Judge Dennis Davis
Jewish Lawyers in Weimar
Summary
A probing analysis of the role Jewish lawyers played in South Africa and Germany during challenging political times, specifically highlighting the courageous actions of Hans Litten (1903–1938)and Hermann Heller (1891–1933), who stood up against the Nazis in Germany and defended the principles of legality and the rule of law.
Judge Dennis Davis
Dennis Davis is a judge of the High Court of South Africa and judge president of the Competition Appeals Court of South Africa. He has held professorial appointments at the University of Cape Town and University of the Witwatersrand, as well as numerous visiting appointments at Cambridge, Harvard, New York University, and others. He has authored eleven books, including Lawfare: Judging Politics in South Africa.
In Litten’s case, his family seemed to have survived. Not quite sure how, as he himself died in ‘38, but somehow his family did survive the war. In Heller’s case, they were out of Germany. He had lost his jobs. Ironically, one of the people who had been terribly responsible for him losing jobs was Carl Schmitt.
He was never even charged. Part of the reason was because he claimed that he was was an academic and a theorist, that he wasn’t part of the sort of Nazi machine. But the truth was he was a fundamental evil man, he was a rabid anti-Semite. He certainly campaigned against expulsion of Jewish lawyers and he should have been held accountable. But in fact, the flaws of the courts, the trials of Nuremberg and beyond allowed him to escape.
In that particular case, Hitler was subpoenaed to give evidence. So whilst he might have had a lawyer, the lawyer had no role. Hitler was brought into court, he was subpoenaed and he had to give evidence to justify the policy which caused all of that violence that had taken place.