'...To restore a national professional civil service and to simplify administration, civil servants may be dismissed from office in accordance with the following regulations, even where there would be no grounds for such actions under prevailing law. Paragraph 2: civil servants who have entered the service since November 9, 1918 without possessing the required or customary educational background or educational qualifications... Paragraph 3: 1) Civil servants who are not of Adecent are to be retired.... If they are honorary officials, they are to be dismissed from their official status.' (Documents on the Holocaust 39-40)
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Much of the country was favourably disposed to the Nazi demand to dismiss Jews from public service and from positions of economic power, provided that this was accomplished by means of legislation. At first, at the insistence of President Hindenburg, the law still protected those Jewish civil servants who had held their posts since the time of the Kaiser, had fought in the World War, or lost relatives at the front.
Exemptions for Jewish War Veterans
Hindenburg to Hitler April 4, 1933:
'Dear Mr. Chancellor, Recently a whole series of cases has been reported to me in which judges, lawyers, and officials of the judiciary who are disabled war veterans and whose record in office is flawless, have been forcibly sent on leave, and are later to be dismissed for the sole reason that they are of Jewish decent. It is quite intolerable for me personally...that Jewish officials who were disabled in the war should suffer such treatment …I am certain, Mr. Chancellor, that you share this human feeling, and request you, most cordially and urgently, to look into this matter yourself, and to see to it that there is some uniform arrangement for all branches of the public service in Germany...'
Hitler' Answer Hitler's answer, April 5, 1933:
'Dear Mr. President! …I pointed out to the Reich Minster of the Interior the cases for which you, Mr. Field Marshal, wished to see exceptions made. The law in question received preliminary discussion at several meetings last week and will provide considerations for those Jews who either served in the war themselves, were disabled in the war, have other merits, or never gave occasion for complaint in the course of a long period of service. In general, the primary aim of this cleansing process is only to restore a certain sound and natural balance, and, secondly, to remove from official positions of national significance those elements to which one cannot entrust [the choice between] Germany's survival or destruction...' (Documents on the Holocaust 37-39).
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A Wave of Anti-Jewish Legislation
The Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service was followed by a series of laws and regulations meant to banish Jews from various areas of life in Germany. These effectively undermined the position of physicians, tax advisors, journalists, students, etc. Most of these laws incorporated the same exemptions applied to the Law for Restoration of the Professional Civil Service. But even if some Jews were still protected during the first years, Nazi leaders were encouraged that, as Achim Gercke, specialist for race research at the Ministry of Interior put it, ...the entire national community becomes enlightened about the Jewish question; it learns that the national community is a community of blood; for the first time it understands racial thinking and, instead of an overly theoretical approach to the Jewish question, it is confronted with a concrete solution'.
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Legal Restrictions 1933
7 April, Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service. 7 April, Law Excluding Jewish Lawyers from the Bar. 21 April, Law Prohibiting Jewish Ritual Slaughtering. 22 April, Decree barring all 'non-Aryan' doctors from work at state supported health insurance clinics and hospitals. 25 April, Law Against the Overcrowding of German Schools ΓÇö limiting the matriculation of new Jewish students in German high schools and universities to 1.5% of applicants. The total of Jewish students in any school should not exceed 5%. May 6, Regulation revoking Jewish Tax Accountants' licenses 14 July Denaturalisation Law - cancelling all naturalisations between November 9, 1918 and January 30, 1933, affected mostly Eastern European Jews who had immigrated to Germany. 22 September, Reich Chamber of Culture Law - making any professional activity in literature, the arts, press, theatre and music dependent on membership in a corresponding chamber. This membership was denied to Jews. 4 October, National Press Law - barring Jews from being editors of German newspapers and publications
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A Local Perspective
In May 1933, the mayor of Frankfurt asked his education department to consider the possibility of expelling Jewish pupils from public schools and gathering them in a special school. The Education and Finance Departments opposed the proposal for economic reasons. They argued that since the Compulsory Education Law applied to Jews just as it did to anyone else, the municipality would have to bear the entire economic burden of building such a school.
