Prologue
In German history, censorship unfortunately has been more of a rule than an exception. It was introduced by the Catholic Church in the form of the Inquisition. However, it was left to the well-known Austrian statesman Metternich to perfect the system of suppressing freedom of speech by means of a comprehensive spy and surveillance apparatus. Neither the German Empire nor the Weimar Republic were particularly soft in their dealings with unwelcome literature,[1] but the worst reputation was doubtless acquired by the Third Reich, which managed, within the twelve years of its existence, to black-list some 10,000 books. While these books were not burned, they did disappear from the shelves of bookstores, to be banished to library archives.[2]
But what is not nearly as well known is the fact that it was the Allied ‘liberators’ of Germany who staged the greatest campaign of book destruction that mankind had ever seen – quite apart from the millions of books which fell victim to the Allied carpet bombing in hundreds of libraries. Among the victims of Allied displeasure were 35,743 titles as well as, comprehensively, all school textbooks published between 1933 and 1945; not only were these no longer permitted to be printed and sold after the war – they also had to vanish from the archives of many libraries.[3] In the years from 1946 to 1952, the Soviet Occupation Power published four such lists (“Liste der auszusondernden Literatur”, or list of proscribed literature) of titles earmarked for destruction. In accordance with the instructions in the censors’ introduction to the second and third volumes, the first three of these lists also went into force in the western Occupation Zones.[3a]. I have published these lists of this gigantic book destruction on the internet.
The German Constitution
In its Article 5, Section 1, Clause 3, the current German Constitution (Grundgesetz, or GG) prohibits censorship. Section 2 of that same Article, however, limits this freedom from censorship as per the regulations imposed by “general laws”, among other things. A fundamental human right can thus be suspended, at least theoretically, by everyday laws such as those of criminal law.[4] In this respect, the German Federal Constitutional Court (Bundesverfassungsgericht) has determined that “general laws” are such that do not prohibit a specific opinion, or freedom of speech per se. Furthermore, general laws may impose limits on a fundamental right only if doing so serves to safeguard another fundamental right. In accordance with the principle of proportionality, the benefits of both conflicting fundamental rights must be weighed against each other.[5]
Further restrictions imposed on freedom of speech by Article 5 Section 2 GG serve the protection of young people and of personal honor. According to rulings of the German Federal Constitutional Court, the core significance of the human right to freedom of speech is that censorship of publications is permitted only if these publications are at least a constant or typical source of endangerment to the young people who might read, hear or watch them.
Regarding injury to honor, the Federal Constitutional Court has ruled that such injury generally has not occurred if no insulting expressions have been used.
Criminal Law
The German Criminal Code (Strafgesetzbuch, StGB) has at its disposal tools facilitating censorship, particularly in §§ 185, 189 and 130f. While §§ 185 and 189 (slander, disparagement of the memory of the dead) may be subsumed under the category of “injuries to honor”, §§ 130f. (incitement of the people, incitement to hatred) are a mixed grouping of injuries to honor, injury to human dignity (Article 1 GG), and endangerment of the public peace.
Although the German courts initially decided that attacks on human dignity (slander, disparagement of the memory of the dead, incitement of the masses) is given only when an insulting and disparaging language is used, case law has since trespassed into areas where already a mere justified criticism is judged as a criminal offense.
The question as to when “public peace” is threatened is also being answered increasingly abitrarily. It is not necessary that the “public peace” has been disturbed (e.g. by certain publications causing demonstrations or insurrections). It suffices that some authority opines that a scenario could be conceived in which acts disturbing the public peace can occur, if a certain dissenting opinion is disseminated in Germany and held to be true by a certain part of the population. Of course such a fuzzy definition can be applied to almost any opinion diverting from that of the authorities. It is a perfect tool for the suppression of any real and fundamental opposition.[5a]
As a consequence of this change attitude of the judiciary, and to account for it, the German penal law was change in the fall of 1994. Hence the revision of § 130 StGB (the so-called Lex Deckert) decreed, among other things, that it is a criminal offense
“publicly or in an assembly, and in a manner likely to lead to a breach of the peace, [to] endorse, deny or trivialize any act committed under National Socialist rule [which was] of the type specified in § 220a Section 1 [i.e., genocide]“
This is precisely the scenario which the Federal Constitutional Court has actually ruled out: this law criminalizes a specific opinion about one detail of the history of only one single, past regime. From this perspective alone, this “hastily passed and unthought-out”[6] “special law against freedom of speech”[7] would seem to be unconstitutional, and it has been criticized commensurately in German legal subject literature, where it is described as being, in effect, “an attack on the intellectual freedom of dissidents”[8] and “virtually the classic example of a norm […] directed against a specific opinion.”[7]
“The legitimacy of this regulation is dubious at the very least. One can already question whether a lie is a criminal wrong at all; one must question whether the mere denial of a historical fact, in the absence of any characteristics of agitation, may be described and dealt with as incitement of the people, of all things.”[9]
The concept of “denying” something which the state deems true is a new element in German criminal law and poses problems which it seems quite impossible for criminal procedure to solve. In order for denial to objectively constitute a criminal offense, it must be done deliberately; that is, the denier must know that he is not telling the truth, and the judge must prove this knowledge, which in and of itself is already virtually impossible. But in order to be able to also punish (especially) the so-called ‘criminals of conviction’ who are convinced that they are telling the truth, the German judiciary has concocted an entirely new definition of intent:[10]
“In this case, intent can only be the knowledge that one’s conviction puts one into conflict with that which ‘general opinion’ indisputably regards as a historical fact. Admittedly, in a state under the rule of law this places a system of criminal law based on guilt squarely at the crossroads [to criminal law based on arbitrariness]. Just as Auschwitz will ever remain a nightmare for the Germans, the ‘Auschwitz Lie’ will clearly remain the same for German criminal law.”
