Walther Merk

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Walther Merk (born October 12, 1883 in Meersburg ; † February 6, 1937 in Freiburg im Breisgau ) was a German lawyer and university professor.

Academic career

During his studies, Merk became a member of the Association of German Students in Freiburg . After studying law in Freiburg, Berlin and Heidelberg, he received his doctorate in Freiburg in 1913. Two years later he completed his habilitation, also in Freiburg, in German law, civil law and administrative law. In 1919 Merk first became an associate professor in Strasbourg (1918) and Freiburg (1919), and finally in the same year a full professor in Rostock. In 1920 he moved to Marburg as a full professor of civil law, where he was rector from October 1932 to November 1933. In 1936, a year before his death, he returned to Freiburg as a full professor.

Political activity

Merk already joined various right-wing organizations during the German Empire. He was u. a. Member of the Pan-German Association and the German Eastern Brand Association. From 1919 to 1933 he was a member of the German National People's Party (DNVP). In 1917 he was accepted into the Association of German-Völkischer Jurists. Merk became a member of the Association of National Socialist Jurists and a supporting member of the SS in 1933 , but did not join the NSDAP. In November 1933 he was one of the signatories of the professors' commitment at German universities and colleges to Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist state .

At times, Merk represented extremely völkisch positions. Michael Stolleis writes in relation to the position taken by Walther Merk (and Hans Gerber) before Hitler was appointed Chancellor: "Others [...] designed future images [...] of a Germanic leader state with popular law and powerful leadership". In his lecture on Race and Law at the Juristentag 1933, the National Socialist Helmut Nicolai called Merks Vom Werden und Wesen der Deutschen Rechts an "excellent writing" and already referred to Merk's writings in his legal doctrine of racial law .

In the GDR , Merk's writings, The Property in Transition of Times (Beyer, Langensalza 1934) and Vom Werden und Wesen des Deutschen Rechts (3rd edition, Beyer, Langensalza 1935) were placed on the list of literature to be sorted out.

Fonts

  • On the becoming and essence of German law , Beyer: Langensalza, 1st edition: 1925 (98 pages), 2nd edition: 1926 (104 pages); 3., rework. Edition: 1935 (114 pages).
  • The Germanic State , Beyer: Langensalza, 1927.
  • (as ed.), Festschrift, Alfred Schultze on his 70th birthday presented by students, colleagues and friends, Böhlau: Weimar, 1934.
  • The thought of the common best in the German state and legal development , Böhlau: Weimar, 1934. Reprint: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft: Darmstadt, 1968 (= separate print from the aforementioned Festschrift).
  • German renewal of law , in: Süddeutsche Monatshefte 31, 1934, 257–301.

literature

  • 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. 118.
  • Harald Kahlenberg:  Merk, Walther. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 17, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1994, ISBN 3-428-00198-2 , p. 141 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Harald Kahlenberg, life and work of the legal historian Walther Merk . An example of the relationship between legal history and National Socialism, Lang: Frankfurt am Main / Berlin / Bern / New York / Paris / Vienna, 1995; ISBN 3-631-47871-2 (also Diss. Uni. Munich, 1994).
  • Anne Chr. Nagel (ed.): The Philipps University of Marburg under National Socialism , Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart 2000, p. 15 ff.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Louis Lange (Ed.): Kyffhäuser Association of German Student Associations. Address book 1931. Berlin 1931, p. 146.
  2. ↑ See Harald Kahlenberg:  Merk, Walther. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 17, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1994, ISBN 3-428-00198-2 , p. 141 f. ( Digitized version ) .: “M. developed a lively journalistic activity for a 'Germanic-German legal renewal'. For this he stepped up, inspired by the political writings of G. v. Below , in mostly popular scientific essays that made his nationalistic attitude clear. This work reached a climax in 1933/34 after the National Socialist seizure of power. However, from 1935 onwards, M. turned back to his scientific research - noticeably disillusioned. "
  3. ↑ Michael Stolleis, In the belly of the Leviathan - Staatsrechtslehre im Nationalsozialismus , in: ders., Recht im Unrecht . Studies on the legal history of National Socialism, Suhrkamp: Frankfurt am Main, 1st edition 1994; 2nd edition: 2006, 126 - 146 (132, 133).
  4. ^ Helmut Nicolai, Race and Law . Lecture given at the German Jurists Day of the Association of National Socialist German Jurists on October 2 in Leipzig (People / Law / Economy in the Third Reich [series without volume numbering]), Hobbing: Berlin, 1933, 10.
  5. ^ Helmut Nicolai, The legal theory of races . Basic features of a National Socialist legal philosophy [National Socialist Library ed. v. Gottfried Feder H. 39], Rather: Munich, 1932, 4.
  6. ↑ http://www.polunbi.de/bibliothek/1953-nslit-m.html

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Merk, Walther
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German lawyer and university professor
DATE OF BIRTH October 12, 1883
PLACE OF BIRTH Meersburg
DATE OF DEATH February 6, 1937
Place of death Freiburg in Breisgau