Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews (12 page)

psychiatric labels—which together accounted for more than 95 per cent of all

cases—did not in themselves constitute precise diagnoses of illnesses. Instead

mental deficiency and schizophrenia were blanket terms for a wide variety of

behaviours that attracted attention or deviated from the norm. ‘Mental defi-

ciency’, for example, was established using an intelligence test that included

general knowledge, facts of the kind taught at school, questions on politics and

history, and general moral concepts. Criteria such as thrift, diligence, industri-

ousness, domestic cleanliness, educational success, ‘normal’ sexual habits, and the

like were decisive factors in determining hereditary illness. The supposed ‘diag-

nosis’ of such illnesses was in reality a social diagnosis in which the social ‘valency’

of an individual was determined in the context of a belief in ‘racial improvement’.

‘Racial hygiene’ was not based on anything approaching empirically verifiable

evidence about clearly defined inheritable conditions or characteristics; instead it

represented a long-term experiment, designed to run over several generations and

to eliminate certain ‘negative’ phenomena felt to be in contradiction to the Nazis’

racial ideals using methods for monitoring and controlling human reproduction

(‘racial enhancement via eradication’). There was a presupposition that illnesses

and characteristics can be inherited, which was to be turned into a proof of the

possibility of ‘racial enhancement’ as the results of these experiments became

available.

The victims of enforced sterilization came overwhelmingly from the socially

disadvantaged groups—pupils at remedial schools, those receiving welfare sup-

port, young people in children’s homes, people with criminal records, prostitutes,

criminals, persons of no fixed abode, families with an ‘irresponsibly large’ number

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Racial Persecution, 1933–1939

of children, or unskilled workers who were thought to demonstrate ‘mental

deficiency’ because they were used to carrying out simple repetitive tasks.
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There was a ‘racial hygiene’ component in the exclusion of certain groups from

eligibility for loans on marriage that had been legally established in July 1933.

Following a decree from the Minister of Finance, spouses who suffered from

‘hereditary mental or physical afflictions’ that demonstrated that ‘their marriage

was not in the interests of the community at large’ were, with Germans of Jewish

origin, ineligible to apply for such loans.
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The same applied from September 1935

to grants for child support.
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The logic of this ban was to prevent such ‘undesirable’ marriages altogether and was taken to its conclusion with the Marriage

Health Law of 18 October 1935.
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The castration of sex offenders sanctioned by the Law against Dangerous

Habitual Criminals passed on 24 November 1935 was also motivated by consid-

erations of ‘racial hygiene’ (and in June 1935 this law was extended to include

homosexuals, provided that the person concerned gave consent). It was not

introduced simply to protect the victims but was intended to prevent ‘degenerate

sexual drives’ from being passed on to future generations. On the basis of this law,

2,300 men were compulsorily castrated in the period between 1935 and 1943
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After enforced sterilization, the next step in the logic of racial hygiene was

termination of pregnancies, and this was realized in September 1934 when the

leader of the Reich doctors’ organization, Gerhard Wagner, included in a circular

letter Hitler’s decision to exempt from punishment abortions carried out to stop

babies with ‘hereditary illnesses’ being born.
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After much discussion an alteration was made to the Sterilization Law in June 1935 to the effect that women whose

sterilization had already been determined upon by the Hereditary Illnesses Tri-

bunal could, with their agreement, have current pregnancies terminated.
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At the same time, threats of action against those who aborted ‘healthy’, ‘Aryan’ children

were intensified, and prosecution of this crime was stepped up, which indicates an

overwhelmingly racial motivation in this area, too.

The Law for the Protection of the Genetic Health of the German People of

18 October 1935 finally made it necessary for couples who wished to marry to

obtain a ‘Certificate of Suitability for Marriage’ from the local Public Health

Department Office.
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It was originally intended to link this form of ‘genetic protection’ (Erbschutz) with ‘racial protection’ (Blutschutz) in a single law against

‘marriages inimical to the welfare of the people’, but on Hitler’s own initiative at

the 1935 Party Conference, these aspects were regulated separately. These ‘Certifi-

cates of Suitability for Marriage’ were not in fact introduced universally. They

were only required when the relevant official had ‘good reasons’ for doubting the

appropriateness of a proposed marriage.

The legal measures taken to promote racial hygiene affected one group, ‘social

misfits’ (Asozialen), in a particular way. These were groups on the margins of society

whose apparently ‘deficient’ genetic inheritance made the National Socialists feel that

Displacement from Public Life, 1933–4

49

they were ‘not in a position to fulfil the minimum requirements of the community

with respect to their personal, social, and national behaviour’.
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The sterilization experts were increasingly extending the concept of ‘mental deficiency’ to include the

‘social misfits’ such that, although repeated demands for a comprehensive Commu-

nity Aliens Law to enforce the sterilization of these groups were never officially met,

by the end of the 1930s this measure was being enforced in practice. The concept of