However, the revised § 130 StGB includes regulations which even go considerably further. It criminalizes not only dissident views of certain aspects of National Socialist persecution of minorities, but in a sense anything and everything which could be considered incitement to hatred against population subgroups of potentially any definition. In that context it is irrelevant whether the criticism is justified. This law only protects those parts of the population from slander and criticism which are considered to be “politically correct” (foreigners, Jews, homosexuals, but not Germans, former German soldiers, patriots, right-wingers etc.). In this regard the foremost German criminal law commentary observes that this amendment means that practically any kind of criticism of population subgroups – however they are defined – can become a criminal offense, since the legal right that is supposed to be protected (the anti-discrimination rule) is rendered too general and vague in this section.[11]
Furthermore, this new version of article 130 also permits precautionary censorship, as it were, by providing for the confiscation of publications or other data carriers which are allegedly intended for distribution and which, in the eyes of the authorities, are inflammatory or a potential danger to “public peace.” The judiciary holds that the intent to distribute prohibited publications exists if persons have in their possession more than one single copy of a data carrier.
This new German law is irreconcilable with international human rights standards, as has been shown by a German PhD thesis dealing with this issue.[11a] This fact has even been openly acknowledged by some of Germany’s leading politicians, but it is excused by virtue of the country’s particular history.[12]. The strange “logic” hiding behind this reasoning is something like that:
Because Germany persecuted minorities, incarcerated dissidents, and burned books in the past, she is now obligated to persecute minorities, incarcerate dissidents, and burn books!
But it was to get even worse: In 2005 Germany tightened the thumbscrews even more by adding a special offense to article 130 of the German Penal Code:
“(4) Disturbing public peace, publicly or during an assembly, in a way injurious to the dignity of the victims [of National Socialism], by condoning, glorifying or justifying the violent and tyrannical rule of National Socialism is punishable with up to three years imprisonment or with a fine.”
The debate about this new restriction to freedom of speech in the German parliament clearly indicates that this was a measure permitting the specific and exclusive prosecution of revisionist historical dissidents and politicians of the right-wing opposition. The German government’s reasons for this change of law explain basically that statements on the Third Reich can already be prosecutable if it can be implied from the context of the deed or from the perpetrator that he intended to glorify or belittle the human rights violations committed by the Third Reich, even if those violations were not even a topic of the objected statements.[12a] The respective German government’s justification has since been quoted almost verbally by German courts of law, which proves them to be mere government puppets, so for instance the Bavarian Administrative Court:[12b]
“For an approval of the violent and tyrannical rule of National Socialism it suffices, if the perpetrator implicitely gives a positive assessment of the human rights violations committed under the rule of National Socialism – for instance by way of value judgments about responsible personalities.”
Let me translate this legalese into plain language: if you say anything positive about any personality of the Third Reich – or about the Third Reich in general – you are liable for prosectuion, if it can be assumed that by so doing you meant to deny or belittle the crimes committed by the Third Reich (which would be assumed only if you have right-wing leanings). This means two things in plain English:
- This offense can be committed only by (alleged) right-wingers, because in Germany it is automatically insinuated that they intend to glorify the Third Reich. Hence article 130 has been converted into an article for the illegal suppression of the legal right-wing political opposition.
- The separation of power, that is, the independence of the court system from the executive branch of the government is an illusion.
Germany’s highest court, The Federal Constitutional High Court, confirmed the latter point in a landmark decision in 2009 in a case that challenged the constitutionality of this new provision of article 130. Being fully aware that this law is not a general one but one aimed at certain opinions on highly limited topics and designed to suppress certain political views, the German Constitutional High Court tried to square the circle when it obeisantly rubber-stamped the German government’s gutting of civil rights by deciding:[12c]
“In general, restrictions to the freedom of opinion are permissible only on the basis of general laws according to art. 5, para. 2, alternative 1, Basic Law. A law restricting opinions is an inadmissible special law, if it is not formulated in a sufficiently open way and is directed right from the start only against certain convictions, attitudes, or ideologies. […] Although the regulation of art. 130, para. 4, German Penal Code is not a general law […] even as a non-general law it is still compatible with art. 5, para. 1 and 2, Basic Law, as an exception. In view of the injustice and the terror caused by the National Socialist regime, an exception to the prohibition of special laws […] is immanent.”
