Gun Control in the Third Reich (4 page)

59
. “Ist der Besitz von Kleinkaliberschusswaffen jedermann, auch ohne behördliche Erlaubnis, gestattet?” (Is Everybody Allowed to Own Small-Caliber Weapons Without Permit?),
Deutsche Juristen-Zeitung
, Nov. 1, 1926, 1554.

60
. Diehl,
Paramilitary Politics in Weimar Germany
, 250, 368 n. 22.

61
. Liang,
The Berlin Police Force in the Weimar Republic
, 107.

62
. Joseph Goebbels,
Instructions to the S.A. Man
(1927), quoted in Liang,
The Berlin Police Force in the Weimar Republic
, 95–96.

63
. “Verbotener Waffenbesitz” (Illegal Weapons Possession),
Deutsche Juristen-Zeitung
, June 1, 1928, S. 810.

THE WEIMAR REPUBLIC'S
weapons laws following the Great War were draconian and vague and could be implemented only in an arbitrary and chaotic manner. To add to the confusion, the German states not only determined how these laws were implemented but also continued to pass their own laws. The resultant patchwork of differing laws sparked the Weimar government to propose a uniform law for the entire republic. The wishful thinking was that such a law would bring armed violence by extremist groups under control.

The Law on Firearms and Ammunition (Gesetz über Schußwaffen und Munition) of 1928, however, would focus not on repression of armed violence, but on regulation of the predominately peaceable citizenry. The millions who died in the Great War were killed by armies raised by nation-states. The violence of the 1920s did not compare with and indeed was in part the result of the war. The Versailles Treaty, with its harsh reparations, was in part to blame for the unemployment, depression, and chaos in Germany. Instead of blaming private firearm owners for the disorder, one can more justifiably blame war and the nation-state.

But the Weimar leaders acted on the illusion that power would be exercised for the common good. They did not anticipate losing power and a new regime's seizing power and using the Weimar laws to repress the citizenry at large. The 1928 Firearms Law would be one of many such laws.

During 1926–28, the Reich Council (Reichsrat) circulated draft laws to the states, which made comments and counterproposals.
¹
In addition to the usual
arguments on gun control that persist to today, an ethnic element was included in the debate. Bavaria demanded a prohibition on issuance of firearm licenses to “Gypsies [Zigeuner] or persons traveling like gypsies.” Bands of gypsies allegedly overwhelmed rural police and routinely used weapons illegally, and a 1926 Bavarian law prohibited them from possessing firearms.

A revised draft law included Bavaria's proposal to deny firearm licenses to Gypsies.
²
It was not limited to a general classification applicable to everyone, such as persons convicted of serious crimes. The precedent was now set to demonize an entire ethnic group, which could be any group chosen by the government in power. A decade later this demonization would be extended to Jews.

Reich interior minister Walter von Keudell of the German National People's Party (Deutschnationale Volkspartei) submitted the draft law to the Reichstag in mid-March 1928.
³
On March 31, the Law on Firearms and Ammunition was adopted without debate.
⁴

The Weimar Republic was led at this time by a center–right coalition government, just before the elections that led to the SPD's taking of power. On April 12, 1928, the government passed the Gesetz über Schußwaffen und Munition (Law on Firearms and Ammunition).
⁵
This comprehensive law required a license to manufacture, assemble, or repair firearms and ammunition or even to reload cartridges.
⁶
A license was also required to sell firearms as a trade.
⁷
Trade in firearms was prohibited at annual fairs, shooting competitions, and other events.
⁸

Acquisition of a firearm or ammunition required a Waffen-oder Munitions-erwerbsschein (license to obtain a weapon or ammunition) from the police.
⁹
The requirement applied to both commercial sales and private transfers. It did not apply to transfer of a firearm or ammunition to a shooting range licensed by the police for sole use at the range.
¹⁰
Exempt were Reich authorities and various government entities.
¹¹

Although these provisions meant that firearms already possessed would not require a license or registration, anyone who needed more ammunition than they already had would require an acquisition license for it. Because the police would thereby have records on ammunition purchasers, the absence of a firearm registration requirement was somewhat illusory.