The Opinion of the City Finance Department
From a letter by the Finance Department to the Mayor of Frankfurt, 30 June 1933:
…In the existing legal situation of compulsory education, the least expensive solution in the matter of the school for Jewish children is to continue giving municipal financial support to the Jewish community.... The only way to absolve the municipality from [liability for] the education expenses of Jewish children is to amend the law in order to make the Jewish community bear this expense.... We are unable to state whether such a solution is feasible…' (Dokumente zur Geschichte Frankfurter Juden 106)
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The Undermining of Jewish Professional Life
The process of banning the Jews coincided with the Nazification of trade unions and many other aspects of German lifeΓÇöthe universities, the judiciary and the bar, the press, and cultural life. The general atmosphere caused growing numbers of Germans to terminate professional relations with Jews, thus causing the Jews' professional activity to diminish even when their jobs were still protected.
Button: From the diaries of Viktor Klemperer, Jewish professor in Dresden:
'7 April 1933. No one dares write a letter. One dares not speak on the phone. We visit one another and weigh the options. The expert at the ministry said this someone else said something else. This could be of an advantage. But one does not know if the person with the favourable opinion will remaining charge, to what extent he is in charge, etc., etc. On May 2, at the first lecture, it will become clear whether I can keep my position… 10 April 1933. The terrible atmosphere of 'hurra, I'm alive'. The new civil servants' 'law' leaves me as a former soldier of the front in my job. But all around insults and provocations, misery, trembling with fear... 27 April 1933. Yesterday I ended my lecture term as I had opened it: that is I waited in vain for students who had again been prevented from coming. This term I have given my classes to one or two students. The same goes for my seminars... And what about the future? I am waiting like a junior employee to know whether I will be laid off on October 1. But maybe until that time others will be fired… Klemperer was dismissed by the university in 1935'. (Klemperer 1933)
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1934 ΓÇô A Pause in Anti-Jewish Measures
Having resolved its initial problems by channeling the Antisemitism of its followers into the boycott and exclusionary legislation, in 1934 the Government instituted almost no new legal measures. Hans Frank at the Party rally in 1933: 'The firm decision of the Reich authorities is that there should be a certain pause now in the continued confrontation with the Jews. The Reich authorities further desire to state - in particular as far as the world is concerned - that Jews living in Germany within the framework of German law may carry out their occupations without hindrance...[and that] a certain agreement has now been achieved in the area of dispute with the Jews...that the security and life of the Jews in Germany is in no danger.' (Documents on the Holocaust p. 44)
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Propaganda Campaign and Social Exclusion
The authorities launched an intensive propaganda campaign, using all available media to instil racist Antisemitism as a social and political norm throughout the general population. The authorities hoped to use the Jewish question, portrayed as the root of all Germany's problems, to rally mass support and forge national unity. Even if all Germans did wholeheartedly embrace Nazi Antisemitism, the propaganda campaign reinforced existing anti-Jewish sentiment. The propaganda, coupled with a climate of terror, caused most Germans to shun Jews and break off professional and social relations. Either for fear of punishment and persecution, indifference or latent Antisemitic sentiments, the propaganda campaign legitimated the exclusion of more and more Jews from German social life.
One Should Not Grumble, Ulrich Karstedt, German professor of ancient history, Goettingen, January 1934 :
One should not grumble...because in a Jewish shop a window pane has been smashed or because the daughter of the cattle dealer Levi was refused admission to a student society.' (Friedlaender 52.)
No Great Misfortune, Anti-Nazi German writer Thomas Mann, regarding the Civil Service Law:
It is no great misfortune after all that...the Jewish presence in the judiciary has been ended.... I could to some extent go along with the rebellion against the Jewish element.' (Bankier 69.)