Or put differently: Exceptional laws are prohibited, except in exceptional cases. It goes without saying that this is nonsense, plain and simple, and amounts to an open admission by Germany’s highest court that they don’t give a damn about civil rights.
This decision sounded the final death knell for freedom of speech in Germany. As of that day it was clear that only those opinions can be voiced publicly with guaranteed impunity which are tacitly endorsed by the authorities. The results of that new law can be gleaned from the statistics (see table below), as the number of prosecutions of right-wing “propaganda offenses” jumped from some 10,000 per year before 2005 to 15,000 case and more after that.
Indexing
The first step in the process of German censorship is the black-listing or “indexing” of, for example, a book or pamphlet. This indexing is done by the Federal Review Office for Youth-Endangering Media (Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Medien, BPjM).[13] Until 2002, this authority could only become active after a complaint by, e.g., a public youth welfare department. However, a more restrictive law introduced in 2002 now allows this authority to index media without the need of a complaint. This indexing means that the black-listed work may no longer be advertised and that it may not be sold or otherwise made available to persons under 18 years of age. In practical terms this means that the work ceases to exist for the public, as one can then legally learn of its existence only by private means – or, alternately, via the list of indexed works, which the BPjM regularly publishes in its Report. By now this list includes thousands of printed, audio and audio-visual works.[14] Once readily accessible by everybody, this Report is now sold only to libraries, wholesalers, and retailers, and even libraries have stopped giving free access to it, which renders the censorship activities of this authority more and more obscure. This tendency to hide its censorship activities was even more enhanced in 2002, when the law was changed so that media regarded to be an especially severe threat to the mental development of young people are now listed in secret lists.
The victims of this secret censorship are primarily media whose content, according to German courts of law, violates German criminal law (libel, denigration of the dead, incitement to hatred, stirring up the people), which includes basically the entire gamut of media by political and historical dissidents.[15]
Ever since then, the public has had no way of finding out, which media are declared illegal and which are not. This is a violation of the fundamental legal principle that both statutory and case law must be publicly accessible so that every citizen can gain knowledge of them and act accordingly. The German federal government, however, keeps its decisions secret, and those citizens who disseminate banned literature are in violation of the law without ever having had an opportunity of avoiding this. This is a first-class example of a totalitarian law.
While the BPjM was initially created primarily to protect German youth from pornography and the glorification of violence or depictions of cruelity, it has increasingly also engaged in the battle against politically or historically unpopular literature. As early as 1990 Eckhard Jesse, who later became a Professor of Sociology at Chemnitz University, criticized that the BPjM had “in many ways turned out to be a gateway for one-sided anti-Fascism”[16] and that its measures are “difficult to reconcile with the principles of a liberal society […], because, on principle, in an open society the printed and spoken word may not be stifled.”[17]
Although Jesse regrets that free speech is stifled in Germany, he considered one fact consoling:[17a]
“By abstaining from keeping its [indexing] decisions secret, a screening by the public and by academia is possible.”
With the changed law of 2002, this is now unfortunately a matter of the past.
To date, this astonishing admission of the violation of human rights through censorship under the auspices of the Federal Constitutional Protection Office, which edited the contribution of Jesse, has received little attention.
The decision of German courts in the case of the book Wahrheit für Deutschland (Truth for Germany) has taken on a central significance where the BPjM’s practice of censorship is concerned. This book dealt in an allegedly unacademic manner with the question of who bears the blame for World War Two.[18] The BPjM black-listed it in the late 1970s. In 1994 the Federal Constitutional Court declared this black-listing decision unlawful,[19] but the BPjM promptly re-indexed the book on slightly reworded grounds.[20] The author’s appeal against this, as well as his complaint to the Administrative Court of Cologne, were successful. According to the verdict the BPjM had failed to prove that the book posed a danger to the young people who might read it:[21]
“The BPjM fails to realize that it is precisely the possibility for open debate among different views which furthers the critical abilities of young people, and this demands free and unfettered discussion. Besides instruction in historical events, this requires particularly the critical examination of divergent views. In its considerations the BPjM has completely disregarded that this […] can (perhaps) protect young people much more effectively from susceptibility to distorting portrayals of history than indexing can, which latter may even endow such opinions with a justified attraction.”
However, this verdict, as well as the Federal Constitutional Court’s previous verdict, also indicate that these principles do not apply if it is, for example, the historiography about the fate of the Jews in the Third Reich that is questioned. Such questioning, the argument goes, not only represents a scientifically blatantly incorrect opinion, it also glorifies National Socialism and disparages the Jews as a group. This does not by any means require that the publication in question verbally attacks the Jews or identifies itself with National Socialist ideology. Not even an open declaration of sympathy with the Jews and a condemnation of National Socialist transgressions in other respects will serve in the publication’s favor if the factual nature of the Holocaust is questioned at even one single point in the work. German courts consider even one such occurrence to be adequate proof of a glorification of the National Socialist system and of an intention to slander the Jews.
