Alexander Baumgarten

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Alexander Baumgarten (born January 8, 1868 in Suhl , † October 7, 1933 in Leipzig ) was a German judge .

Life

Baumgarten received his doctorate. He passed the 1st state legal examination in 1891 with the grade "sufficient". In 1892 he entered the traineeship. In 1896 he passed the 2nd state law examination with the grade "sufficient". In 1901 he was appointed public prosecutor in Magdeburg . In 1904 he was transferred to the district court Berlin I and in 1906 to the district court Berlin III. In 1909 he moved to the bench as district judge at the Berlin II district court. In 1910, Baumgarten was promoted to district judge. In 1912 he became district court director at the district court of Berlin I. After the outbreak of the First World War, he became an unskilled worker in the Reich Attorney's Office in mid-September 1914 . In February 1920 he became a lawyer himself. In March / April 1921 he came to the Reich Court. He worked as a judge in the IV and V Criminal Senate. From September 1922 he was a member of the State Court for the Protection of the Republic , from 1927 only a deputy member. Various authors refer to him as President of the Senate.

Baumgarten was " not a stranger to the Chronique scandaleuse of the justice system of the Weimar Republic ". He was an associate judge in various fememicide trials , such as the Parchimer fememord of Walter Kadow (1900–1923) by Martin Bormann and Rudolf Höß . He became known as the presiding judge in the Ulm Reichswehr trial . He had summoned Hitler as an expert witness to the question of whether the NSDAP was an anti-constitutional party. Witness Hitler: " If the movement wins its legal struggle, a German state court will come, and November 1918 will find its atonement, and heads will roll too ". Instead of having Hitler arrested in the courtroom, Baumgarten swore him in. This is how Hitler's famous oath of legality came about.

"Mr. Frank , the designated legal advisor of the Third Reich, was allowed to address the chairman [Dr. Baumgarten] rightly thank you. The Reichsgericht suspects the Lord of tomorrow. No irony interrupts the nonsense of explaining the program, and how ironic can judges otherwise be! No reference cuts off the bloodthirsty bravades, the heroically wallpapered piece Malheur develops its guillotine fantasy undisturbed with the dictatorial craze. What Hitler proclaimed before the highest court, wrapped in a spider-thin cloth of legality, would mean for politicians who are not coalition friends of the Reich Minister of Justice ; Preparation for murder. Max Hölz is said to have said recently in the Sportpalast that a GPU is needed in Germany too , and the arm of justice was quickly stretched out. "

- Carl von Ossietzky : " The Trial of the Officers ", Die Weltbühne of October 1, 1930, p. 501ff.

Ossietzky was soon to experience Baumgarten himself. Baumgarten also presided over the scandalous Weltbühne trial .

“Nothing against Mr. Baumgarten! He has perfect manners, he has a very cavalier way of handling inevitable incidents. But very soon we notice that we are falling behind with this amiable gentleman. "

- Carl von Ossietzky : The world stage process , Die Weltbühne from December 1, 1931

Baumgarten should also have problems with the rulers of tomorrow. The law for the restoration of the civil service of April 7, 1933, which excluded everyone from the civil service who were not of “Aryan” descent, also affected him. The so-called “ front fighter privilege ” of § 3 II 1 applied formally to most of the councilors of the Reichsgericht because they had started their professional career before August 1, 1914. Nevertheless, Baumgarten was given leave of absence on April 1, 1933, along with eight other people who were of Jewish origin according to the criteria at the time. For early release (Baumgarten had already reached the age of 65. According to Section 60a of the Reichsbeamtengesetz as amended by Art. I No. IV of the Staff Reduction Ordinance of October 27, 1923 [RGBl. I, p. 999], members of the Reichsgericht were subject to 68 . Year of age), because he had died in October 1933.

editor

  • Baumgarten u. a. (Ed.): Erich Wulffen - Festschrift for his seventieth birthday, Berlin 1932.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Leipzig as the place of death according to the webpage of RA Hubert Lang Leipzig ( memento from April 15, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on May 27, 2011.
  2. ^ So with Ernst Rudolf Huber : German Constitutional History since 1789, Volume 6: Die Weimarer Reichsverfassungs, Stuttgart 1981, pp. 673, 676; Ingo J. Hueck: "The State Court for the Protection of the Republic", Tübingen 1996.
  3. ↑ Ingo Müller, "The famous Ossietzky case from 1930 could repeat itself ...," in: Hans-Ernst Böttcher, (Ed.): " Law, Justice, Criticism " Festschrift for Richard Schmid on his 85th birthday, Baden-Baden 1985 , Pp. 297, 304
  4. ↑ Thomas Henne: “Jüdische Juristen” at the Reichsgericht and their connections to the Leipzig Faculty of Law 1870–1945, in: Stephan Wendehorst (Ed.): Building blocks of a Jewish history of the University of Leipzig, Leipzig 2006, p. 202.

source

  • Adolf Lobe: Fifty Years of the Reich Court on October 1, 1929 . Berlin 1929, pp. 384, 402.
  • Friedrich Karl Kaul: History of the Reichsgericht, Volume IV (1933–1945) , East Berlin 1971, p. 262.
personal data
SURNAME Baumgarten, Alexander
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Reich judge
DATE OF BIRTH January 8, 1868
PLACE OF BIRTH Suhl
DATE OF DEATH October 7, 1933
Place of death Leipzig