Reichsgesetzblatt, Berlin, 7 April 1933

Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service

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On 7 April 1933, a law was published in the Reich Law Gazette which had profound consequences for many public service employees and civil servants. Hardly more than two months after the Nazis came to power, the new government wanted to – as it put it – ‘restore the professional civil service’. Under this new regulation, civil servants defined as being of Jewish descent as well as those with ‘objectionable’ political views could simply be expelled from the civil service or forcibly retired. Lawyer Roland Freisler, a participant at the Wannsee conference, had just been appointed as Ministerial Director in the Ministry of Justice. There, he immediately began to put his colleagues of Jewish descent under enormous pressure. You can find out more about Roland Freisler later at one of the two dark grey pull-out panels.

The ‘Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service’ was one of the measures driving forwards a rapid and systematic restructuring of personnel in the civil service. This also marked the start of a policy of marginalising Jewish citizens from public life. Alongside this and other new laws, the National Socialists organised acts of terror to frighten and intimidate Germany’s Jewish communities. For example, as early as 1 April 1933, the Nazi Party called for a boycott of businesses and stores owned by Jews – and anyone refusing to follow the boycott was also pilloried and humiliated. The objective of this and other actions was to make life difficult for those people the Nazi categorised as Jews and so force them to emigrate.