To date, appeals against the black-listing of “Holocaust-denying” books have been uniformly unsuccessful, since German courts refuse all motions to introduce evidence into such trials.[22] Documentation, however, is very fragmentary in this context. Older books which dispute the mainstream view of the Holocaust – such as Geschichte der Verfemung Deutschlands (History of the Defamation of Germany),[23] Hexeneinmaleins einer Lüge (Magic Square of a Lie),[24] Feuerzeichen (Fire signal)[25] or Die 2. babylonische Gefangenschaft (The 2nd Babylonian Captivity)[26] – are not to be found on the Index of the BPjM. On the other hand, one of the first books of this genre – a book that, regarding its style, must certainly be accorded scientific and academic credit, namely, Der Jahrhundertbetrug[27] (The Hoax of the Century) – was black-listed as early as spring 1979.[28]
A work issued by the publisher Kritik-Verlag, lately of Denmark, has achieved fame at least indirectly. In the early 1970s this publisher issued a brochure titled Die Auschwitz-Lüge (The Auschwitz Lie), in which a former German soldier described his experiences in Auschwitz, which are diametrically opposed to those recounted in the well-known eyewitness testimony.[29] At least in Germany the title of this publication became the embodiment of what is otherwise known less polemically as Holocaust revisionism, i.e., the thesis that there was no Third Reich policy of extermination of the Jews. A portrait of Thies Christophersen, the brochure’s author, who was prosecuted in Germany and had fled abroad, was used in 1995 by Amnesty International as advertisement for free speech because even the most controversial of all opinions, namely the one that disputes the Holocaust, ought to be protected by the human right to freedom of speech.[30] The publication was not indexed until 1993, fully 20 years after its first publication.[31]
Since the 1994 and 2005 tightenings of the German criminal law no change has become apparent in the BPjM’s decision-making process, and neither is any change necessarily to be expected, since the BPjM proceeds in accordance with the Law for Youth Protection (Gesetz zum Schutz der Jugend, or GjS), not with criminal law.
Confiscations up to 1994
The second stage of German censorship is the so-called confiscation (or seize-and-destroy) stage. This stage hardly registers with the public at all, and even Professor E. Jesse, whom I quoted earlier, seems either not to be aware of it or to ignore it. The confiscation of a publication takes place at the order of a court. What happens to the confiscated copies of such a publication is not quite clear, but it probably varies with the police station in charge. One publisher who is quite frequently the target of such book confiscations reported that he had been told that the books are burned under police supervision.[32] In one case the press reported that confiscated literature is being burnt in waste incinerators.[33] This is only consequential, as dangerous books have to be dealt with like dangerous drugs in the eyes of the authorities: they poison the brain and turn us into “improperly” functioning members of society. Hence the weapons of crime – drug or book – are destroyed by fire (an alternative for books would be the shredder).
According to information from the German Federal Government, and unlike for indexed works, there is no office or authority which publishes an even remotely complete list of confiscated books; similarly, the confiscation orders issued by the courts are not published anywhere.[34] Certainly every court that orders or revokes the confiscation of a publication is required to communicate its decision to the German Federal Criminal Investigation Office (Bundeskriminalamt), which therefore ought to have a complete and current list, particularly as it serves the courts as an information database regarding confiscation orders already issued.[35] However, these confiscation orders are published only every now and then in the official Bundeskriminalblatt, a publication not readily accessible to the public. When approaching the Bundeskriminalamt in order to obtain such a list, one does not obtain an answer, which contributes to the secretiveness about the above-mentioned list of “dangerous” prohibited media.
Hence, here as well the public is left completely in the dark about which media are confiscated and which are not. Those who dare to import, export, store, publish, promote, disseminate or sell a confiscated media item will find themselves in the dock accused of a thought crime.
Although pornographic or pro-violent publications are also affected by confiscations, these are not discussed here, since the destruction of political or historical publications is a much more explosive issue from a human rights point of view.
Up to 1994 it was still possible to keep track of all the confiscated publications with political or historical content. During the 1970s, mainly such books were affected which voiced sympathy or even more for the left-wing extremist terrorism of the German terrorist group Red Army Fraction. In contrast to this, there has never been a connection between the prohibition of right-wing or revisionist historical media and right-wing extremist violence or even acts threatening the state, if only because there has never been any right-wing terrorism in Germany. In addition, historical revisionism doesn’t primarily argue politically. In this case, the dreaded hypothetical political repercussions of a changed conception of history are the cause for governmental persecution.
