Law regulating questions of nationality

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Basic data
Title: Law regulating questions of nationality
Abbreviation: StAngRegG (not official)
Type: Federal law
Scope:
Legal matter: Constitutional law
References : 102-5
Issued on: February 22, 1955
( Federal Law Gazette I p. 65 )
Entry into force on: February 26, 1955
Last change by: Art. 4 G of December 17, 2008 ( BGBl. I p. 2586 )
Effective date of the
last change: 		September 1, 2009
Expiry: December 14, 2010
(Art. 2 G of December 8, 2010, Federal Law Gazette I p. 1864 )
Weblink: Text of the law
Please note the note on the applicable legal version.

The law regulating questions of citizenship of February 22, 1955 was a German federal law which, after the Second World War, regulated the German citizenship of certain population groups and persons as well as their relatives under international law, which the displaced persons legislation had initially left open.

Legal historical background

1919-1933

German territorial losses due to the Treaty of Versailles in 1919

With the territorial provisions of the Peace Treaty of Versailles , the German east and west borders were redefined after the First World War . Parts of the Kingdom of Prussia , the Reichsland Alsace-Lorraine and other border areas went to Poland, France, Belgium and Czechoslovakia as former federal members of the German Empire . Thus, the Germans residing in these areas had lost their German citizenship by law and acquired Polish, French, Belgian and Czechoslovakian citizenship (cf. Articles 91, 53, 36 and 84 of the Versailles Treaty).

In the Little Treaty of Versailles , Poland had committed itself to treating all residents equally, regardless of birth, nationality, language, ethnicity or religion.

The so-called national politics of all governments of the Weimar Republic aimed to counteract both the assimilation and the emigration of the German minorities.

1933-1945

German territorial status after the Munich Agreement 1938

In the revision of the Treaty of Versailles, some 10 million people belonging to the German people in the areas of Eastern Europe annexed by the German Reich until 1938 or occupied by the German Wehrmacht during the Second World War were (re) granted German citizenship , partly by international treaty regulation, partly by ordinance . As a result of the Munich Agreement, this particularly affected the Reichsgau Sudetenland , also the Memelland , Bohemia and Moravia as well as the persons entered in the German people's list in former Poland and Ukraine , as well as resettlers, for example from the Baltic states due to the German-Soviet border and friendship treaty of September 28, 1939.

After 1945

Germany within the borders of December 31, 1937

After the end of World War II who went victorious powers of a territorial status of Germany after the border demarcation from December 31, 1937 from. However, a peace treaty had not been concluded regulating the territorial and nationality issues relevant to the end of wars, nor had the Allied legislation brought about a settlement of the citizenship issues for persons outside this territorial state. In addition, under international law, Germany was responsible for deciding the fate of its previous naturalizations, but according to the Berlin Declaration of the Allies without governmental power, and in accordance with the Estoppel principle, basically bound to previous naturalizations.

The relevant legislative acts in the foreign states that were disannounced after the end of the war fluctuated between re-naturalization as their own citizens and expulsion and expulsion of the German people on suspicion of collaboration with Nazi Germany .

In 1952, the Federal Constitutional Court assumed that an Austrian who had been naturalized after the annexation of Austria had regained his or her original citizenship by virtue of international law as part of federal law ( Art. 25 GG) and lost the German nationality again, even though general international law did not contain supplementary rules on changing citizenship in the event of territorial changes .

On the other hand, the Federal Administrative Court , citing the ban on expatriation in Article 16.1 sentence 2 of the Basic Law, was of the opinion that the German naturalization acts still had their nationality effects, regardless of their initial ineffectiveness or subsequent cancellation of the underlying territorial changes. This only results in an obligation for Germany to revoke those naturalizations, but not their automatic lapse.

Origin and content of the law of February 22, 1955

Equal opportunity certificate about the legal status as a German without German citizenship according to Article 116.1 of the Basic Law

The law of February 22, 1955 essentially regulates the German citizenship of former nationals who were affected by German naturalization measures between 1938 and 1945 and who did not adopt this group of people as their own nationals after the Second World War, but instead expelled, expelled or expelled them.

These people had lost their German citizenship without having obtained another. According to Article 116, Paragraph 1, 2nd Old Basic Law, they were initially considered Germans within the meaning of the Basic Law if they had found admission as refugees or expellees of German ethnicity in the territory of the German Reich as of December 31, 1937.

