Arnold Freymuth

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Arnold Freymuth (born November 28, 1872 in Mehlauken ; † July 14, 1933 in Paris ) was a legal author, high-ranking republican-oriented judge, social democratic politician and human rights activist.

Live and act

Freymuth came from a middle-class family with Jewish roots and studied law . He had come into contact with anti-Semitism at the university early on . As a member of the Königsberg fraternity in Gothia (1892) he campaigned in vain against the exclusion of Jewish students.

He married in 1902 after ending his time as a court assessor . Between 1902 and 1906 Freymuth was a district judge in Vandsburg , then a district judge in Konitz until 1911 and then, interrupted from military service between 1914 and 1916, a higher regional judge in Hamm . During his time at the front, Freymuth became a pacifist.

During the November Revolution , Freymuth was deputy chairman of the local workers 'and soldiers' council in Hamm and, from March 1919, a city councilor. In 1918 he became a member of the SPD. In 1920 he went to Berlin as a member of the chamber judge . In addition, Freymuth was a member of the constituent Prussian state assembly between 1919 and 1921 and since 1919 a member of the Prussian state parliament . On October 15, 1919, Freymuth was appointed "parliamentary" undersecretary of state in the Prussian Ministry of Justice, a title that from July 1, 1920 was "parliamentary" state secretary. As part of the Prussian government, Freymuth was a member of the Reichsrat in 1920 and 1921 . Freymuth was an independent spirit. So he opposed the resolutions of his party at the time to allow judges to be elected directly by the people. Instead, he campaigned for the independence of the judges' position. He came into conflict with his party on other issues as well. Therefore she did not put him up as a candidate for the Reichstag and no longer nominated him as a candidate for the state parliament.

In the spring of 1921 Freymuth was seconded as a judge to the Prussian highest court, the Kammergericht . In 1923 he was promoted to President of the Senate at the Supreme Court. Because in this position, as in previous years, he continued to publicly oppose anti-republican tendencies in the judiciary and also spoke about the secret Black Reichswehr , a case was initiated against him at the instigation of Reichswehr Minister Otto Gessler . Then Freymuth, who was in poor health, retired.

Since 1926 Freymuth lived as an author in Berlin. He had been a member of the Republican Judges Association since 1923 . Between 1924 and 1926 he was a member of the federal executive committee of the German League for Human Rights , and since 1924 in the Reich Committee of the Reich Banner Black-Red-Gold . In 1924/25 Freymuth was a member of the management of the German Peace Society and between 1930 and 1933 chairman of the German Peace Association.

In addition, Freymuth was the author of numerous legal articles and papers. Among other things, he was co-editor of the "Freymuth / Kamnitzer / Rosenthal: Commentary on the Civil Code", which appeared in numerous editions. In 1931 the 13th edition of the commentary appeared.

After the beginning of Nazi rule Freymuth went into exile first in the Switzerland , then to France , where he 1933 together with his wife committed suicide .

In Hamm, the working group of social democratic lawyers founded an Arnold Freymuth Society in 1992, which is dedicated to contemporary legal history and promotes initiatives to defend fundamental rights and to develop the social constitutional state; it awards an Arnold Freymuth Prize . In 2012, the first secondary school in Hamm was named after Arnold Freymuth.

Fonts

  • Ed. Arnold Freymuth; Bernhard Kamnitzer Civil Code - Commonly explained with special consideration of the legal relationships of daily life . Editor Heinrich Rosenthal. C. Heymann, Berlin 1931, 13th edition.
  • What is treason? A sketch . Greifenverlag, Rudolstadt. 1929. Overall title: Deutsche Rechtsnot; H. 2.
  • The Fechenbach judgment. An investigation carried out on behalf of the Republican Association of Judges . With a foreword by Friedrich Thimme . Publishing house d. Neue Gesellschaft, Berlin 1928. (A treatise on the judicial scandal in connection with Felix Fechenbach , who was sentenced to 11 years in prison in a political show trial in 1922 for alleged treason.)
  • Expropriation of princes - people's law . With an introduction by Robert René Kuczynski , Reichsausschuss f. Expropriation. Berlin 1926.
  • The case turns . (A treason trial) . In Friedens-Warte 25 (1925) pp. 162-165.
  • With Emil Julius Gumbel : Conspirators - Contributions to the history and sociology of the German nationalist secret societies since 1918 . With a foreword by A. Freymuth. Malik, Berlin 1924.
  • Collaboration on Gerhart Pohl : Deutscher Justizmord - The legal and political material on the Fechenbach case at the same time the answer of the German intellectuals to the German Republic. With legal statements by Arnold Freymuth, Friedrich Kitzinger , Eduard Kohlrausch a . a. and contributions by Johannes R. Becher ; Otto Flake ; Friedrich Wilhelm Foerster . Addendum René Payot, Verlag Erich Oldenburg, Leipzig 1924.
  • Martial Law and War Taxes: Commonly Understandable Presentation d. more important war laws, war ordinances, war tax laws ... Oefler, Berlin 1915.
  • Martial law: Commonly understood presentation of the more important war laws and war ordinances . Oefler, Berlin 1916.

literature

  • Otmar Jung: Senate President Freymuth: Judge, Social Democrat and pacifist in the Weimar Republic. A political biography. Lang, Frankfurt am Main 1989, ISBN 3-631-40811-0 ; ders .: Arnold Freymuth: some additions to his political biography, in: Rechtsanwalt des Rechtsstaates. Festschrift for Diether Posser on his 75th birthday, ed. by Franz Josef Düwell on behalf of the Arnold Freymuth Society. Carl Heymanns, Cologne a. a. 1997, pp. 47-78, ISBN 3-452-23817-2 ; ders .: The literary Star of David. The indexing of “Jewish” legal literature in National Socialist Germany, in: Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, Oldenbourg, Munich 54 (2006), pp. 25–59, ISSN 0042-5702; ders .: Arnold Freymuth - a review, in: Jahrbuch der Juristische Zeitgeschichte, De Gruyter Berlin 10 (2008/2009), pp. 209–245, ISBN 978-3-89949-790-8 .
  • Johann Heinrich Lüth; Uwe Wesel: Arnold Freymuth (1878-1933), Hermann Großmann (1878-1937?), Alfred Orgler (1876-1943?) - Three judges for the republic . In Kritische Justiz (Ed.): Controversial Jurists - Another Tradition . Jürgen Seifert, co-editor of Critical Justice, on his 60th birthday. Baden-Baden 1988, ISBN 3-7890-1580-6 , pp. 204-218.
  • Karin Jaspers / Wilfried Reinighaus: Westphalian-Lippian candidates in the January elections in 1919. A biographical documentation , Münster: Aschendorff 2020 (publications of the Historical Commission for Westphalia - New Series; 52), ISBN 9783402151365 , p. 72f.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Gerhard Schulze (edit.): The protocols of the Prussian State Ministry 1817–1934 / 38. Volume 11 / I, November 14, 1918 to March 31, 1925. Acta Borussica, New Series . Ed. from the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences, Hildesheim 2004, p. 184, Document No. 136/1 ( PDF; 2.6 MB ).
personal data
SURNAME Freymuth, Arnold
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German judge, human rights activist, politician (SPD)
DATE OF BIRTH November 28, 1872
PLACE OF BIRTH Mehlauken
DATE OF DEATH July 14, 1933
Place of death Paris