"Non-Germans" Under the Third Reich (271 page)

56.
Thus, the attorney general at the Kraków Special Court, who had reported to the Central Department of Justice at the office of the governor general on the treason cases pending there, received a strong reprimand from the Justice Department of the Kraków district for not having gone through the official channels (secret communication from the Justice Department [Kraków district] to the Central Department of Justice, dated June 13, 1942, ZS, Poland 342, 1036).

57.
The following were under the obligation to report in the district: the presiding judges of the German courts, the presidents of the special courts, the heads of the Polish courts, the director of the patent office in Warsaw, and the head of the chamber of notaries and lawyers (progress report of the Justice Department at the Office of the District Governor of Warsaw, dated August 8, 1940, Archives of the Main Commission Warsaw, Regierung des GG/Hauptabteilung Justiz V 87). Beginning in March 1941, the progress reports by the courts were supplemented by monthly so-called business reports by the heads of the public prosecutors’ offices, special courts, and German courts, which contained brief summaries of business that had come in and had been dealt with, and which were to be submitted by the Justice Department to the Central Department of Justice (directives of the Central Department of Justice dated March 4, 1941 [ibid., V/6], and of February 28, 1944 [ibid., V/126, Bl. 7]).

58.
Under the terms of the circular of November 21, 1941, from the Central Department of Justice, the public prosecutors’ offices were to report directly to the Central Department of Justice at the office of the governor general, with a copy to the Justice Department of the district concerned. Instructions and directives concerning penal matters went directly to the public prosecutors (ibid., V/6). In matters concerning pardons, the public prosecutors’ offices were to submit their proposals as before to the Justice Department of the district, but they were directed by the Central Department of Justice to file a report immediately in addition. Reports to the Central Department of Justice on death sentences were to be sent to the Justice Department of the district as before (circular dated February 8, 1940, from the Central Department of Justice, quoted in the circular of February 1, 1944, ibid., V/126). Regarding reports on so-called ghetto affairs, that is criminal proceedings against Jews condemned to death for leaving the ghetto, a special regulation came into force in March 1942: whereas hitherto regular reports had been filed in such matters, the public prosecutors were instructed to report only in cases in which the governor general was required to make a decision on a pardon (directives of the Central Department of Justice, January 2, March 30, 1942, ZS, Poland, Film 64, 158).

Part Two. Section 3. B. Criminal Law as the Principal Tool of Discriminatory Law (Special Law) against “Non-Germans”

1.
Klein, “Zur Stellung des GG” (1941); Giese, “Die gegenwärtige Staatsangehörigkeit.”

2.
See part 1, section 3, introduction.

3.
Circular dated September 8, 1941, from the Central Department of Justice (Archives of the Main Commission Warsaw, Regierung des GG [Hauptabteilung Justiz V/6]).

4.
Cf. sec. 7, par. 2, Decree of June 6, 1940, on the Introduction of the German Penal Code in the Annexed Eastern Territories (
RGBl.
I 844); clause 1, pars. 1, 3; clauses 2, 12, Decree on Penal Law for Poles of December 4, 1941 (
RGBl.
I 759); secs. 4, 5, Decree on the Judiciary in the Eastern Territories of September 25, 1941 (
RGBl.
I, 597).

5.
VBl.GG
1939, 4.

6.
Decree of November 30, 1941, on the Rights of Persons of German Descent in the General Government (
VBl.GG
1942, 739 f.).

7.
Sec. 2, par. 2, of the Decree of October 26, 1939, on the Development of the Judiciary in the General Government (
VBl.GG
1939, 4; also published in
Doc. Occ.
6:102 ff.).

8.
Sec. 2 of the Decree on Special Courts of November 15, 1939 (
VBl.GG
1939, 34), in conjunction with sec. 7, par. 2, of the Decree on German Jurisdiction of February 19, 1940 (
VBl.GG
1940 I, 57).

9.
Sec. 1, par. 2, of the Decree on Polish Jurisdiction in the General Government of February 19, 1940 (
VBl.GG
1940 I, 64).

10.
Statements by the head of the Justice Department at the office of the governor general (K. Wille, “Diensttagebuch,” 1940, I, 93, BA R 52 II/175).

11.
The Wehrmacht courts, though, being directed centrally from Berlin, were instructed to apply the section on substantive law of the Decree on Penal Law for Poles. For full details, see the situation report of May 27, 1942, by the chief public prosecutor, Posen (Pozna
), according to which the appropriate instruction was issued on the basis of a decision of the Reich Court-Martial with the agreement of the Reich Ministry of Justice and the Armed Forces High Command (BA R 22/850).