In order to achieve, at least for the time being, an extensive approximation of the legal status of these persons with German citizens without stipulating the question of citizenship, the concept of German without German citizenship was created. The final legal regulation of the German citizenship of those affected by the collective naturalization of the German Reich from 1938 to 1945 was only made by the law regulating questions of citizenship (StAngRegG).

§§ 1 ff. StARegG

Persons affected by German collective naturalization between 1938 and 1945 and who remained in the areas that were disannounced after the Second World War became German citizens unless they expressly refused German citizenship, for example because the collective naturalization had not complied with their wishes. The German authorities issued a certificate of rejection as proof of the rejection of the disapproved state. The rejection meant that the declaring party had not acquired German citizenship through collective naturalization (§ 3 StARegG). The legal status of a German without German citizenship was retained by the deciding factor.

§§ 6 f. StARegG

Refugees and displaced persons of German ethnicity according to Article 116, Paragraph 1 of the Basic Law were given a legal right to naturalization. Anyone who did not assert this, for example in order to retain the possibility of returning to their country of origin and their right of home , remained status German . With the relocation back to the area of ​​displacement, this status was lost (Section 7 StARegG).

To prove the status of a status German, with the application for naturalization either an equality certificate stating the legal status as a German without German citizenship from the time before the Federal Expellees Act (BVFG) came into force or an identity card according to § 15 para. 1 BVFG, which the expellee status according to § 1 BVFG who documented admission to Germany and German ethnicity.

§§ 8 ff. StARegG

Other groups of people received a naturalization claim or a corresponding right to apply from abroad, such as members of the German people who did not get into the territory of the German Reich as of December 31, 1937 on their escape route. B. only to Austria (§ 9 StARegG).

According to Section 10 of the StARegG, only those foreigners of German origin in the German Wehrmacht , the Waffen-SS , the German police and the Todt Organization had become German citizens for whom, on the basis of the Führer’s decree on acquiring German citizenship through employment in the German Wehrmacht , the Waffen-SS, the German police or the Organization Todt of May 19, 1943, before the StARegG came into force, German citizenship had been expressly determined by a decision from the former immigrant central office. Merely serving in one of the organizations mentioned was not enough. This legal regulation implemented the corresponding decision of the Federal Constitutional Court of January 30, 1953.

By Circular of the collective naturalizations in the annexed or occupied eastern territories on racial grounds excluded German people related, in particular the Jewish faith, who now lived in Germany and had no other nationality were given a naturalization gem. Section 11 StARegG. In extension of the re-naturalization claim according to According to Article 116 (2) of the Basic Law, persons who had already acquired foreign citizenship prior to their expatriation, for example according to the Eleventh Ordinance on the Reich Citizenship Act of November 25, 1941, could be naturalized according to § 12 StARegG . For these people, too, were the cause of the acquisition of foreign citizenship due to National Socialist persecution and emigration.

Paragraph 25 of the StARegG expressly left the right of home and the future regulations on citizenship unaffected by the declarations made on the basis of the StARegG.

Consequential Laws

Second law regulating questions of nationality

The second law regulating questions of citizenship of May 17, 1956 repealed the ordinances on German citizenship in Austria of July 3, 1938 and June 30, 1939 with effect from April 27, 1945. However, persons whose German citizenship had subsequently expired had the right to reacquire it by means of a declaration with retroactive effect to the date of expiry.

Third law regulating citizenship issues

With the third law regulating questions of citizenship of August 19, 1957, descendants of those who were politically, racially or religiously persecuted also received a naturalization claim (Section 12 (2) StARegG new version).

