Hermann Jahrreiß

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article or section needs to be revised. Details should be given on the talk page. Please help to improve it , and then remove this flag.

Hermann Jahrreiß (born August 19, 1894 in Dresden , † October 23, 1992 in Cologne ) was a professor of law with a focus on constitutional and international law .

Life

Jahrreiß initially wanted to study art, but then, at the insistence of his father, decided to study law at the University of Leipzig . After his doctorate as Dr. jur. In 1921 he was a judge at the Leipzig District and Regional Court from 1922 to 1927. After his habilitation, he became an associate professor in 1926 and an associate professor in Leipzig in 1927. In 1932 he was appointed full professor for public law, international law and legal and state philosophy at the University of Greifswald .

After the " seizure of power " by the National Socialists, he published the treatise Europe - Germanic Foundation from the East in 1933 . In 1937 he moved to the University of Cologne , where he was full professor until 1962, only interrupted by brief teaching activities in Göttingen (1939-1940) and Innsbruck (1944-1945). During the Second World War he took part in the Nazi project war deployment of the humanities .

He received honorary doctorates from the French universities of Clermont-Ferrand, Dijon and Nancy and from the English University of Manchester . In 1959 he was awarded the Great Federal Cross of Merit. In 1961 he became an officer in the French Legion of Honor. Other positions: 1939–42 and 1951–52 Dean of the Faculty of Law, 1956–58 Rector of the University of Cologne, 1958–60 President of the West German Rectors 'Conference and 1960–64 Vice President of the European Rectors' Conference (source: University of Cologne, Rector portraits). On his 70th and 80th birthday, the University of Cologne published festschriften commemorating him and his work and made him an honorary citizen on his 90th birthday.

In the post-war period, the following works by Jahrreiß, created during the National Socialist era, were placed on the list of literature to be sorted out in the Soviet occupation zone : England and Germany (The Hague: Holle 1943), Paris 1919 and Europe. The attempts at order of the Atlantic world powers , (Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt 1943), the revision struggle for Europe (Leipzig: Noske 1934), international law and international peace around Europe (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer 1937), as well as 1948 Germany and Europe (Cologne. Schaffstein 1941) and Chamberlains Peace plan and the English claim to world order. Speeches d. Rector Prof. Otto Kuhn , Cologne University Speeches. (Cologne: Müller 1940), also in 1952 in the GDR Europe-Africa (Leipzig, Berlin: Teubner 1940).

Jahrreiß was in the Nuremberg trial against the main war criminals as assistant to Franz Exner, co-defender of the accused head of the Wehrmacht command staff of the Wehrmacht High Command , Alfred Jodl . Jodl was indicted as one of the main war criminals at the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal. In the Jodl case, the core question was whether military orders justified war crimes. Jodl's defense counsel took the position that wars were decided by politicians and not by soldiers and that the soldier in his function was not obliged or entitled to review the order. He was referring to being a soldier as a profession. The arguments of the prosecutors: war is not the same as war, but can be good or bad. If wars of aggression are crimes, warriors of aggression are criminals. Declaring war of aggression as a criminal offense, said Jahrreiß, violates the principle of law, according to which no one can be convicted of an act that was not yet criminal at the time of the offense ("ex post facto ban"). However, this view was disputed even then because it was not valid in international law. The protection of peace and human rights comes first - today this is generally recognized. The prohibition of retrospective punishment does not protect tyrants and dictators; this clause can also be found in the European Convention on Human Rights . This is what the Federal Constitutional Court ruled when it came to the same legal issue in the indictment against those responsible for the former GDR . Jahrreiß unsuccessfully asked the Control Council to repeal Jodl's death sentence.

Fonts

  • Europe - Germanic foundation from the Baltic Sea region (1939)
  • Germany and Europe (1939)
  • Democracy (1950)
  • The administration of justice in the Bonn Basic Law (1950)
  • Rule according to the measure of man (1952)
  • Size and Need of Legislation (1953)
  • Freedom and the Welfare State (1957)
  • Man and State (1957)

literature

  • Seliger, Hubert: Political lawyers? The defenders of the Nuremberg trials (historical foundations of modernity; 13). Nomos, Baden-Baden 2016, ISBN 3848723603 .
  • Weinke, Annette: Hermann Jahrreiß (1894–1992). From the exponent of the "war effort" under international law to the defender of the German elite in Nuremberg , in: Steffen Augsberg ; Andreas Funke (ed.): Cologne lawyers in the 20th century. Contributions to a lecture series at the University of Cologne, summer semester 2010 and winter semester 2010/2011 (contributions to the legal history of the 20th century; 74). Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 2013, pp. 163-195, ISBN 3-16-152430-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Ernst Klee : The dictionary of persons on the Third Reich. Who was what before and after 1945 . Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, Second updated edition, Frankfurt am Main 2005, p. 282.
  2. ^ List of literature to be sorted out 1947 .
  3. ^ List of literature to be sorted out 1948 .
  4. ^ List of the literature to be sorted out 1952 .
  5. ^ Trial of the Major War Criminals before the International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg, November 14, 1945 - October 1, 1946 , Vol. 1. Nuremberg 1947, p. 6 . (Volume 1 of the "Blue Series")
  6. ↑ A stroke of luck in history . In: Der Spiegel . No. 14 , 2005 ( online - about Jahrreiß 'role in the Nuremberg trials).
personal data
SURNAME Jahrreiß, Hermann
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lawyer, professor of law
DATE OF BIRTH August 19, 1894
PLACE OF BIRTH Dresden
DATE OF DEATH October 23, 1992
Place of death Cologne