Republican Association of Judges

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Republican Judges' Association was an association of judges , administrative lawyers , politicians and law teachers in Germany founded in 1922 . It existed until March 14, 1933.

Emergence

The Republican Judges' Association (RRB) was founded in response to a judiciary that was neutral to obviously hostile to the Weimar Republic . In his call for founding, which was published in the social democratic daily Vorwärts on December 30, 1921 , the founders, among them the long-time chairman of the federal government, Wilhelm Kroner , demanded an independent judiciary, a comprehensive judicial reform and a judiciary that unconditionally became democratic Weimar Republic and is committed to social justice. The RRB saw itself as a constitutional association , but not as a professional or professional association and, in accordance with Section 2 of its statutes , left it to its members to defend their professional interests in the respective professional associations. Soon after its foundation, the RRB came into conflict with the German Judges' Association and the judges' associations of the individual countries : The RRB accused the German Judges' Association and the regional associations of expressing openly anti-republican sentiments , not only in its magazine Deutsche Richterzeitung . On the other hand, the German Association of Judges took the view that the amalgamation of jurisprudence and politics, as represented by the Republican Association of Judges, was disastrous. The German Association of Judges saw itself as a representative of an "apolitical" judiciary that was only obliged to the state and the law, whereby its concept of state was abstract and independent of the current constitutional form, which is why the majority of its members internally rejected the Weimar Republic and anti-republican parties such as the DVP and the DNVP . This "apolitical" attitude was expressed, among other things, in the fact that judges viewed the November Revolution as high treason and, for example, the Magdeburg Regional Court in the " Rothardt Trial " found the then Reich President Friedrich Ebert guilty of treason .

activity

As part of its objectives, the Republican Association of Judges initially dealt critically with the anti-republican jurisprudence in the Weimar Republic. In addition, he went public with demands for judicial reform. He demanded u. a. the takeover of the entire judiciary by the Reich, the social opening of the profession of judges, the admission of women as professional and lay judges, the strengthening of the lay element in the criminal and labor courts, a uniform regulation of the penal system and an education based on the spirit of the social republic the new judge. From 1925, the Republican Judges Association published the magazine Die Justiz , a magazine for the renewal of German law, and also an organ of the Republican Judges Association . The chairman of the federal government, Councilor at the Prussian Higher Administrative Court, Wilhelm Kroner, in conjunction with Wolfgang Mittermaier , Gustav Radbruch and Hugo Sinzheimer , was the editor . In the following years the magazine was one of the most important organs of judicial criticism in the Weimar Republic. a. Ernst Fraenkel and Robert Kempner . The RRB also expressed criticism of the high treason case law of the 4th Criminal Senate of the Reichsgericht , whereby the long-time President of the Senate was even a member of the federal government.

In questions of judicial reform, the federal government opposed the abolition of jury courts , since from 1925, instead of three judges and twelve jury members, a large criminal chamber with three professional judges and two lay judges had to judge capital crimes instead of three judges and twelve jury members , and thereby the lay element in criminal justice was weakened.

Members

Until its dissolution, the chairman of the Republican Judges' Association was Wilhelm Kroner, and since 1925 senior administrative judge at the Prussian Higher Administrative Court in Berlin. His appeal to the Higher Administrative Court by the then Prussian Interior Minister Carl Severing was linked to the charge that the promotion was only due to his position in the Republican Association of Judges. Arnold Freymuth , President of the Senate at the Court of Appeal since 1923 , was a member of the board of the Republican Judges' Association, as was Hermann Großmann , who had been a Reich judge since 1930 . Other well-known members were the Württemberg District Court Judge Fritz Bauer , the Bavarian District Court Judge Wilhelm Hoegner , the university professors Gustav Radbruch and Hugo Sinzheimer , the Senate Presidents at the Court of Appeal Alfred Orgler and Fritz Goldschmidt , the lawyers Ludwig Bendix and Ernst Fraenkel, and the Senior Government Councilor Robert Kempner . The members were predominantly close to the DDP and the SPD or were members there. Some members of the RRB were also members in the center , in the DVP or, like the later Reich judge Friedrich Hartung , in the DNVP .