Repeal

The law regulating questions of nationality was repealed in its entirety by the law of December 8, 2010 on December 15, 2010 after the content of the regulation had largely become obsolete. Theoretically still feasible naturalizations according to §§ 9, 11 and 12 StARegG can be carried out on the basis of § 8 , § 13 and § 14 of the Citizenship Act (StAG).

literature

  • Werner Hoffmann: The law regulating questions of citizenship. Kohlhammer. Stuttgart, Cologne 1955.
  • Alexander Nikolajevie Makarov: The federal law regulating citizenship issues of February 22, 1955. In: Juristenteitung 1955, pp. 659–663.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Vogt: The law regulating questions of citizenship of February 22, 1955 / Origin and content of the law of February 22, 1955 ZaöRV 1955, p. 661 f.
  2. ↑ cf. Art. 27 ff. Of the Versailles Treaty of June 28, 1919 documentArchiv.de, accessed on December 31, 2018
  3. ^ Peace Treaty of Versailles ("Versailles Treaty") of June 28, 1919 dokumentArchiv.de, accessed on December 31, 2018
  4. ^ Dietmar Müller: Citizenship and minority protection. "Managing diversity" in Eastern and Western Europe Topic Portal European History, 2006
  5. ↑ Jochen Oltmer: "Homecoming"? "Ethnic German foreign citizenship" from Eastern, Central Eastern and Southeastern Europe in the German Empire and the Weimar Republic European History Online , June 1, 2011
  6. ↑ Strebel: The law regulating questions of nationality of February 22, 1955 / Prehistory ZaöRV 1955, p. 648 ff.
  7. ↑ Joachim Neander: "Heim ins Reich"? Volksdeutsche as political maneuvering mass 1938-46 Review by Markus Leniger: National Socialist "Volkstumsarbeit" and resettlement policy 1933-1945: From the care of minorities to the selection of settlers. Berlin: Frank & Timme, 2006. ISBN 978-3-86596-082-5 . h-net.org, accessed January 5, 2019
  8. ↑ Treaty between the German Reich and the Czechoslovak Republic on citizenship and options issues of November 20, 1938 RGBl. II p. 895. Monthly Bulletins for Foreign Policy 1938, pp. 1213–1216
  9. ^ Treaty between the German Reich and the Republic of Lithuania on the citizenship of the Memel countries of July 8, 1939 , RGBl. II p. 1000
  10. ^ Ordinance on the acquisition of German citizenship by former Czechoslovak citizens of German ethnicity of April 20, 1939 , RGBl. I p. 815 in connection with the ordinance regulating citizenship issues vis-à-vis the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia of June 6, 1941, RGBl. I p. 308
  11. ↑ Ordinance on the German People's List and German citizenship in the incorporated eastern areas of March 4, 1941, RGBl. I p. 118 in the version of the Second Ordinance on the German People's List and German citizenship in the incorporated eastern areas of January 31, 1942, RGBl. I p. 51
  12. ↑ Ordinance on the granting of German citizenship to persons entered in the German People's List of Ukraine of May 19, 1943, RGBl. I 321
  13. ^ The Reorganization of Eastern Europe ZaöRV 1939, pp. 912–940
  14. ↑ Alexander Nikolajevie Makarov: On the treatment of German forced naturalizations 1938 to 1945 . JZ 1952, p. 403 ff.
  15. ↑ Ordinance on German citizenship in Austria of July 3, 1938 dokumentArchiv.de, accessed on December 31, 2018
  16. ↑ BVerfG, decision of May 28, 1952 - 1 BvR 213/51 = BVerfGE 1, 322; NJW 1952, 777
  17. ↑ BVerwGE 1, p. 206 ff.
  18. ^ Fritz Münch: Decisions of national courts in questions of international law. German case law 1951-1957 (Part A) ZaöRV 1959, pp. 186–242
  19. ↑ Voigt: The law regulating questions of nationality of February 22, 1955 / Origin and content of the law of February 22, 1955 ZaöRV 1955, pp. 661–670
  20. ↑ RGBl. I 315
  21. ↑ BVerfGE II, 115; NJW 1953, p. 497
  22. ↑ cf. Circular decree of the Reich Ministry of the Interior of March 29, 1939, Ministerialblatt der Innere Verwaltung , p. 783
  23. ↑ RGBl. I, p. 722
  24. ↑ Voigt: The law regulating questions of nationality of February 22, 1955 / Origin and content of the law of February 22, 1955 ZaöRV 1955, p. 670
  25. ↑ BGBl. I p. 431
  26. ↑ RGBl. I p. 790
  27. ↑ RGBl. I p. 1072
  28. ↑ BGBl. I p. 1251
  29. ↑ Art. 2 of the law on the further revision of federal law of December 8, 2010, Federal Law Gazette I p. 1864
  30. ^ Draft of a law on the further adjustment of federal law BT-Drs. 17/2279 of June 23, 2010, p. 29