"Non-Germans" Under the Third Reich (41 page)

1. Identification Requirements

From 1934 on, Jews were not allowed to alter their names (circular of the Reich Ministry of the Interior of June 25, 1934).
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In mid-1938 special identity cards were issued to all Jews, obliging them to indicate their Jewish status to authorities or Party offices without being asked and to indicate the place and date of issue of the identity cards.
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These provisions obviously did not bring about the desired discrimination, because only a few weeks later, through a decree of August 17, 1938,
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compulsory marking by the use of special names was imposed on all Jews of German citizenship—after previous proposals of the Reich Chancellery and the Reich Ministry of the Interior had proved not to be sufficiently radical.

In the beginning, in preparation for “consciously racial legislation,” it was planned “only” to abolish all name changes since 1918 and to order the restoration of the former names, so as to distinguish more easily between Jews and non-Jews.
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The decree of August 1938 went much further, however, permitting Jews to choose only such names as were listed in the Directives on the Use of Names for Jews of August 18, 1938,
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published by the Reich Ministry of the Interior. From January 1, 1939, on, any male Jew who did not have one of these names was obliged to add Israel to his name, and every female Jew the name Sara. These names had to be registered within one month at the proper registrar’s office and the appropriate police station. A special designation was also required for the children of German citizens who were not Jews but of other “alien” descent (of “non-German nationhood”). Such persons were allowed to keep their (“alien”) names, even when a German form for the name existed.
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The beginnings of discrimination in legal and business communications are to be found in section 3 of the decree of August 17, 1938, according to which Jewish first names (either the original or the imposed one) had to be used in all relevant documents, insofar as it was usual to include names—including family names—in such documents. A further decree of October 1938 required that the passports of Jewish citizens be inscribed with a
J
so as to make the owner immediately recognizable as a Jew to all authorities.
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But in any case, passports were issued only in exceptional circumstances, in order to prevent Jews from fleeing.
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The use of distinguishing marks for Jews in public began with the exclusion of Jews from air-raid exercises from October 1938 on
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and from service in the voluntary fire brigade after 1939.
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Three years later, the obligation for Jews to wear a distinguishing mark in public was established by the Police Decree on the Appearance of Jews in Public of September 1, 1941, issued by the chief of the Security Police.
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Jews had to wear the Star of David not only on their everyday clothes but on their work clothes too:
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this order revived the practice of labeling Jews that dated from medieval times. Violations of the decree were punished by a fine of up to RM 500 or a month’s imprisonment. Jews married to a person of German blood were exempt from the obligation, very much against the will of the Party sections.
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This obligation to wear a distinguishing mark—allegedly “welcomed” by the population but more likely perceived with considerable embarrassment
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—was extended some months later (effective April 15, 1942) by an order that also all the homes of Jews were to display the Star of David in addition to the Jewish name.
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Air-raid precautions were taken for Aryans’ houses, but not for those owned by Jews, which were thus clearly recognizable.
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Specific days and hours were fixed during which Jews had to do their shopping, and no shopping was permitted outside these times.
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2. Restrictions on Freedom of Personal Movement

By the measures mentioned above, the Jews were marked as outlaws of society: now all that was lacking was to restrict their freedom of movement so as to prepare for their deportation and put them totally at the mercy of the police.

Until 1941 freedom of movement was more or less guaranteed formally to Jews of German citizenship, notwithstanding that certain restrictions already obtained, such as a ban on participation in all cultural activities; a de facto total prohibition by the Reich minister of the interior against staying at health resorts (after mid-1939);
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a ban on going out at night (from the fall of 1939);
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and a ban on driving a car (from the end of 1938), with the requirement to surrender all driving licenses,
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so that Jews were restricted to public transport. General restrictions on free movement did not yet exist in these years. It is true that the presidents of the administrative districts had been authorized by a police decree issued by the Reich authorities on November 28, 1938, to order restrictions of movement for Jews in their districts,
²⁴
but this power was exerted only in Berlin, where the “Jew ban” (
Judenbann
) was imposed for all public cultural and sports places as well as the most important streets and squares.
²⁵
But effective restrictions of free movement were the regular practice of the authorities, especially in the eastern parts of the Reich territory, where there was considerable pressure on housing on account of evacuation measures in other parts of the Reich. It was reported from Silesia, for example, that a whole Jewish quarter had been requisitioned by the authorities and had to be vacated by their Jewish tenants or owners under humiliating conditions in favor of Party or administration officials; the evicted Jews were put in camps on the outskirts of town or immediately deported eastward.
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In the eyes of the National Socialist authorities, such actions did not formally constitute a restriction of personal movement, since all Jewish tenants and owners were forced to sign a declaration that they had left town voluntarily.
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As for Jews of Polish nationality in the Reich territory, who numbered some seven thousand in 1933,
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special measures had already been taken in October 1938. These were the so-called Eastern Jews, whose expulsion had been the declared aim of the political leadership since 1933
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in accordance with the policy that anyone who endangered “the purity of the German race” was to be removed from Reich territory. This concept applied to all “alien” foreigners (based on the Law on Expulsions from the Reich) and especially immigrant Jews.
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The police decree on foreigners imposed a general ban on these Polish Jews and provided for their expulsion to Poland, as that country was preparing legislative measures to prevent their return.
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Those Jews who were not taken in or were expatriated by Poland were treated by the Reich authorities as stateless until they were finally accepted in Poland or another country.
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The basic rule for the restrictions effective since fall 1941 was the above-mentioned September 1, 1941, police decree by the chief of the Security Police,
³³
which in addition to the use of the compulsory identification marks imposed strict limits on residence. This decree is clearly indicative of the shift of power in favor of the Security Police over the regular police forces (
Ordnungspolizei
). For all questions relating to this decree, a circular from the Reich minister of the interior proclaimed that the regular police were no longer competent for matters having to do with foreign residents and that this authority was in the hands of the Security Police.
³⁴

