by The Destruction of the European Jews, Vol. 1-3 (Third Edition) Yale University Press (2003) (pdf)
Ministry
(Staatsministerium)
informed
the
Prussian
Justice
Ministry of an intent to restrict office holding in the judiciary by
“nonadherents
of a Christian faith”
(Nicktangehörige christlicher Bekenntnisse). That very day the Prussian Justice Ministry sent a draft of a law to the State Ministry for the dismissal of non-Christian judges and
prosecutors who had either not been in office prior to November 9,
1918, or who were not war veterans. During the following week Prussian Finance Minister Popitz and Oberregierungsrat Seel of the Reich Interior Ministry were working on a much broader provision foreseeing
the removal of any civil servant for a “simplification” of the administrative structure, that of the Reich as well as that of the Länder While all 2. For detailed statistics, see Statistisches Reichsamt, Statistik des Deutschen
Reichs, CDLI, Pt. 5, ‘‘Die Glaubensjuden im Deutschen Reich,'' pp. 29, 61,66. See also
Erich Rosenthal, “Tbends of the Jewish Population in Germany, 1910-1939," Jewish
Social Studies, 6 (1944): 255-57; and Institute of Jewish Affairs, Hitler's Ten-Year War on
the Jews (New York, 1943), p. 7.
The number of government employees who were Jews by religion was about 4,000.
In public education (all three levels) there were 1,832; in the judiciary, 286; in the railway
and postal administrations, 282; in all other agencies, including the armed forces, 1.545.
3. RGBl I, 175.
4. The actions were taken in Prussia, Bavaria, Baden. Hessen, Württemberg, and
Saxony. See Uwe Adam, Judenpolitik im Dritten Reich (Düsseldorf, 1971), pp. 46-51.
See also detailed report by Frederick T. Birchall, “German Business Protests Boycott.”
The New York Times, March 31, 1933, pp. 1,8, and earlier news stories in the same paper.
5. On "simplification," see text of proposals by Pfundtner in the spring of 1932, in
Hans Mommsen. Beamtentum im Dritten Reich (Stuttgart, 1966), pp. 127-35. Pfundtner,
later Staatssekretär of the Reich Interior Ministry, addressed himself to mergers of
ministries, both Reich and Prussian, and elimination of "leftist" civil servants. His proposals did not mention Jews.
86
DISMISSALS
these drafts were being discussed, Hitler himself intervened to demand
a nationwide dismissal of all Jewish civil servants.6 7
On April 4, 1933, the aged President, Field Marshal von Hinden-
burg, addressed a letter to Hitler. In the last few days, he wrote, he had
heard of a whole series of cases in which war-invalided judges, lawyers, and judicial officials with exemplary administrative records had been forced to take leave, with a view to later dismissal, only because
they were of Jewish descent. For him personally such treatment of war
invalided civil servants was completely intolerable. In his view civil
servants, judges, teachers, and lawyers who were invalided or who
were veterans of front-line service or who were sons or fathers of men
killed in action had to be retained in office. If they had been good
enough to fight and bleed for Germany, they were worthy of serving it
now.
Hitler’s reply is dated April 5. The letter is the longest that Hitler,
as Chancellor and Führer, was to write about Jewish affairs. Its tone is
strident. Without preliminaries, Hitler gave two reasons for his attitude:
First,
the
long-lasting
exclusions
of
Germans
(including
war
veterans) from office because of the heavy participation of Jews in the
legal and health professions, and second, the weakening of the whole
German state by a foreign body whose competence was concentrated
in
business
activity.
The
officer corps, Hitler reminded Hindenburg,
had always rejected Jews. Still, honoring the field marshal's humanity,
he had already discussed with Reich Interior Minister Frick a law that
was to remove the dismissal process from arbitrary individual initiatives and that was to make allowance for Jews who either had served in the war themselves or who had been harmed by it, or who had other
merits or who had never given rise to complaint in the course of a long
tenure.’
When the law appeared a few days later, it provided for the compulsory retirement of non-Aryan officials, including those of the Reich, the Länder, the local governments (Gemeinden), and public corporations, with the exceptions anticipated in the early Prussian draft and demanded by Hindenburg in his letter. The non-Aryan clause did not
apply to officials who had served in the government since August 1,
1914, or who had fought at the front for Germany or one of Germany’s
allies in World War I, or whose fathers or sons had been killed on the
6. Adam believes that Hitler made the move on March 31 or April 1. See Adam,
Judenpolitik, pp. 58-61.
7. Texts of the two letters in Walter Hubatsch, Hindenburg und der Staat (Göttingen, 1966), pp. 375-78.
87
EXPROPRIATION
German side during that war. The nature of these exceptions appears to
reflect
a
feeling
that
loyalty
ought
to
be
rewarded
with
loyalty.