Carrying a firearm required a Waffenschein (license to carry a weapon). The issuing authority had discretion to limit its validity to a specific occasion or locality.
¹²
“Firearm and ammunition acquisition licenses and firearm carrying licenses may be issued only to persons whose reliability is unquestioned, and firearm carrying licenses may be issued only with proof of a need.”
¹³
Licenses were automatically denied to “Gypsies or persons traveling like Gypsies”; persons with convictions under various laws, including this law; and “persons for whom police surveillance has been declared admissible, or upon whom the loss of civil rights has been imposed.”
¹⁴

These categories of persons who were disqualified from obtaining an acquisition or carry license were also prohibited from possession of a firearm or ammunition. Persons not entitled to possess firearms were ordered to surrender them immediately but could designate transfer thereof to an eligible person or would receive compensation.
¹⁵
Further, a license was required to possess a firearms or ammunition “arsenal,” which was defined as more than five firearms of the same type or more than 100 cartridges.
¹⁶
(These quantities would have
been very low for collectors or target competitors.) Also included in the definition was more than ten hunting arms or more than 1,000 hunting cartridges.
¹⁷
Licenses were available only to “persons of unquestioned trustworthiness.”
¹⁸

It was forbidden to manufacture or possess firearms that were adapted for “rapid disassembly beyond the generally usual extent for hunting and sporting purposes.”
¹⁹
Firearms with silencers or spotlights were prohibited.
²⁰

The unlawful carrying of a firearm was punishable with up to three years in prison and a fine, as was inheriting a firearm and failing to report it in a timely way.
²¹
The same punishment applied to a person who deliberately or negligently failed to prevent a violation of the law by a member of his household younger than twenty.
²²
Other violations were punishable with fines and unspecified terms of imprisonment.
²³

The new law would take effect on October 1, 1928, on which date the 1919 law requiring immediate surrender of all firearms would be repealed.
²⁴
That date would allow individuals more than six months to comply with the new law while leaving the more draconian but widely ignored law on the books for the same period.

Hermann Kuenzer was the government's point man to explain the new law. A member of the left-liberal German Democratic Party, he headed the Political Department of the Reich Interior Ministry and was Reichskommissar for the protection of public order.
²⁵

Kuenzer's office collected intelligence about extremist groups on the left and right and shared it with urban and state police forces.
²⁶
During the 1923 insurrection,
he was aware that the Communists were armed mainly with rubber truncheons and few firearms—they were thus viewed as militarily worthless but politically dangerous.
²⁷

The day after the new Firearms Law's passage, Reichskommissar Kuenzer published a detailed explanation of its background and meaning in the newspaper
Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
.
²⁸
He attributed the lengthy time it took to be adopted to the fact that it interfered with the police authority of the
Länder
(states). But when sent to the Reichstag in 1928, it was considered so urgent that it was not reviewed by committee and was adopted by the Reichstag without debate on the second to last day of the session.

The goal of the law was to disarm unauthorized persons and to have a clear, uniform law for the whole Reich. “The difficult task,” Kuenzer explained, “was to find the appropriate limits between this necessity of the state on the one hand and the important interests of the firearms industry that was employing a large number of workers and had been heavily damaged through the peace treaty, the interests of the legal sporting industry, and the personal freedom of the individual.”

The law required a police permit to carry a firearm, but not merely to possess one in the home, unless one possessed a cache of arms. “The legislature has the duty to adopt only laws that can be executed in practice because nothing is more demoralizing for the population than laws that exist only on paper, but cannot be implemented,” Kuenzer clarified.

Kuenzer also published an analysis of the new law in the legal periodical
Deutsche Juristen-Zeitung.
He candidly expressed misgivings about how the law was drafted by the Reich Council without any input from the legislature: “This is the first time in the history of the Reichstag that such an important statute with far-reaching consequences for economy and jurisprudence was adopted in the Reichstag without any debate, as an afterthought as part of the budget of
the Reich Department of the Interior. We hope that this manner of adopting laws will remain a great exception.”
²⁹

Kuenzer noted that Austria, Portugal, Russia, and Hungary required a police permit for mere possession of a firearm. So had Germany's 1919 decree. “But we all know that this provision has absolutely no effect, is completely disregarded and only occasionally is used for denunciations.” To restore respect for the law, the legislature must adopt only laws that are enforceable.