The most spectacular case of a book confiscation prior to 1994 was no doubt the confiscation of the revisionist book Der Auschwitz-Mythos (The Auschwitz Myth). Due to the book’s ‘Holocaust-denying’ theses, the author, a former judge, was stripped of his doctorate, and his pension was reduced.[36]
Other interesting cases are the confiscations of the books published by the revisionist Jew Joseph Ginsburg under the pseudonym J. G. Burg. His Holocaust-denying books also fell victim to German book burning, even though – being a Jew and in light of the contents of his writings – he could hardly be accused of anti-Semitism.
| Year | Right | Left | Foreign | Sum |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1994 | 5,562 | 185 | 235 | 5,982 |
| 1995 | 6,555 | 256 | 276 | 7,087 |
| 1996 | 7,585 | 557 | 818 | 8,960 |
| 1997 | 10,257 | 1,063 | 1,029 | 12,349 |
| 1998 | 9,549 | 1,141 | 1,832 | 12,522 |
| 1999 | 8,698 | 1,025 | 1,525 | 11,248 |
| 2000 | 13,863 | 979 | 525 | 15,367 |
| 2001 | 8,874 | 429 | 353 | 9,656 |
| 2002 | 9,807 | 331 | 467 | 10,605 |
| 2003 | 9,689 | 431 | 1,340 | 11,460 |
| 2004 | 10,915 | 410 | 341 | 11,666 |
| 2005 | 13,838 | 654 | 554 | 15,046 |
| 2006 | 15,995 | 709 | 310 | 17,014 |
| 2007 | 15,211 | 738 | 507 | 16,456 |
| 2008 | 17,479 | 898 | 967 | 19,344 |
| 2009 | 16,236 | 1,472 | 402 | 18,110 |
| 2010 | 13,663 | 1,101 | 531 | 15,295 |
| 2011 | 13,865 | 1,416 | 414 | 15,695 |
| 2012 | 15,017 | 822 | 379 | 16,218 |
| 2013 | 14,570 | 1,444 | 379 | 16,393 |
| 2014 | 14,529 | 1,387 | 1,547 | 17,463 |
| 2015 | 18,830 | 2,197 | 1,017 | 22,044 |
| 2016 | 18,908 | 1,684 | 2,139 | 21,731 |
| 2017 | 16,755 | 1,475 | 1,488 | 19,718 |
| 2018 | 17,056 | 1,322 | 1,563 | 19,941 |
| 2019 | 19,055 | 1,892 | 22,072 | |
| 2020 | 19,970 | 1,419 | 611 | 22,000 |
| 2021 | 17,900 | 1,589 | 741 | 20,230 |
| 2022 | 18,933 | 1,051 | 1,308 | 21,292 |
| 2023 | 23,199 | 1,088 | 2,769 | 27.056 |
| Total: | 422,363 | 31,165 | 27,492 | 481,020 |
|
• Right: “Offenses with right wing extremist background,” that is: “Propaganda Offenses” and “Stirring up the People.” |
||||
 Thought Crimes in Germany |
||||
| Especially right-wingers are persecuted in Germany. | ||||
| Caveat: The above numbers concern cases of criminal investigations, not of indictments or even court convictions. Statistically seen, only a minority of these cases end up with a person or group of persons being charged with a crime, as most “propaganda crimes” – like painting a slogan on a bill board, putting a sticker on a lamp post or sticking a leaflet in someone’s letter box – are elusive acts leaving little evidence. Maybe only 20% of the cases are ever resolved, of which the majority end with a fine being paid. As little as 1% of these cases may actually result in a prison term handed down by a court, and most of these convictions are on probation for first-time offenders. Hence only a few of the culprits who have committed the above “thought crimes” will have ended up in prison as “political prisoners,” maybe as little as 0.1%. Of half a million, this would still amount to 500 political prisoners, spread out over those years.
Now, the interesting thing about this is what, for instance, the U.S. State Department has to say about political prisoners in Germany in their Human Rights Reports, which they have published online every year since 1999 for basically every country in the world. And here is the sentence which the U.S. State Department has copied and pasted into every single one of these reports: “There were no reports of political prisoners.” 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, (the 2004 report does not contain any statement about political prisoners), 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 So how do they justify these acts of political persecution by prosecution? By throwing expletives at the offenders: “neo-Nazis,” “racists,” “anti-Semites” etc, all terms which evade any attempt at defining them precisely, which is why they are irrelevant. But they are very effective, because who would not merrily agree – or who would dare to disagree – to deny those evil individuals their civil rights? Hence, once they manage to make those epithets stick to the “offenders” – whether true or not – these “thought criminals” are fair game. Needless to say that this applies only to right-wing offenders and Muslims (who are all, by definition, potential “anti-Semites”… although strange enough, most Muslims are Arabs = Semites). |
||||
Up to the winter of 1996, and where political and historical publications are concerned, the BPjM itself had listed the confiscation of only a few issues of the Swiss-based revisionist periodical Der Eidgenoss. The various issues of the revisionist periodical Historische Tatsachen (Historical Facts), on the other hand – which have long been subject to confiscation, and which are published by the same publisher whose book Wahrheit für Deutschland the BPjM tried for over 20 years to ban – are not mentioned.[38] It was not until the spring of 1997 that the BPjM updated its list, particularly with four books by the Swiss revisionist author Jürgen Graf. With one exception, however, these books had all been confiscated before the end of 1994, and one had already been de-indexed again in 1995.[39] The BPjM itself is thus even less clear on the state of confiscations than is the author of the present article, as there has apparently been no communication between this office and the Bundeskriminalamt either.
