Leopold Zimmerl

Leopold Zimmerl (* 4. May 1899 in Vienna , † 14. September 1945 ) was an Austrian - German lawyer in the era of National Socialism .

Life

Gravestone of Leopold Zimmerl in Marburg

After passing the school leaving examination in 1918, Zimmerl worked for three years in commercial professions in Vienna and Amsterdam . From 1921 to 1925 he studied at the Vienna University of Jura . After receiving his doctorate in December 1925, he was employed on January 1, 1926 as a research assistant at the Chair of Criminal Law at the University of Vienna. In 1928 he completed his habilitation in Vienna with the habilitation thesis "On the teaching of the facts", which was examined by Wenzeslaus von Gleispach , among others .

From 1928 to 1934 Zimmerl taught criminal law and criminal procedure law in Vienna. Since 1930 he was a paid “extraordinary assistant”. As before von Gleispach, he turned to National Socialism and joined the NSDAP in June 1931 . His lectures and lectures increasingly contained political considerations in the folkish- national socialist sense. In a lecture on December 1, 1931 before the German gentlemen's club , of which he was possibly a member, he criticized the dominance of “non-German thoughts of all kinds” in current law. The adoption of Roman law was to be rejected, especially since it was no longer Roman at the time it came into existence. Rome was already "a mixture of Africans, Asians and Mongols of all kinds". Its right “could no longer be a culture-related right.” In addition, it was further worsened by more recent “un-German cultural currents”, namely liberalism , communism and Americanism . Zimmerl called for the creation of a truly "German criminal law" for which one had to fall back on "old Germanic thinking". Furthermore, "not only the status of lawyers, but also the status of judges and public prosecutors are increasingly flooded by elements alien to the people".

In January 1934 Zimmerl was dismissed from the University of Vienna. The reasons for dismissal include the closeness of Zimmerl and his sponsor von Gleispach to National Socialism, a politically unpleasant contribution to the “protest band” of Viennese lawyers in the “Verwaltungsarchiv” magazine, but also the difficult financial situation of the university. He is no longer listed in the 1933/1934 personnel register. In the same year he was appointed to the Philipps University of Marburg . In Marburg Zimmerl positioned himself with Erich Schwinge as an opponent of the Kiel School and opposed the use of the term “ healthy people's feeling ”. The constant reference to the "healthy public feeling" does not offer the judge what he needs. The term is far too vague and its content is obviously controversial. He argued: “Just as the best nationalist does not need to be the most frequent and loudest 'Heil Hitler!' shouts, it is so little proof of the closeness of the law to the people when it repeatedly claims to be. ”In 1936/37 Zimmerl was Dean of the Law Faculty of Marburg and Vice-Rector of the University of Marburg. From April 1937 to September 1938 he was rector in Marburg. Under his leadership, all honorary senators of the university were checked for loyalty to the regime in terms of racial laws and their commitment to the Nazi state. At the Senate meeting on May 21, 1938, Georg Thöne and Wilhelm Lutsch were stripped of their honorary senatorship. There was increasing tension between Zimmerl and members of the National Socialist Lecturer Association , in the course of which Friedrich Wachtsmuth was removed from his position as dean of the Philosophical Faculty by Zimmerl. This was followed by arguments with the Gaudozentenbundführer Düring and the Lecturer League Leader at the University of Marburg, Theodor Bersin . Since Zimmerl did not find any support within the teaching staff and his applications for the removal of Düring and Bersin from office were not decided by the Prussian Ministry of Culture and Gauleiter Karl Weinrich , he submitted his resignation as rector on July 15, 1938.

Zimmerl died on September 14, 1945. His grave is in Marburg.