Moreover, “the possession of firearms in one's residence, business, or enclosed property does not, in general, represent a great danger to public security and order.” Licenses should be required only of persons who collect numerous weapons or carry firearms.

A Reich-wide firearms carry license, Kuenzer noted, would rein in the chaos from having separate license requirements by every jurisdiction. “The result [of separate licensing] was that individuals who would have needed 10 to 15 firearm licenses to travel through several States and administrative districts, simply disregarded existing regulations.”

Kuenzer's assurance that persons denied licenses to engage in commerce in firearms were entitled to judicial review was disputed.
³⁰
Following Prussian legal practice, judges could decide only whether the police acted in their discretion and could not review the facts.

Meanwhile, the Weimar government changed hands with the Reichstag elections of May 20, 1928. The SPD took power after being in the opposition since the end of 1923, and the KPD made significant gains.
³¹

Carl Severing, the newly installed Reich interior minister, promulgated regulations for the Firearms Law on July 14, 1928.
³²
The regulations provided
that an acquisition permit entitled one to acquire only one firearm and fifty cartridges.
³³
The seller would submit the permit to the police,
³⁴
who could inspect dealer records on demand.
³⁵

Legal treatises on the new law would be published by Werner Hoche, assistant to the interior minister, and Fritz Kunze of the Office of the Reichskommissar for the Protection of Public Order. These same authors would a decade later serve a new regime's firearms prohibitions by publishing commentaries on the 1938 Nazi law.
³⁶

Restrictions on firearms were aimed not so much at armed crime as at political violence.
³⁷
But such policies had little effect and instead served primarily to restrict law-abiding citizens. Those whose agenda was overthrow of the state could have cared less about jumping through the hoops to obtain arms according to the bureaucratic requirements imposed by the existing authorities.

Directed by Moscow, the KPD became increasingly aggressive through its combat league, the RFB, which clashed with the police, the Nazi SA, and the SPD's Reichsbanner. The Reich interior minister warned the states to increase surveillance of the RFB to detect weapon law violations.
³⁸

Finally, the RFB was banned on the basis of the Law for the Protection of the Republic.
³⁹
In introducing that law, Prussian Interior Minister Carl Severing (SPD) explained in March 1930: “The right of assembly has become the wrong of assembly, and press freedom has become press licence. We cannot permit demagogues to inflame the masses any further.”
⁴⁰
Like the right to have arms, the rights to free speech and assembly were curtailed.

In early 1930, Communists killed SA leader Horst Wessel, whom the Nazis then made into a martyr extolled in a famous song. Nazis quietly infiltrated the police, who saw the SA—which, after all, did not attack the police—as a potential ally against Communist assaults. The officers at Police Station 111 in the Kreuzberg area of Berlin thus welcomed Joseph Goebbels's SA headquarters in their precinct.
⁴¹
It was at such police stations throughout Germany that firearm licensing and registration records would be kept. These records would be useful to the Nazis when they came to power.

The SA's strength was also enhanced by the growing use of its services by the Reichswehr, the strength of which was limited by the Versailles Treaty. Although the Stahlhelm and even the Reichsbanner were also seen as sources of a militia that the Geneva Disarmament Conference might approve, the SA was of particular use as border patrol in East Prussia to defend against possible Polish encroachment. But the Left saw the SA as increasingly terrorist, leading to the Reichsbanner's founding of the paramilitary Iron Front (Eisernen Front).
⁴²

As Communist versus Nazi fights and riots escalated in 1930–31, Berlin enacted more stringent restrictions on handgun sales and possession of other weapons.
⁴³
Berlin police proposed to criminalize the carrying of edged and blunt hand weapons in the same manner as firearms rather than to focus on misuse.
⁴⁴