Rudolf Smend (lawyer)

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Carl Friedrich Rudolf Smend (* 15. January 1882 in Basel , † 5. July 1975 in Goettingen ) was a German state and canon lawyer .

Life

The son of theology professor Rudolf Smend began studies at the universities of Basel , Berlin , Bonn and Göttingen in 1900 , which he completed in 1904 in Göttingen with the award-winning dissertation on the relationship between the Prussian constitutional charter of 1850 and the Belgian one. With a thesis on the Reich Chamber of Commerce , he completed his habilitation in 1908 under Albert Hänel at the Christian Albrechts University in Kiel .

Professor Rudolf Smend at the Berlin University at the celebration of the foundation of the Reich , January 1933

In 1909 Smend was appointed associate professor in Greifswald ; In 1911 he was appointed full professor in Tübingen . In 1915 he moved to Bonn, and in 1922 he was offered an appointment at the Friedrich Wilhelms University in Berlin. During this time Smend was a member of the anti-republic German National People's Party (DNVP). In contrast to other German Nationals, however, he kept his distance from the emerging National Socialism. Under pressure from the Reich Ministry of Education , which wanted to vacate his Berlin chair for the appointment of SS lawyer Reinhard Höhn , Smend had to accept an offer at the University of Göttingen in 1935. He stayed in Göttingen until the end of his life.

After the war, Smend was the first post-war rector of the University of Göttingen and contributed significantly to the rapid resumption of teaching and research. As a representative of university theology, he signed the Stuttgart confession of guilt in October 1945 . From 1944 to 1949 he held the office of President of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen . At his suggestion, the Canon Law Institute of the Evangelical Church in Germany was founded in Göttingen in 1946 , the first director of which was Smend. After his retirement (1951) he continued his seminar on canon law until 1965; state and constitutional theory even until 1969. In 1970 he was succeeded as head of the canon law institute by Axel Freiherr von Campenhausen , who was succeeded in 2008 by Hans Michael Heinig .

Smend were awarded four honorary doctorates; two commemorative publications were offered to him. In 1951 he co-founded the “ Journal for Protestant Church Law ” and was one of the editors in 1948 when the “ Archives of Public Law ” were resumed . From 1946 to 1955 Rudolf Smend was a member of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany .

Scientific work

After his initial writings on constitutional and legal history, Rudolf Smend's academic work was later devoted exclusively to the two great subjects of state and church. Before 1945, the focus was on constitutional law. Only later did he also increasingly turn to canon law . The work “Constitution and Constitutional Law” (1928) is regarded as his main work. Basically he worked out his integration theory in particular . His aim was to develop a theory of the state that should not be drawn on the basis of normative deduction , but sociological and humanistic knowledge. He based this on a social doctrine that understands the state as a spiritual reality that is built up from the interaction of individual life processes. He was also concerned with revising the basic concepts of constitutional law and emphasizing the dynamic, dialectical character of the life process of the state. The constitution is seen in Smend's theory of integration in its function for the unity of the state. The state organs and powers are not understood as substances of a dormant nature, but as moving forces.

Smend has dealt with emotional sources of domination, for example with the meaning and effect of flags , national anthems , coats of arms , language images or historical references. It is they who can integrate across social, religious or ideological boundaries. He hardly believed that legislation and jurisprudence would have such an integrating effect. They are something for experts, but in large sections of the population they have no binding effect. In Smend's engagement with state ceremonies, symbols and rituals, his Christian-Evangelical background is recognizable; it is influenced by the Christian community of experience, which creates identity through certain images, actions and formulas.

As avowed supporters of the Smend School, u. a. Ulrich Scheuner , Horst Ehmke , Konrad Hesse and Peter Häberle name. In the field of political science , Wilhelm Hennis is one of them. According to his students, the continuing fruitfulness of integration theory is based on the fact that it overcomes legal positivism and the dissolution of norms and reality and thus opens up new fields of work.

Smend's theses are criticized in particular from the positivist side with regard to the blurring of the terms, the connection of the legal terms with substantive values ​​and standards. The doctrine of integration is criticized as a model of radical political immanence thinking, insofar as it puts the own value law of the state integration process in the foreground. Integration theory also underestimates the intrinsic importance of law. If it is viewed as a theory of the state, it is criticized as ambiguous and fragmentary.

With the theory of integration, Smend represented the scientific antithesis to the decisionist theory of Carl Schmitt , which he represented in his standard work " Verfassungslehre ", also published in 1928 . The schools that developed from these contradicting approaches to thought and research continued to make their mark in the Federal Republican constitutional law debate until the 1970s and, with some cuts, are even noticeable today.

The scientific estate of Rudolf Smend is kept in the Lower Saxony State and University Library in Göttingen .

Awards

Fonts

  • The Reich Chamber of Commerce. History and constitution. Böhlau, Weimar 1911; Reprint: Scientia, Aalen 1965.
  • Unwritten constitutional law in the monarchical federal state. In: Festgabe for Otto Mayer. For the 70th birthday offered by friends, admirers and students. Mohr, Tübingen 1916, pp. 247-270.
  • Constitution and Constitutional Law. Duncker & Humblot, Munich 1928.
  • Constitutional treatises. Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1955; 3rd edition 1994 (including bibliography).
  • "On the dangerous road of public law". Correspondence between Carl Schmitt and Rudolf Smend 1921–1961 , ed. v. Reinhard Mehring , Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2010.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Michael Grüttner u. a .: The Berlin University between the World Wars 1918-1945 , Berlin 2012 (= History of the University of Unter den Linden , vol. 2), p. 154.
  2. ↑ Anna-Maria Countess von Lösch: The naked spirit. The law faculty of the Berlin University in transition from 1933 , Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1999, p. 394 ff.
  3. ↑ See Jürgen Hartmann, Bernd Meyer: Introduction to the Political Theories of the Present . VS, Verl. Für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2005, ISBN 3-531-14909-1 , pp. 40–42.
  4. ^ Axel Freiherr von Campenhausen , Joachim E. Christoph: Collected writings . Mohr Siebeck Verlag , Tübingen 1995, p. 480 ( online in Google Book Search).

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Smend, Rudolf
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Smend, Carl Friedrich Rudolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German constitutional and canon lawyer
DATE OF BIRTH January 15, 1882
PLACE OF BIRTH Basel
DATE OF DEATH 5th July 1975
Place of death Goettingen