12.
See Freisler, “Das deutsche Polenstrafrecht” (1942), 25 ff.

13.
VBl.GG
1939, 34 (sec. 3).

14.
VBl.GG
1940 I, 57 (secs. 7 and 8); see also note 7 above.

15.
Statements made at the occasion of the introduction of German jurisdiction in the General Government (“Diensttagebuch,” 1940, II, April 9, 1940, 279; reproduced in
Doc. Occ.
6: 108 n. 15).

16.
Circular dated March 28, 1944, from the Central Department of Justice (Archives of the Main Commission Warsaw, Regierung des GG/Hauptabteilung Justiz V/126, Bl. 8).

17.
Implementing Regulation of May 31, 1941, to the Blood Protection Law (
RGBl.
I 297). Under the terms of the decree, that law was to be applied in racial offenses by German nationals, assimilated nationals, and Jews. According to a note in the “Diensttagebuch” of February 19, 1940, I, 84 ff., the courts were instructed to call for the decision of the governor general in all cases of “racial defilement,” by analogy to the Reich regulations, under which the approval of the Reich minister of justice and the Reich minister of the interior was required before sentences against Germans could be implemented. According to a circular dated September 8, 1941, from the Central Department of Justice to the district justice departments, however, only the male German (not the Jewish) party was liable to punishment (the reason probably being the relatively large proportion of Jews in the General Government, although sec. 5, par. 2, of the Blood Protection Law held the male party to be punishable without distinction [circular of March 28, 1944 (see note 16 above), V/6]). See the report of June 1943 by the commander of the Security Police, Lemberg (L’viv), to the Reich Security Main Office—III (the number of racial defilement cases was “remarkably high”) (ZS, Ordner 36, Bl. 49 ff.).

18.
Decree of March 20, 1942, on Protection against Major Criminals and Habitual Offenders (
VBl.GG
1942, 143) (preventive detention or death penalty for major habitual offenders).

19.
VBl.GG
1941, 595 (reproduced in
Doc. Occ.
6:542), and circular dated July 18, 1943, from the Central Department of Justice (ZS, Poland 342, 204 f.).

20.
Regarding the term
unauthorized leaving
of the ghetto, see the circular of May 9, 1942 (ZS, Poland 342, 880 ff., and Poland Film 64, 166). More on the persecution of those who helped escaped Jews will be found in Bartoszewski and Lewin,
Righteous among Nations
(1969); Szymon Datner, “Niektóre dane o zbrodni Hitlerowskich na Polakach ratuj
cych
ydów” (Some notes on the persecution by the Nazis of Poles who helped the Jews),
Bulletin der Hauptkommission Warschau
16 (1967): 158 ff.

21.
Cf. circular of July 18, 1943, Central Department of Justice (ZS, Poland 342, 204 f.).

22.
See part 2, section 3, A (“The Function and Structure of the German Judiciary”), note 26.

23.
This was true for the Galicia district, where Poles and Ukrainians lived in close proximity and the judiciary found itself in difficulties on account of the frequent lack of subjective evidence (report of October 7, 1943, by the higher SS and police leader in the General Government, Institute for Western Studies, Pozna
, doc. 1–7, excerpts in
Doc. Occ.
6:452); see also the following note.

24.
For example, at the cabinet meeting of March 11, 1942, the governor of the Radom district, Kundt, stated that the public prosecutor’s office had for too long neglected to apply the decree on unauthorized departure from the ghetto in the special court at Petrikau (Piotrków Trybunalski) and that therefore no deterrent existed for the Jews emigrating from the Warsaw district. That had now changed (“Diensttagebuch,” 1942, BA R 52 II/242).

25.
As stated by the head of the office of the district governor of Warsaw, Dr. Hummel, at the cabinet meeting of December 16, 1941; only death sentences had been pronounced in Warsaw; a further six hundred demands for judgment (from the public prosecutor’s office?) were pending. For the reasons named, it was impossible to close the ghetto by judicial means. The procedures needed to be “simplified”—for example by using court-martial procedures (“Diensttagebuch,” 1941, II/2, BA R 52 II/241).

26.
Letter dated February 20, 1942, from the head of the Warsaw district (office chief: Dr. Hummel) to the General Government Legislative Office (ZS, Verschiedenes 69, Bl. 312).

27.
See “Die Arbeit der Sondergerichte in der Kriegszeit” (a summary report on the meeting of the special-court presidents and experts on special-court questions to the chief public prosecutors, held in the Reich Ministry of Justice on October 24, 1939) (BA R 22/4158, also Archives of the Main Commission Warsaw; paper by
Ministerialrat
Rietzsch, Reich Ministry of Justice, Bl. 8).

28.
Details from
Die Ostgebiete des Deutschen Reiches und des Generalgouvernements
(Berlin-Dahlem, 1940) (ZS, Bl. 9).