Moreover, those who were subject to retirement were entitled to a
pension if they had completed ten years of service.1
After the blow was struck, there was a feeling that the outer limits
of political latitude had already been reached. On April 25, 1933, at a
conference chaired by Frick and attended by the minister presidents
and interior ministers of the Länder, a particularly cautious note was
sounded by Goring in his capacity as Minister President of Prussia.
Hitler had specifically told him that in the implementation of the law
care had to be taken not to ignore the wishes of President von Hinden-
burg or the reactions of foreign countries. Germany could not say: we
will do whatever we want. Already Germany was isolated, and the
Jews were seeing to it that the situation was becoming more severe.
The Jews had to be hit hard, but outsiders who could misunderstand
what was being done were not to be given the opportunity to brand the
Germans as barbarians. A Jew who had contributed something really
significant to mankind was not to be removed—the world would not
understand
that.
Furthermore,
Hindenburg
was
going
to
preoccupy
himself with the possibility of equating “such eminent scientists (derartige wissenschaftliche Kapazitäten)" with veterans of the front.’
This was the mood when the first law designed to inflict actual
harm on the Jews was being promulgated. It was a relatively mild
measure, but the destruction process was a development that was begun with caution and ended without restraint. The victims never remained in one position for long. There were always changes, and the changes were tdways for the worse. Such was the subsequent history
also of the civil service law.
There were to be no more exemptions, and those incumbents who
; were initially protected soon lost their positions. The lever by which
further ejections were accomplished was a paragraph in the decree
stating that anyone could be retired from the civil service if such separation would further the “simplification of administration.” According to Ministerialdirigent Hubrich of the Interior Ministry, this paragraph
was used extensively to eliminate non-Aryans who were old officials,
veterans, or relatives of deceased veterans. There were no restrictions
upon the payment of pensions to officials retired in this fashion.8 9 10 Fi-
8. Affidavit by Dr. Georg Hubrich (Ministerialdirigent, Interior Ministry), November 21, 1947, NG-3567.
9. Summary by Reich Interior Ministry and detailed memorandum by Staatsrat Dr.
Schultz (Hamburg), both dated April 27, 1933, about conference of April 25. Texts in
Mommsen, Beamtentum, pp. 159-63.
10. Affidavit by Hubrich, November 21, 1947, NG-3567.
DISMISSALS
T A B L E 5-6
REGULATION OF THE PENSION SYSTEM
1933
“Simplification"
1935
Veterans
Pension
Pension
Surviving relatives
Pension
No pension
Service before 1914
Pension
No pension
Ten-year service
Pension
Less than ten years' service
No pension
nally, the decree of November 14, 1935, which defined the concept of
“Jew,’’ stipulated that all remaining Jewish civil servants (excepting
only teachers in Jewish schools) were to be removed by December 31,
1935. Officials retired under this decree were granted pensions only if
they had served as front-line soldiers in World War I."
The Jews had now been ousted from the civil service, but the
regulation of the pension system was far from perfect (see Table 5-6).
To the bureaucrats this meant that some pensions would have to be cut
out. For a long time nothing was done about the matter. Then, in
November
1939,
Staatssekretär
Pfundtner
proposed
to
Chief
of
the
Reich Chancellery Lammers a complex regulation for the reduction of
pension
payments
to
Jews.”
Reichspostminister
(Minister
for
Postal
Affairs) Ohnesorge commented that the draft was too complicated. “I
consider it undesirable,” he wrote, “that the administrative apparatus
should be burdened with additional difficulties on account of the Jews,
of all people.” Moreover, it was “quite likely” (durchaus denkbar) that
the Jews who were still in the country, most of whom were “doing
nothing"
anyhow
(untätig
herumlungern),
would
be
incarcerated
in
protective custody, security arrest, “or the like” for the duration of the
war.
Consequently,
one
could
prepare
for
this
eventuality
in
the
pension field right now, by withdrawing all pension provisions for Jews
and by granting payments only on a revocable basis or on a basis of
need.15
These
comments
indicate
how
quickly
the
German
bureaucracy,
even in the Postal Ministry, could develop some drastic thoughts in
connection with such a minor matter as pensions. Incarcerations “and 11 12 13
11. RGBl I, 1333. The Mischlinge were not affected by the decree of November 14,
1933. Insofar as they had survived under the excepting clauses of the law of April 7, 1933,
the Mischlinge could therefore continue in office.
12. Pfundtner to Lammers, November 17, 1939, NG-358.
13. Reichspostminister to Interior Minister, November 30, 1939, NG-358.
89
EXPROPRIATION
the like" soon became a reality. The pensions, however, remained untouched. The problem did not reemerge until the Jews were killed.