‘social misfit’ was vague, encompassing both prostitutes and their pimps, criminals,

persons of no fixed abode, beggars, ‘depraved’ families or families with too many

children, the work-shy, addicts, gamblers, those guilty of any form of perversion,

unmarried mothers, fathers who did not support their families financially, those in

long-term receipt of state support, Gypsies, and many others.
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In the first years of the ‘Third Reich’ the authorities directed their principal

attentions towards various measures for interning ‘social misfits’ who had

nowhere to live, and in doing so greatly increased the population of asylums. In

later years, many of these people were to fall victim to the policies of annihilation

as ‘unnecessary mouths to feed’. On the initiative of the Reich Propaganda

Ministry, September 1933 was to see the first ‘beggars’ week’, in which perhaps

as many as 100,000 beggars and persons of no fixed abode were arrested. There-

after many raids like that were carried out. Those arrested would be imprisoned

briefly and then sent to workhouses. Between 1934 and 1940 the courts made

nearly 8,000 such orders. A few beggars were also sent to concentration camps.
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Other official measures were taken to secure the internment of this group of

people. From 1934, special camps were designated by some districts for those

carrying out the work that was obligatory for those in receipt of welfare support.
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Those on welfare benefits were increasingly sent to special detention institutions,

and in 1934–5 local authorities began to set up their own dedicated ‘colonies’ for

the ‘social misfits’.
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In the early years, Gypsies were also subjected to increased discrimination and

persecution by the authorities, measures which can be interpreted as a radicaliza-

tion of traditional anti-Gypsy policies. Some states tightened up their regulations

on the rights of Gypsies, local authorities discriminated against Gypsies when

granting welfare or interpreted the administrative regulations in a restrictive

manner. Gypsies were frequently hauled in as part of the operations undertaken

against ‘social misfits’. From 1935 many municipalities, especially the larger cities,

began to accommodate Gypsies in dedicated camps, which were closely guarded

and strictly regulated.
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However, Gypsies were particularly affected by the new legal requirements

governing the control and management of reproduction and were disproportion-

ately the victims of enforced sterilization. Qualified estimates assess that some

2 per cent of all Sinti and Roma aged between 14 and 50 were detailed for

sterilization and that about 400 of the 450 people concerned were actually sub-

jected to enforced sterilization.

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Racial Persecution, 1933–1939

Gypsies were prevented from marrying those ‘of German blood’ both by the

Blood Protection Law and the Marriage Health Law. (The First Implementation

Order of the Blood Protection Law, 14 November 1935, made explicit provision for

extending the marriage ban to non-Jewish ‘members of alien races’, and soon

afterwards the Reich Ministry of the Interior confirmed that it was to be applied to

‘Gypsies, negroes, and their bastards’.
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) The racist paradigm thus affected the Gypsies in two different ways, as ‘alien races’ and as ‘inferiors’ to be excised from

the ‘Aryan’ race. With the implementation of enforced sterilization and marriage

bans on Gypsies the regime was beginning to depart from the traditional paths of

Gypsy persecution. The supposedly genetic reasons for ‘typically Gypsy’ behav-

iour were now being moved into the heart of Gypsy policy.

Enforced sterilization, exceptions to the regulations on abortion, and the

institution of marriage bans gave the National Socialist regime a whole battery

of weapons for the social discipline of individuals whose lives—at a more personal

level than political opposition—did not conform with National Socialist norms.

Those who were in any way inconvenient, conspicuous, non-conformist, or

potentially disruptive could be kept in check with the help of these three eugenicist

measures. It was precisely the fact that the criteria for making these interventions

were indistinct and indefinable that made them a potential threat for all those

whose private lives deviated from what was considered to be ‘normal’.

Aiming wider even than the control of marginal social groups, and working

alongside massive racial ‘hygiene’ propaganda,
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the eugenicist measures were designed to form one of the cornerstones of the National Socialist project to

establish a new order of values and authority in German society, one determined

by the hegemony of ‘race’. Sterilization, abortion for reasons of racial hygiene, and

bans on marriage represented not only a deep intrusion into people’s private lives

but were intended to abolish the very notion of a private sphere. Decisions about

who to live with, when to start a family, and parenthood were now subject to a

state veto.
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The eugenicist measures helped replace the principle of equality of citizenship with the principle of racial inequality, and did so in a manner that was

directly effective at an individual level. In essence there were no limits to the

continuing exclusion of citizens from reproduction. Experts juggled with numbers

of ‘inferior people’ that ran into millions.
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Using racial hygiene arguments it was theoretically possible to use a self-defining position of ‘normality’ as a basis for

declaring everything else, everything different, a ‘deviant biological development’

and thus open the way to its ‘eradication’. It was the very inconsistency and

irrationality of the concept of race, which was not scientifically definable, that left

it up to the National Socialist state to determine the content of its cherished racial

ideals. In reality, a form of ‘biologization’ subjugated society to the totalizing

claims of National Socialist policy.

Another group that should be investigated within the context of racist perse-

cution is homosexuals. Attacks on homosexuality by the NS regime were on the

Displacement from Public Life, 1933–4

51

one hand clearly consistent with the long tradition of persecuting homosexuals in

Germany, but on the other it is equally clear that such persecution in the ‘Third

Reich’ was radicalized and motivated in a new and distinct manner. The perse-

cution of homosexuals was rooted in population policy and formed a fixed

component of the plan for the racial ‘enhancement’ of German society.

Between the ‘seizure of power’ and the murder of Ernst Röhm, known to be

homosexual, and his followers on 30 June 1934, the NS regime did intensify police

measures against visible focal points of the homosexual sub-culture, but the

majority of homosexuals were left largely free of persecution.
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This situation changed when the SA leadership was eliminated and the systematic persecution of

homosexuals began. A special section was established in the Gestapo headquarters

and in the last months of 1934 large-scale raids on homosexuals were carried out.

In the summer of 1935 the relevant paragraph of the penal code (§175) was made

significantly more severe, in particular by the introduction of a penalty of impris-

onment of up to ten years for certain groups of offenders.
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