A Void Had Been Generated Around You, Hanna Arendt, Jewish philosopher:
The wave of unification [was] created voluntarily, and in any case not under the duress of terror.... The personal problem was not what our enemies were doing but what our friends were doing.... It was as though a void had been generated around you...' (Reif 21.)
Ja, If Only All Of Them Were Like You, From the testimony of Joseph B. Levy, Jewish teacher from Frankfurt/Main:
Contact with 'Aryans,' including exchanges of greetings in encounters in the street and public places, diminished steadily. Even former acquaintances and good friends, professional colleagues, and wartime buddies, were deterred from conversing [with us], greeting us furtively and often explaining their behaviour as stemming from fear of persecution or other unpleasantness. Here is one of many examples: An old woman who I almost failed to identify at first glance greeted me in the street from a distance and seemed pleased to see me. She was a work colleague from one of the government schools that I had attended decades back. We approached each other. However, after we exchanged a few words my eyes settled on the party emblem affixed to her dress. Noticing my gaze, she abruptly turned pale and, without saying another word, spun about and walked away. It had suddenly dawned on her that she, a respectable Party member, was standing and talking with a Jew, thereby risking dismissal from the Party. We, of course, were among the few decent Jews. We were given this dubious compliment almost every day in the following words: 'Ja, if only all of them were like you....' (Yad Vashem Archive 0.33/975)
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Party Agitation to Isolate Jews
The party agitated not only against Jews but against Germans who continued to frequent Jewish establishments or consort with Jews in public.
Party Members Must Stop Consorting With Jews. In his directives to all regional party officials (Kreisleiter) on July 7, 1933, the Party chief of propaganda (Gaupropagandaleiter der NSDAP) in the Koblenz Trier district called for a struggle against the Jews:
...The regional administration shall appoint a committee to manage and oversee all localities in the region.... The committee shall establish local committees, the names of whose members shall be known only to the regional committee. The members of the local committees shall forward to the regional committee the names of all Party members and other Germans – especially civil servants - who buy from Jews. … For reason of national interest, Party members must stop consorting even with their best friends if these people continue to buy from Jews. It should be stressed that the goal is that no German will speak with a Jew except where this is unavoidable. For the time being, German girls who continue to consort with Jews should be warned of the danger of their behaviour. In any case, members of our organisation must have no relationship with such a girl.' (Mommsen & Willems 83-90.)
Dachau for Women Traitors. A manifesto in the Wuerzburder Generalanzeiger from the Gaubetriebszelle NSDAP, October 5, 1933:
Women who buy from Jews, overtly or covertly, should be denounced as lackeys of the Jews.... It would be worth opening a department in Dachau for women traitors, and this will be done.... Germans, remember these women, who have nothing in common with the German people. The day will comeΓÇöit is not so far offΓÇöwhen these people, too, will have to pay for their actions.' (Juedische Rundschau 6 May 1933)
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Jews Withdraw from Asscociations
The Jews were forcibly dismissed from jobs, associations, and unions. However, the anti-Jewish climate also induced them to withdraw from non-Jewish German associations of their own free will.
A Local Perspective Report by the City of Frankfurt regarding the decline in membership in cultural associations resulting from the withdrawal of Jewish members, February 16, 1934:
'1) Because of the Jews' refraining from visits to the theatre, there has been a decline of 550 memberships in the year 1933. Based on 50 Marks per member, the total is a loss of 30,000 Marks for the year. The assessment of the loss in ticket sales for individual shows is around 100,000 Marks. The Association of Friends of the City Theatres', which was 90% Jewish, has dissolved... 2) The Museum Association lost 40% of its income from memberships and ticket sales in the winter of 1933/4. The decline is due primarily to the fact that Jewish circles refrain from visiting the museums. 3) In the year 1933, 270 Jewish and 50 non-Jewish members withdrew from the Frankfurt Association of the Arts...The number of members is at present 600. About 50% of the members resigned in 1933.' (Dokumente zur Geschichte Frankfurter Juden 86-7)