The provisions of the civil service law were to be applied to professionals who were not civil servants. Thus Jewish doctors, admitted to the roster of physicians in the state-sponsored health insurance program (Krankenkassen), were deprived of their affiliation by a decree to
“implement" the civil service law. Exempted were doctors who had
served at the front or in epidemic wards, or who had been active before
August
1,
1914.14
TWo
thousand
non-Aryan
physicians
were
immediately affected by the ordinance, which was soon supplemented by
another enactment directed at dentists and dental technicians.1’ Clearly
the civil service law was being widened rather than "carried out” by
denials of fees to Krankenkassen doctors and dentists. In a similar
vein, the law served as an inspiration for orders disallowing stipends to
non-Aryan university students.16 On the other hand, the independent
Jewish lawyers, whose disbarment was first considered in conjunction
with removals of Jewish judges and prosecutors, were not ejected until
1938.17
Unlike the civil service ousters, the dismissals from the armed
forces were a relatively simple matter. In the first place, the army in
1933 was a comparatively small organization, whose size was limited
by treaty to 100,000 men. Second, as Hitler had intimated in his letter
to Hindenburg, the military had always discriminated against Jews. As
late as 1910 no Jew could become a career officer in the Prussian army
14. Decree of Reich Labor Ministry, April 22, 1933, RGBl I, 222.
15. Decree of June 2,1933. RGBl 1,350. For a complete description of the history
and impact of these ordinances, see Florian Tennstedt, “Sozialpolitik und Berufsverbote
im Jahre 1933," Zeitschrift für Sozialreform 25 (1979): 129-53, 211-38. Most private
health insurance companies promptly followed suit by barring payments to physicians
who had been struck from the lists of the Krankenkassen. The additional withdrawal of
these private patients was usually tantamount to a loss of the physician's livelihood.
Ibid., pp. 222-23. There were about 9,000 Jewish doctors in all, and by 1938 about 5,000
had emigrated. Ibid., p. 224.
16. Announcement by the rector of Freiburg University (Martin Heidegger), in
Freiburger Studentenzeitung, November 3, 1933, as reprinted in Guido Schneeberger,
ed., Nachlese zu Heidegger (Bern, 1962), p. 137. Specific reference was made by the
rector to the definition of “non-Aryan" in the civil service law. Exemptions, however,
were provided only for students who were front-line veterans or whose fathers were
lulled on the German side. A parallel edict had been issued by the Prussian Education
Ministry for universities in its jurisdiction. See Albrecht Götz von Olenhusen. "Die
'nichtarischen' Studenten in den Deutschen Hochschulen," Vierteljahrshefie für
17. Note the postwar explanation by Staatssekretär Schlegelberger of the Reich
Justice Ministry in Trials of War Criminals (Washington: U.S. Government Printing
Office, 1952), vol. 3, pp. 718-19.
90
DISMISSALS
unless he changed his religion or unless he was a doctor. ■* Consequently the status of non-Aryans in the armed forces could be regulated by a single decree, issued on May 21,1935, and signed by Hitler, War Minister von Blomberg, and Interior Minister Frick.15 The law
provided that ‘‘Aryan” descent was a prerequisite for active service in
the armed forces. However, there was a provision for “exceptions,” to
be agreed upon by the Interior Ministry and the War Ministry, and
another clause providing that service of non-Aryans in wartime could
be regulated by special directives. It must be remembered that this law
was published several months before the Interior Ministry defined the
term Jew and that one of the reasons for splitting non-Aryans into Jews
and Mischlinge was the utilization of the latter on the battlefront. Ironically, this employment was to give rise to ideological difficulties. The half-Jewish Mischling could, as soldier and subsequent veteran, claim
privileges and benefits that were not tolerable to Hitler and the party
stalwarts. Accordingly, on April 8,1940, Field Marshal Keitel, Chief of
the
Armed
Forces
High
Command,
issued
a
regulation
dismissing
Mischlinge of the first degree from active service.®
In the party there were no dismissals because the party had no
Jews. However, the party—or,
to be more precise, the propaganda
apparatus in the party—was keenly interested in the elimination of
Jews who held positions that could serve a propagandists purpose.
When Goebbels, the party’s propaganda chief, formed his Propaganda
Ministry, he began to issue decrees. One of the first measures was the
decree of October 4, 1933, which directed the newspapers to remove
all non-Aryan editors.18 19 20 21 Other regulations assured the ouster of Jewish
musicians, artists, writers, and so on, by excluding them from the
guilds (“chambers”). No artist could practice unless he was a member
of one of the Goebbels-controlled guilds.
The most interesting, and also most complicated, dismissal process
occurred in the business sector. Business was no single hierarchy but a
conglomeration of organizations. Since there was no office that could