The membership of the Federation should not have exceeded 400.

Resolution and impact

After the takeover of the Nazi regime on 30 January 1933, the Republican Association of Judges on 14 March 1933 resolved. It can no longer be determined whether it had already been banned at this point in time or had anticipated a ban through self-dissolution. Since many of the members of the Republican Judges Association belonged to the SPD or were considered Jews according to the racial terms of the Nazi government , a large number of the members of the federal government were dismissed or transferred within the framework of the law to restore the civil service . For the district of the Chamber Court in Berlin it can be stated that of 68 judges and public prosecutors who were members of the Republican Judges' Association, five were transferred under Section 5 of this Act and the remaining 63 were removed from their offices for various reasons. The chairman Wilhelm Kroner was deported to Theresienstadt in 1942 , where he died a few days later, his close colleague Arnold Freymuth emigrated to France in 1933, where he committed suicide on July 14, 1933.

The demands of the Republican Association of Judges were partially implemented in the Federal Republic of Germany . According to Section 9 No. 2 of the German Judiciary Act, judges must guarantee that they will stand up for the free democratic basic order within the meaning of the Basic Law at all times ; The judges' oaths of the individual state judge laws also require that the judge's office be interpreted in accordance with the Basic Law and the respective state constitution . Women are now also granted access to professional and lay judges' offices. However, the experience of the Weimar Republic could not prevent many judges initially from continuing their work despite their burdens from the Nazi era and from showing only a neutral, if not negative, relationship with the constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany.

A judge organization corresponding to the Republican Judges' Association did not come into being in the Federal Republic of Germany. The German Association of Judges, which initially joined the Association of National Socialist German Jurists on a corporate basis and dissolved at the end of 1933, was re-established in 1949. It was not until late that he dealt with his behavior in the Weimar Republic and the behavior of its members during the Nazi dictatorship. A specialist group for judges and public prosecutors was formed in the ÖTV trade union , which was founded in 1949 and is now part of the judiciary group of the Verdi union . In connection with the peace movement in the Federal Republic of Germany and the resulting initiative “Judges and Public Prosecutors for Peace”, the conservative self-image of the German Judges Association and the lack of treatment of current professional and legal issues by the then trade union ÖTV, the New judges' association that wants to be a professional association and sees itself as the successor to the Republican Association of Judges.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Vorwärts , Issue A of December 30, 1921, quoted in according to Schulz, The Republican Association of Judges (1921–1933) , 1982, p. 18 f.
  2. ↑ Self-presentation of the Republican Association of Judges to the Prussian Minister of Justice from March 1924, quoted in according to Schulz, The Republican Association of Judges (1921–1933) , 1982, p. 20
  3. ↑ Deutsche Richterzeitung , 1922, issue 34
  4. ↑ Otto Landsberg: The Rothardt Trial , Die Justiz , Vol. I, p. 124 ff.
  5. ↑ Working guidelines of the Republican Association of Judges , Die Justiz , Vol. III, p. 490 f.
  6. ↑ Schulz, The Republican Association of Judges (1921–1933) , 1982, p. 118
  7. ↑ Schulz, The Republican Association of Judges (1921–1933) , 1982, pp. 77 ff .; Peter Weber: Republican judges in a lost position - "traitor" Friedrich Ebert ( Memento of the original from September 24, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , on the website of the Forum Justizgeschichte e. V. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.forumjustizgeschichte.de
  8. ^ Friedrich-Karl Kaul: History of the Reichsgericht , Vol. IV, p. 273
  9. ^ Heinrich Hannover and Elisabeth Hannover-Drück: Political Justice 1918-1993. Bornheim-Merten 1987, p. 15
  10. ↑ Schulz, The Republican Association of Judges (1921–1933) , 1982, p. 173
  11. ↑ Schulz, The Republican Association of Judges (1921–1933) , 1982, p. 181