The Nuremberg race laws

The State, Columbia SC – Special supplement from the Columbia Holocaust Education Commission

By Leah Greenberg Davis

–

Nuremberg. For most, the word conjures up memories of a post war world. Seldom associated with Nuremberg are the hundreds of laws that were passed that laid the groundwork for Hitler’s systematic destruction of the European Jews. Hitler’s persecution and dismantling of the Jewish people did not happen over night. Between 1933 and 1939, over 400 laws were passed that impacted German Jews.

After the Germans were defeated in World War One, Hitler played into a general feeling of inadequacy among the German public. Germans were eager to see a strong Germany rise again. Hitler was obsessed with the idea of a pure “Aryan” race. In his book Mein Kempf, which translates to My Struggle in German, Hitler wrote that the “state must set race in the center of all life. It must take care to keep it pure.”[2] Hitler used the Jews as a scapegoat, arguing that Germany needed to rid their society of any people that weren’t “pure.”

Under Hitler’s regime, “racial sciences” became an academic subject. A twenty-five year old doctoral student wrote these horrifying words as part of his “studies” in 1936: “Only a racially valuable person has a right to exist in the community. A racially inferior or harmful individual must be eliminated.”[3]

Hitler was appointed Reich Chancellor on January 30, 1933 and by April, he had already begun to implement laws removing Jews from various aspects of society.

While the Nuremberg laws were not the first laws passed isolating the Jews, they significantly codified Hitler’s distorted racial theories embodied in Mein Kempf. Moreover, as opposed to many of Hitler’s edicts, these laws were passed by the German legislature, the Reichstag.[4]

In 1935, the Nazi party elite held their annual meeting in Nuremberg, which was ironically titled the “Congress of Freedom.”[5] On September 15, two laws were passed that forever changed the course of Jewish history in Europe.[6] The first was called the Reich Citizenship Law. This law provided, inter alia, that “a Reich citizen is a subject of the state who is of German or related blood, and proves by his conduct that he is willing and fit to faithfully serve the German people and the Reich.”[7] Moreover, a “Reich citizen is the sole bearer of full political rights in accordance with the law.”[8]

The second law was called the “Law for Protection of German Blood and German Honor of September 15, 1935.”[9] This law was “[m]oved by the understanding that purity of German blood is the essential condition for the continued existence of the German people. . . .”[10] It prohibited marriages between Jews and German citizens, as well as “extra marital relations” between Jews and Germans.[11] It also excluded women under the age of 45 from working in Jewish households and provided that Jews could not “fly the Reich or national flag or display Reich colors.”[12]

The question of who exactly was Jewish remained open. What if someone had converted from Judaism to another religion? Using the Reich Citizenship Law as legal justification, Hitler instituted the “First Regulation to the Reich Citizenship Law of November 14, 1935.”[13] A “full” Jew was someone who had three Jewish grandparents “who were full Jews by race.”[14] The law also defined people as partly Jewish or “mischlings” if they had two Jewish grandparents and met several other conditions. Those who had one Jewish grandparent were ultimately considered Jewish and denied German citizenship.[15] Even those who had converted to Christianity were considered “racially” Jewish under the Nuremberg laws.[16]

German Jews in 1933 never would have envisioned that they would be excommunicated from society and ultimately mass murdered. They were an integral part of Germany – they were doctors, musicians, lawyers, writers, shopkeepers and friends. These laws created the foundation for Hitler’s ability to turn an entire country against the Jewish people.

[1] Holocaust Encyclopedia: Antisemitic Legislation 1933-1939. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 20 June 2014. Web. 29 December 2014.

[2] Berenbaum, Michael. The World Must Know. Washington, D.C.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006. Print. p. 27.

[3] Gilbert, Martin. The Holocaust: A History of the Jews of Europe During the Second World War. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. 1985. Print. p. 50.

[4] Yahil, Leni. The Holocaust: The Fate of European Jewry. New York: Oxford University Press. 1990. Print. p. 68.

[5] Id.

[6] Holocaust Encyclopedia: Translation: Nuremberg Race Laws. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 20 June 2014. Web. 30 December 2014.

[7] Id.

[8] Id.

[9] Id.

[10] Id.

[11] Id.

[12] Id.

[13] Yahil at 72.

[14] Id. at 72-73.

[15] Berenbaum at 30.

[16] Id.