the Holocaust would not have occurred had the population of Germany been armed. Nonetheless, firearms in the possession of individuals, especially Jews after they were ghettoized, might have raised the costs to the Nazis and slowed them down.”

  —William A. Schroeder, Professor of Law, Southern Illinois University

  “Even a defense with small arms against a tyrannical regime, if known, can galvanize public opinion, which is the ultimate source of all political authority. That is why, as Halbrook authoritatively shows in Gun Control in the Third Reich, the Nazis—despite their massive military force—went out of their way to confiscate even small caliber weapons in Germany.”

  —Donald W. Livingston, Professor of Philosophy Emeritus, Emory University

  “Stephen Halbrook’s meticulous research in Gun Control in the Third Reich sheds new and revealing light on the consolidation of Nazi power and the prosecution of the Holocaust. Everyone, including advocates of gun controls, should find this pioneering and thought-provoking book essential reading.”

  —James B. Jacobs, Warren E. Burger Professor of Law, New York University; author, Can Gun Control Work?

  “Gun Control in the Third Reich is Stephen Halbrook’s best book. He shows how the destruction of gun ownership, gun clubs, and self-defense was part of the National Socialists’ extermination of civil society, individualism, and the Rule of Law.”

  — David B. Kopel, Adjunct Professor of Advanced Constitutional Law, Denver University Sturm College of Law; author, Guns: Who Should Have Them?; Research Director, Independence Institute

  “In Gun Control in the Third Reich, Halbrook is particularly effective in showing how the path for Nazi totalitarianism was cleared, though inadvertently, by firearms laws of Weimar Germany. The political objective of those laws was to enhance the public welfare by diminishing the ability of the population to inflict violence on each other. What followed instead was something not foreseen by the principled, well-intending Weimar democrats who carried that policy into execution. Those laws—heavily laden with official discretion—left disfavored minorities perfectly helpless when Hitler and the Nazi government came to power. Halbrook’s book is the most complete depiction of a story that is interesting in itself, and which has lessons for our own place and time.”

  —Daniel D. Polsby, Dean and Professor of Law, George Mason University School of Law

  “Stephen Halbrook, a renowned expert on the subject, systematically and brilliantly examines Nazi gun-control policy in Gun Control in the Third Reich. American advocates of banning guns have tried to downplay the Nazi example because stringent control preceded the Nazis. But the fact remains that the Nazis capitalized on the fact that neither the Jews nor other victims nor the Germans in general, as well as those people in the occupied countries, could resist the Holocaust because the Nazi government had all the guns.”

  —Don B. Kates, Jr., co-author (with Gary Kleck), of Armed: New Perspectives on Gun Control and The Great American Gun Debate (with Gary Kleck)

  “Gun Control in the Third Reich is a provocative book on what is surely the ‘worst case scenario’ in the history of gun control and an illuminating meditation on the role that the disarming of the Jews played in the Holocaust.”

  —Jonathan Kirsch, author, The Short, Strange Life of Herschel Grynszpan: A Boy Avenger, a Nazi Diplomat, and a Murder in Paris

  “Steeped in rich detail, exactingly researched, and supported by newly discovered documents, Gun Control in the Third Reich is a compelling work that no one who is serious about the gun control debate in America can ignore. Stephen P. Halbrook has produced a seminal piece of scholarship that describes how the gun control policies of the liberal Weimar Republic were molded into Hitler’s strategy to disarm both the Jews and his political opponents.”

  —Abraham H. Miller, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, University of Cincinnati

  “Discussions of Nazi gun control efforts are a staple of American debate, but until now there was little authoritative in-depth research to draw on. Stephen Halbrook’s extensive research and clear explication in his book Gun Control in the Third Reich ensures that future discussion will be much better informed. A must-read for anyone interested in this subject.”

  —Glenn H. Reynolds, Beauchamp Brogan Distinguished Professor of Law, University of Tennessee

  “One need not agree with Stephen Halbrook’s opposition to almost all forms of firearms control in order to find Gun Control in the Third Reich, his book on regulation of firearms in post-World War I and Nazi Germany, both illuminating and challenging. The most truly serious arguments against significant regulation of firearms have always involved critiquing the proposition that a potentially oppressive state should have a monopoly over the means of violence, and Halbrook’s book very much contributes to that debate. Many no doubt would like to believe that Nazi Germany is s
ui generis, which, paradoxically, implies that there is not much to be learned from its specific history or policies with regard to our own dilemmas today. Others are less optimistic, and for them Halbrook’s well-told narrative has implications for our contemporary debates.”

  —Sanford V. Levinson, W. St. John Garwood and W. St. John Garwood, Jr. Centennial Chair, University of Texas School of Law; author, Framed: America’s 51 Constitutions and the Crisis of Governance

  Independent Studies in Political Economy

  THE ACADEMY IN CRISIS | Ed. by John W. Sommer

  AGAINST LEVIATHAN | Robert Higgs

  ALIENATION AND THE SOVIET ECONOMY | Paul Craig Roberts

  AMERICAN HEALTH CARE | Ed. by Roger D. Feldman

  ANARCHY AND THE LAW | Ed. by Edward P. Stringham

  ANTITRUST AND MONOPOY | D. T. Armentano

  AqUANOMICS | Ed. by B. Delworth Gardner & Randy T. Simmons

  ARMS, POLITICS, AND THE ECONOMY | Ed. by Robert Higgs

  BEYOND POLITICS | Randy T. Simmons

  BOOM AND BUST BANKING | Ed. by David Beckworth

  CAN TEACHERS OWN THEIR OWN SCHOOLS? | Richard K. Vedder

  THE CAPITALIST REVOLUTION IN LATIN AMERICA | Paul Craig Roberts & Karen Araujo

  THE CHALLENGE OF LIBERTY | Ed. by Robert Higgs & Carl P. Close

  CHANGING THE GUARD | Ed. by Alexander Tabarrok

  THE CHE GUEVARA MYTH AND THE FUTURE OF LIBERTY | Alvaro Vargas Llosa

  THE CIVILIAN AND THE MILITARY | Arthur A. Ekirch, Jr.