Confiscations after 1994
This ‘moderate’ confiscation policy changed radically after the revised § 130 StGB took effect on December 1, 1994. Even though the time from December 1, 1994 (the date the new § 130 StGB came into force), and mid-1997 (the authorship date of the original version of this article) is only two and a half years, the list of books ordered seized and destroyed during this period is about as long as that of the books which to my knowledge were confiscated in the previous 45 years of the Federal Republic of Germany’s existence.
It is important to note that in most instances the court case reference numbers given refer not only to the confiscation proceedings directed at the books themselves, but refer also to concomitant criminal trials of authors, editors, publishers, booksellers, sometimes even against the printers and multiple-copy purchasers of the publications in question. Criminal prosecution of the purchasers of prohibited publications is initiated even if the books were bought at a time when they were not yet prohibited. In actual fact, almost all such trials are of this retroactive nature, i.e., they deal with cases where books were bought before they were confiscated, for it is usually no longer possible to obtain the books after they have been violently withdrawn from the market.
One should think that no author, printer, wholesaler, retailer or buyer of several copies of a banned or confiscated media item could be punished, if he has written, printed, sold or bought the book before it is prohibited. In reality, however, they all can – and usually will – be prosecuted if they have unfolded their respective activity before the pertinent court decision ordering the confiscation. The judiciary argues that a confiscated media item did not become illegal due to a pertinent court decision, but that is has always been illegal due to its contents. Hence already the production of such a media item is a crime, even if the authorities have no knowledge of its existence during the production process. Subsequently authors, translators, editors, publishers, printers, warehouse owners, wholesaler, retailers, and customers who have purchased more than one copy of the item (which “proves” an intent to disseminate) all are subject to prosecution, even if their acts occurred prior to any court decision.
In reply to an inquiry, the Ministry of Justice of the Federal Land of Baden-Württemberg has stated that in the time between the end of 1994 and mid-1996, in the German state of Baden-Württemberg alone, there were 32 cases of preliminary proceedings being instituted against private individuals for their multiple purchases of such books.[40] Projected to cover all of Germany, this figure indicates some 250 to 300 such criminal cases.
Revisionist books which, to my knowledge, have not even been black-listed yet – such as Feuerzeichen or Die 2. babylonische Gefangenschaft – were not the only victims of this new wave of censorship. Books with strictly political content, such as In Sachen Deutschland (In the Matter of Germany) or Wolfsgesellschaft (society of wolves), were also destroyed. Both books deal in an unpolemic but rejective manner with the problems of multiculturalism and the supposed incompetence of German politicians. However, since this openly negative attitude allegedly represents incitement against the foreigners in Germany and against the establishment political parties and their representatives, in other words since the books endangered the internal peace of the Federal Republic, they were confiscated.
It is impossible to discuss every prohibited book adequately within the scope of this article. I shall therefore focus on only one case, namely the first seize-and-destroy order that was issued after the legal revision of December 1, 1994. This order was carried out in late March 1995 against the scientific handbook Grundlagen zur Zeitgeschichte (German original of Dissecting the Holocaust), which deals very critically with the Holocaust. Since then, 1,000 persons, primarily from the ranks of academia, have spoken out publicly in support of de-indexing this book,[41] and two distinguished historians have even testified in court that the book is scientific and academic in nature and thus ought to be protected under Article 5 Section 3 of the Constitution, where freedom of research is guaranteed without limitations.[42]
In 1996 the Ministry of Justice of Baden-Württemberg announced that this constitutional provision is not sacrosanct when it stated that destruction of a scientific work is permissible if said work unduly restricts the fundamental rights of a third party.[43] This interpretation is not new, as the German Constitutional High Court decided already in 1985 in the matter of Wilhelm Stäglich/Der Auschwitz-Mythos, that freedom of science finds its limits where its results allegedly attack the human dignity of Jews.[44] The implications of this are that scientists may not postulate certain theses and may not question or seek to refute certain establishment theses if this conflicts with Jewish interests. This ruling of the German Constitutional High Court is quite obviously a violation of human rights, for this interpretation strikes at the heart of the fundamental right to freedom of research, i.e., the right to freedom of choice in the selection of one’s theses and the right to openness of research findings (cf. Karl R. Popper[45]). Publications of legal experts have also confirmed that this approach is clearly unconstitutional.[46] But as I have shown earlier[12c], exceptions violating human rights seem to be the rule for that court.
The trial concerning the book Grundlagen zur Zeitgeschichte – that is, concerning the freedom of its authors, editor, publisher, printer, sellers and buyers – was terminated prematurely shortly after the publisher had filed an appeal against the initial decision: Government official made it unofficially clear that the Grabert company would be subjected to constant house searches and book confiscation, if they did not withdraw that appeal. And indeed, since Grabert publishers had to endure a spring tide of house searches and book confiscations already during the years 1995/1996, they knew that this was no empty threat, so they withdrew the appeal.[46a]
Add to all this the fate of the confiscated book Lectures on the Holocaust and it’s imprisoned author and publisher Germar Rudolf, discussed in detail on his website.
