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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 September 2020
In the Weimar Republic, police matters were in the hands of the federal states. The strongest federal police unit was the Prussian police, which from 1931 relied on a codified police law which was considered the model for organizing the police by the rule of law (not least since it allowed for administrative judicial review of police measures). The Prussian Interior Minister had control over the police (including the political police). With the Nazis accession to power in late January 1933, the police’s legal framework abruptly changed. The Reichstag Fire Decree of February 1933 allowed for police interventions into basic personal rights. The regime’s claim of restoring public order provided a pretext for persecuting political opponents. Such new measures as protective custody soon resulted in an unleashing of police power. The chapter outlines how the police, controlled by Heinrich Himmler from June 1936, transformed from an executive power into an instrument of “inner warfare” that undermined the judiciary. A particularly terrifying aspect of life in Nazi Germany was the omnipresent Secret State Police (Gestapo). The chapter outlines the “legal framework” of the Secret State Police, as it was developed by the Nazi jurist Werner Best.
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