With respect to citizenship, the laws planned which are to disfranchise the Jews are for the most part still in preparation. From the best information available, it is apparently still the intention that practically all the Jews in Germany are to be disfranchised. The Jews are to be given the status of “foreigners” in Germany even though the family may have been in Germany for generations. This is the attitude of the radical element of the Party and unless there is a considerable change, the laws, when they appear, will be very drastic. Under the law of July 14, 1933, the Minister of the Interior of the Reich already has the authority to deprive persons of their citizenship without giving any reason for such action, and to confiscate the property of such persons. The “Berliner Tageblatt” of August 25 and other newspapers carry of a list of thirty-three German citizens who were deprived of their citizenship under this law by the Minister of the Interior. Among the names in these lists are those of George Bernhard, Leon Feuchtwanger, Heinrich Mann and Philip Schneidemann.
The laws governing the prohibition of mixed marriages have not yet been issued; but such marriages have been almost as effectively stopped already by the other measures in effect as they could be by law. The Department is aware from previous reports that Party members can no longer marry a person who is not of Aryan origin, and if there is any Party member who has a non-Aryan wife of husband, he or she must be excluded from the Party. According to the “Beamtengesetz” many persons of Aryan origin who are married to non-Aryans have been compelled to give up their positions. It is no exaggeration to state that thousands of marriages which had been planned between Aryans and non-Aryans are not taking place as the marriage would ruin the career or the possible chance of making a livelihood of the one or the other party. The non-Aryan wives of Aryan officials have to my knowledge voluntarily left their husbands in order that they might continue in their careers. The wife of an Aryan professor recently informed me that she was leaving for the United States and separating from her husband as he had a position with a Government office in Stuttgart, and as she was of Jewish origin she was leaving him in order that he might be able to continue to make his living. As I happen to know that this was a happy marriage, I merely cite this as an isolated instance of the human tragedies daily taking place.
The “cleaning-out” in the universities of Jewish professors and those who have any non-Aryan ancestors according to the “Beamtengesetz” is continuing. There is, I understand, only one professor of Jewish origin left in the University of Berlin. On September 9 the Reichstatthalter of Saxony, in accordance with a decision of the Saxon Ministry of Education and the “Beamtengesetz”, ordered the separation of six former Professors from the University of Leipzig, of whom five were of Jewish origin. In other universities the “cleaning out” process has been completed for some time.
print version
return to list
previous document