Personal Fates
Which brings us to the fate of persons behind those books. Naturally, every trial for printing, publishing or disseminating a prohibited work also involves at least one personal fate. Exactly how many persons have been punished since 1994 for their will to disseminate media items which were outlawed afterwards is not known. The statistical data about “propaganda offense” (see table), totaling almost a quarter million initiated criminal investigations between 1994 and 2010, indicates, however, that the number must be substantial. In the following I shall touch on only four of the most prominent examples from recent years. (The corresponding court case reference numbers may be found with the entries for the books in question, in the appended list of confiscated books.)
Not mentioned in my article originally penned in 1997 are the later fates of Horst Mahler, Ernst Zündel, and Sylvia Stolz. Although none of them were prosecuted for writing books, they nevertheless fell victim to Germany’s censorship laws for their writings of a different nature:
- Horst Mahler, a German lawyer, was sentenced to a cumulative term of 11 years imprisonment for various papers he had written and disseminated either online or by mail.
- Ernst Zündel, a German-Canadian free speech activist, had to serve 7 years in prison for various newsletters and online texts he had either written or was held responsible for while residing in Canada and the U.S., where these activities were absolutely legal (this time includes two years in solitary deportation confinement in Canada).
- Sylvia Stolz, a German lawyer, was sentenced to 3½ years imprisonment for motions she had filed in court.
Googling the names of these individuals will bring up a plethora of information and disinformation about these individuals, so I abstain from footnoting them here.
First and foremost, I mention the case of Günter Deckert, the former Federal Chairman of the German right-wing Nationaldemokratische Partei (National Democratic Party). This case even attracted international attention. As early as 1994 Deckert was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for having interpreted, in an assenting manner, an American speaker’s English-language presentation which disputed the mass extermination of the Jews in Auschwitz.[47] This case has been partially recounted in the book Der Fall Günter Deckert (The Case of G.D.), co-edited by Deckert himself.[48] This book, in which Deckert supported his revisionist views with new arguments, as well as the sale of 50 copies of the revisionist anthology Grundlagen zur Zeitgeschichte, resulted in renewed proceedings against him, the bottom line of which was that he was sentenced to another 20 months’ imprisonment in spring 1997. He is supposed to be released from jail in August 2000 – after almost 5 years.
The second-worst fate struck a long-time publisher from Vlotho, the academically accredited political scientist Udo Walendy. In December 1996 he was sentenced, in his last possible appeal, to 15 months’ imprisonment for four issues (nos. 1 (2nd ed.), 59, 60 and 64) of his revisionist series Historische Tatsachen, a series which includes 77 issues to date. In May 1997 the County Court of Herford struck a supplemental blow, as it were, by sentencing Walendy to yet another 14 months’ imprisonment for his issues 66 and 68. Subsequently, Walendy’s license as a publisher was withdrawn in September 1999, so it is no longer permitted to Herrn Walendy to publish or distribute any media.[49] This case shows especially clearly how German censorship has escalated since the introduction of the relevant legal revisions in late 1994: while none of Walendy’s issues had had any criminal consequences for the author prior to the revision, fully six of the twelve issues that appeared afterwards resulted in trials and convictions, even though neither the style nor the content of the periodical had changed in any way, and ten old issues were confiscated as well.[50]
Our third example is the fate of academically accredited chemist Germar Rudolf, who also publishes under the pseudonym Ernst Gauss. For drawing up and disseminating a chemical and technical expert report known as Das Rudolf-Gutachten (The Rudolf Report), which claims to disprove the mass gassings in Auschwitz, he was sentenced in June 1995 to 14 months’ imprisonment and has since been prosecuted and persecuted for authoring or editing various revisionist books and brochures (for example, Grundlagen zur Zeitgeschichte, Prof. Dr. Ernst Nolte: Auch Holocaust-Lügen haben kurze Beine, Auschwitz: Nackte Fakten, Kardinalfragen zur Zeitgeschichte, various issues of the Journal Vierteljahreshefte für freie Geschichtsforschung). He avoided his first prison sentence as well as the trial for editing the book Grundlagen zur Zeitgeschichte by fleeing into exile, but was later deported back to Germany to serve his old sentence and face additonal charges for his already mentioned book Lectures on the Holocaust, resulting in a total of 44 months of incarceration.[51] Wigbert Grabert, the publisher of the book Grundlagen zur Zeitgeschichte was fined DM 30,000.00.