  CRISIS AND LEVIATHAN, 25TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION | Robert Higgs

  CUTTING GREEN TAPE | Ed. by Richard L. Stroup & Roger E. Meiners

  THE DECLINE OF AMERICAN LIBERALISM | Arthur A. Ekirch, Jr.

  DELUSIONS OF POWER | Robert Higgs

  DEPRESSION, WAR, AND COLD WAR | Robert Higgs

  THE DIVERSITY MYTH | David O. Sacks Peter A. Thiel

  DRUG WAR CRIMES | Jeffrey A. Miron

  ELECTRIC CHOICES | Ed. by Andrew N. Kleit

  THE EMPIRE HAS NO CLOTHES | Ivan Eland

  ENTREPRENEURIAL ECONOMICS | Ed. by Alexander Tabarrok

  THE ENTERPRISE OF LAW | Bruce L. Benson

  FAULTY TOWERS | Ryan C. Amacher & Roger E. Meiners

  FINANCING FAILURE | Vern McKinley

  FIRE & SMOKE | Michael I. Krauss

  THE FOUNDERS’ SECOND AMENDMENT | Stephen P. Halbrook

  FREEDOM, FEMINISM, AND THE STATE | Ed. by Wendy McElroy

  GOOD MONEY | George Selgin

  GLOBAL CROSSINGS | Alvaro Vargas Llosa

  HAzARDOUS TO OUR HEALTH? | Ed. by Robert Higgs

  HOT TALK, COLD SCIENCE | S. Fred Singer

  HOUSING AMERICA | Ed. by Randall G. Holcombe & Benjamin Powell

  JUDGE AND JURY | Eric Helland & Alexender Tabarrok

  LESSONS FROM THE POOR | Ed. by Alvaro Vargas Llosa

  LIBERTY FOR LATIN AMERICA | Alvaro Vargas Llosa

  LIBERTY FOR WOMEN | Ed. by Wendy McElroy

  LIVING ECONOMICS | Peter J. Boettke

  MAKING POOR NATIONS RICH | Ed. by Benjamin Powell

  MARKET FAILURE OR SUCCESS | Ed. by Tyler Cowen & Eric Crampton

  MONEY AND THE NATION STATE | Ed. by Kevin Dowd & Richard H. Timberlake, Jr.

  NEITHER LIBERTY NOR SAFETY | Robert Higgs

  THE NEW HOLY WARS | Robert H. Nelson

  NO WAR FOR OIL | Ivan Eland

  OPPOSING THE CRUSADER STATE | Ed. by Robert Higgs & Carl P. Close

  OUT OF WORK | Richard K. Vedder & Lowell E. Gallaway

  PARTITIONING FOR PEACE | Ivan Eland

  PLOWSHARES AND PORK BARRELS | E. C. Pasour, Jr. & Randal R. Rucker

  A POVERTY OF REASON | Wilfred Beckerman

  PRICELESS | John C. Goodman

  PRIVATE RIGHTS & PUBLIC ILLUSIONS | Tibor R. Machan

  PROPERTY RIGHTS | Ed. by Bruce L. Benson

  THE POWER OF HABEAS CORPUS IN AMERICA | Anthony Gregory

  THE PURSUIT OF JUSTICE | Ed. by Edward J. López

  RACE & LIBERTY IN AMERICA | Ed. by Jonathan Bean

  RECARVING RUSHMORE | Ivan Eland

  RECLAIMING THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION | William J. Watkins, Jr.

  REGULATION AND THE REAGAN ERA | Ed. by Roger E. Meiners & Bruce Yandle

  RESTORING FREE SPEECH AND LIBERTY ON CAMPUS | Donald A. Downs

  RESURGENCE OF THE WARFARE STATE | Robert Higgs

  RE-THINKING GREEN | Ed. by Robert Higgs & Carl P. Close

  RISKY BUSINESS | Ed. by Lawrence S. Powell

  SCHOOL CHOICES | John Merrifield

  SECURING CIVIL RIGHTS | Stephen P. Halbrook

  STRANGE BREW | Douglas Glen Whitman

  STREET SMART | Ed. by Gabriel Roth

  TAxING CHOICE | Ed. by William F. Shughart, II

  TAxING ENERGY | Robert Deacon, Stephen DeCanio, H. E. Frech, III, & M. Bruce Johnson

  THAT EVERY MAN BE ARMED | Stephen P. Halbrook

  THE TERRIBLE 10 | Burton A. Abrams

  TO SERVE AND PROTECT | Bruce L. Benson

  TWILIGHT WAR | Mike Moore

  VIETNAM RISING | William Ratliff

  THE VOLUNTARY CITY | Ed. by David T. Beito, Peter Gordon, & Alexander Tabarrok

  WINNERS, LOSERS & MICROSOFT | Stan J. Liebowitz & Stephen E. Margolis

  WRITING OFF IDEAS | Randall G. Holcombe

 

 

 


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