Works (excerpt)

De Lege Ferenda; Walter de Gruyter & Co. , Berlin, Leipzig 1931 Digitized (excerpt) from Google Books

literature

Inge Auerbach: Catalogus professorum academiae Marburgensis. The academic teachers at the Philipps University in Marburg . Volume 2: 1911 to 1971. Elwert, Marburg 1979, ISBN 3-7708-0580-1 , p. 150.
Michael Grüttner : Biographical Lexicon on National Socialist Science Policy (= Studies on Science and University History. Volume 6). Synchron, Heidelberg 2004, ISBN 3-935025-68-8 , p. 189.
Anne Christine Nagel (Ed.): The Philipps University of Marburg in National Socialism: Documents on its history , Franz Steiner Verlag , Stuttgart, 2000 Digitalisat (excerpt.) At Google Books
Kamila Staudigl-Ciechowicz: On the emergence of Viennese criminology and criminalistics in the 1st Republic , in: Journal On European History Of Law , Vol. 2/2011, No. 1.

Individual evidence

↑ Tamara Ehs, Thomas Olechowski, Kamila Staudigl-Ciechowicz: Leopold Zimmerl. In: The Vienna Law and Political Science Faculty, 1918–1938; Writings from the archive of the University of Vienna, ISSN 2197-0785 (excerpt from Google Books). 2014, accessed June 21, 2017 .
↑ Staudigl-Ciechowicz, Kamila: On the emergence of Viennese criminology and criminalistics in the 1st republic. In: Journal On European History Of Law, Vol. 2/2011, No. 1, ISSN 2042-6402. STS Science Center Ltd., 2011, accessed June 21, 2017 .
^ Law and material justice in criminal law, in: Contributions to the reorganization of German law. The Marburg Faculty of Law and Politics celebrates the 70th birthday of Professor Dr. jur., Dr. phil., Dr. rer. pole. hc Erich Jung, Marburg 1937, pp. 222–242, p. 241.
↑ Michael Grüttner : Biographical Lexicon for National Socialist Science Policy (= Studies on Science and University History. Volume 6). Synchron, Heidelberg 2004, ISBN 3-935025-68-8 , p. 189.
↑ Honorary senators of the Philipps University of Marburg. Philipps University of Marburg , accessed on January 11, 2020 .
↑ The Philipps University of Marburg under National Socialism: Documents on their history, p. 316ff (digitized extracts from Google Books). Anne Christine Nagel, 2000, accessed January 11, 2020 .

personal data
SURNAME	Zimmerl, Leopold
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Austrian-German lawyer during the Nazi era
DATE OF BIRTH	May 4, 1899
PLACE OF BIRTH	Vienna
DATE OF DEATH	September 14, 1945
Place of death	Marburg

[wien18-38-1] Tamara Ehs, Thomas Olechowski, Kamila Staudigl-Ciechowicz: Leopold Zimmerl. In: The Vienna Law and Political Science Faculty, 1918–1938; Writings from the archive of the University of Vienna, ISSN 2197-0785 (excerpt from Google Books). 2014, accessed June 21, 2017 .

[stau-cie-2] Staudigl-Ciechowicz, Kamila: On the emergence of Viennese criminology and criminalistics in the 1st republic. In: Journal On European History Of Law, Vol. 2/2011, No. 1, ISSN 2042-6402. STS Science Center Ltd., 2011, accessed June 21, 2017 .

[zimmerl_ve-3] Law and material justice in criminal law, in: Contributions to the reorganization of German law. The Marburg Faculty of Law and Politics celebrates the 70th birthday of Professor Dr. jur., Dr. phil., Dr. rer. pole. hc Erich Jung, Marburg 1937, pp. 222–242, p. 241.

[4] Michael Grüttner : Biographical Lexicon for National Socialist Science Policy (= Studies on Science and University History. Volume 6). Synchron, Heidelberg 2004, ISBN 3-935025-68-8 , p. 189.

[unimr-ehrens-5] Honorary senators of the Philipps University of Marburg. Philipps University of Marburg , accessed on January 11, 2020 .

[nagel-hrsg-6] The Philipps University of Marburg under National Socialism: Documents on their history, p. 316ff (digitized extracts from Google Books). Anne Christine Nagel, 2000, accessed January 11, 2020 .