The decree of September 1, 1941, rescinded in detail the freedom of movement for all Jews of German nationality and confined them to their local community, which they were permitted to leave only with the permission of the local police. The use of public transportation (except local) was in principle prohibited except by a special police permit,
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and such permits were to be “limited to the strictest minimum.”
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Initially the special permit included the use of waiting rooms, station restaurants, and other transport utilities,
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but it was repealed in July 1942 by a directive of the Reich minister of transport,
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so that Jews with travel permits had the right to board and alight from the vehicle but no right to wait. Under the Reich minister of the interior’s directives concerning the implementation of the decree of September 1, 1941,
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Jews with a travel permit were allowed to sit down in a public vehicle only if the seat was not claimed by a German passenger: the use of sleeping cars and dining cars was forbidden. Jews were not allowed to use public transport during rush hours.

The publication of the decree of September 1, 1941, was followed by a number of further restrictions on movement.
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On October 16, 1941, the Reich minister of the interior prohibited all Jews from using motor buses (interurban bus lines) run by the postal services.
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After spring 1942, new restrictions were issued on the pretext of passengers’ complaints that the inconveniences caused by the use of public transportation by Jews had become too great.

New restrictions came with the circular of March 24, 1942,
⁴²
issued by the Reich minister of the interior. This required a permit for all journeys within the community of residence, issued for a specific mode of transport and for one year only, to Jewish workers who lived at least an hour’s walk or seven kilometers away from their workplace, to Jewish schoolchildren if their distance from school was at least five kilometers or required them to walk at least an hour, and to Jewish “legal advisers” (lawyers), “medics” (doctors), and midwives; shortly afterward, this permission was restricted to Jewish workers and schoolchildren.
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Violations of these provisions were punished with “protective custody” (thus even the minor offense of riding in a street car or bus without permission could carry the penalty of deportation to an SS concentration camp). The timing of these restrictions was not accidental but was chosen to coincide exactly with the start of the large-scale deportations to the East in the fall of 1941.
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In the eastern parts of the Reich, the deportations were often justified by the “need for housing space” for Germans and were implemented under the cruelest conditions.
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These restrictions thus created the best administrative conditions for preventing Jews from fleeing and the most “problem-free registration” of all concerned.

3. “Non-German” Associations

With the abolition of personal freedom of “non-German” individuals came the destruction of “non-German” associations. From the beginning all events in the Jewish communities had been subject to registration and police supervision.
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As we have seen above, the courts had denied Jewish institutions a public corporation status (with the consequence that they forfeited all tax privileges),
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and this status was then definitively abolished by the decree of March 28, 1938,
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which deprived the Jewish communities of the status of public-law corporations. Jewish cultural associations and their auxiliary organizations thus became incorporated societies under private law. The Jewish associations thus lost their autonomy, for all resolutions of any importance had to be sanctioned by the senior administration (presidents of the district administration). A year later, the Tenth Decree to the Reich Citizenship Law of July 4, 1939,
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obliged all Jews living in the territory of the Reich to become members of the Reich Association of Jews in Germany. It had the form of an incorporated association, responsible for the Jewish school and welfare systems and serving as the central office for Jewish emigration (secs. 1 and 2).

With the establishment of this central office, the last ties between Jewish citizens and the authorities were severed: the central office was declared the sole addressee of commands related to the anti-Jewish regulations issued by the Reich authorities and the police; it was to pass those orders on to all members of the association. The Reich minister of the interior was charged with its technical and legal supervision and authorized to dissolve all Jewish associations, organizations, and foundations or to order their integration into the Reich Association (secs. 4 and 5 of the decree).

All Polish organizations in the territory of the Altreich were also completely abolished. The preparatory measures were secret, and as little as possible was published in order to prevent leaks. At a conference held in November 1939 at the Reich Ministry of the Interior only a few weeks after the outbreak of the war, it was agreed to dissolve the Polish organizations in the Reich territory immediately.
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Their assets, about 7 to 8 million reichsmarks, were to be liquidated and to accrue to the Reich. It was planned to declare these assets as hostile under the terms of the Law on the Seizure of Assets of Enemies of the People and State of July 14, 1933,
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with a view to confiscating them, but this was not done for reasons of foreign policy.
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The Polish associations in the Annexed Eastern Territories were not included in these regulations, because in these regions, where the “national-racial struggle” had quite a different flavor, it was desired to introduce “as little as possible” new (German) legislation. The closing down of the Polish organizations was planned to take place on the basis of secret instructions issued with the consent of the Gestapo. It was planned to dissolve Polish commercial organizations on the basis of private law and Polish political and cultural organizations on the basis of “national policy” principles. With regard to the procedure followed, the Reich authorities concerned, who set a high value on an orderly procedure, prevailed against the police, who would have liked to dissolve the organizations immediately. The dissolution of the Polish associations was not to be implemented through police orders but by decree. The result of the Ministry of the Interior conference mentioned above was the Decree on the Organization of the Polish Ethnic Group in the German Reich of February 27, 1940.
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This decree prohibited all activities of Polish organizations on Reich territory and declared their dissolution; a commissioner took charge of the liquidation of their assets, to the exclusion of all claims for damages.
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