And last but not least, I mention the case of Hans Schmidt, an American citizen born in Germany. He is the head of a US-based right-wing organization that claims to represent the interests of the German-Americans in the United States. In this capacity he has for many years annoyed numerous prominent persons in Germany with Open Letters. When Schmidt visited Germany in the summer of 1995, he was held in custody, awaiting trial, for more than five months, since one of these Open Letters, in which he had described the German elites as “infested by Jews and Freemasons”, allegedly constituted incitement of the people. Schmidt avoided prosecution by fleeing to Florida.[52]
We should not forget the publisher Wigbert Grabert, whose publishing houses Grabert and Hohenrain have been for many years in the focus of the book burning frenzy of the local Tübingen judges. To my knowledge, eight criminal cases with book confiscations have been launched against Grabert since 1995, four of which also included criminal investigations against Grabert himself. Hence for many years, Grabert was considered the most courageous of all of Germany’s publishers. It seems, though, that the German authorities are out to ruin this little right-wing publishing company.[52a]
The fact that there is no publicly accessible list of confiscated books makes it difficult in some cases to determine whether or not a confiscation order exists. Sometimes one only learns of confiscations by the various public prosecutors’ offices in the course of full-blown criminal investigations. If proceedings are then stopped or abandoned for reasons other than supposed innocence (for example, a legally valid conclusion to the proceedings, lapse, or a consolidation with other proceedings, frequently accompanied by the withholding of evidence such as the confiscated books), the legal state of the confiscation proceedings – i.e., with respect to the ‘weapon’, the book – often remains unclear. And quite a few of the censored publishers and authors are not very co-operative, as they do not want to see their case dragged into the public. They fear damage to their reputation, so they stay silent, too. Obviously, the general confusion regarding the law in matters of German book confiscations is a constant uncertainty factor for every publisher, bookseller and book buyer. For this reason a trend towards preventive self-censorship is becoming increasingly manifest in Germany: to avoid the incalculable risk of criminal prosecution, one is less and less inclined to pick up politically or historically hot potatoes which a judiciary might choose to single out as being right-of-center. This silent, hidden censorship is admittedly the most effective and thus the most dangerous one that can be. That in the long term this must bring catastrophic effects on social and political life in Germany seems not to interest anyone.
Now it does not really matter what one thinks of the theses advocated by this group of persons. The fact is that the human right to freedom of speech must be indivisible, as Professor R. Dworkin already put it in Index on Censorship.[53] And since none of the cases described here involved any calls to violence, instructions for violent acts, or trivializations of violence – at most, violence is disputed for certain historical events, or portrayed as less than generally usual in other accounts – the harshness with which the German judiciary proceeds against these dissidents is incomprehensible and unjustified.
If the cases described herein affected any other persons or groups, then there would be a worldwide outcry in the press, denouncing such human rights violations. But since the victims are after all only the right ones, the matter is ignored and hushed up. But from an objective perspective there is no difference between, for example, Communists and Jehovah’s Witnesses being imprisoned in the Third Reich for their beliefs, and right-wingers and Revisionists being thrown behind bars in the Federal Republic of Germany today for the sake of their publications. Human rights remain human rights. They go for leftist radicals just as for right-wingers.
Considering the results of a more comprehensive, highly recommended study about the deterioration of civil rights in Germany in general,[54] one must conclude that Germany’s tradition of free speech is rather underdeveloped. The general German attitude behind this – “tough measures are justified to prevent the repetition of this dark (Third Reich) chapter of our history” – is understandable, but it is wrong, too, since it leads to the paradox and perverse situation where, in order to prevent the persecution of minorities and the burning of books, minorities are persecuted and books are burned. This is exactly the situation we are facing in Germany today. In light of her history, the only correct position for Germany to take would doubtless be the strict and impartial granting of human rights for everyone – and that is not to suggest that this time they ought to be denied the other side for a change, either. Obviously, where human rights are concerned, Germany is caught in a historical vicious circle, or, to use a different metaphor: the pendulum is swinging wildly from one extreme to the other. It is high time that it came to rest in the middle.
If you want to learn more about human rights violations in Germany, please read my paper “Discovering Absurdistan”
Notes
| [1] | For more see Claus Nordbruch, Sind Gedanken noch frei? Zensur in Deutschland, Universitas, Munich 1998. |
| [2] | The opinions about this differ slightly: acc. to Dietrich Strothmann, Nationalsozialistische Literaturpolitik, 3rd ed., Bouvier, Bonn 1985, some 12,500 books, acc. to Dietrich Aigner, Die Indizierung “schädlichen und unerwünschten Schrifttums” im Dritten Reich, vol. XI of the Archiv für Geschichte des Buchwesen, Buchhändlervereinigung, Frankfurt/Main 1971, the number was less than 10,000. |
| [3] | For some more details see, e.g., Martin Lüders, Nation und Europa, vol. 47(9) (1997), pp. 7-11. |
| [3a] | The list of all books banned by the Allies (Liste der auszusondernden Literatur) was recently reprinted by Uwe Berg-Verlag, Toppenstedt (Germany) 1983/84 (Deutschen Verwaltung für Volksbildung in der sowjetischen Besatzungszone/Ministerium für Volksbildung der Deutschen Demokratischen Republik (ed.) Liste der auszusondernden Literatur. Index der in der sowjetischen Besatzungszone verbotenen Bücher nach dem Stand vom 1. April 1946; Erster Nachtrag zum Index der in der sowjetischen Besatzungszone verbotenen Bücher nach dem Stand vom 1. Januar 1947; Zweiter Nachtrag zum “Index” der in der sowjetischen Besatzungszone verbotenen Bücher nach dem Stand vom 1. September 1948; Dritter und letzter Nachtrag zum “Index” der in der sowjetischen Besatzungszone verbotenen Bücher nach dem Stand vom 1. April 1952, 4 vols., Zentralverlag, Berlin (East) 1946-1948, 1953). It can be found completely at vho.org/censor/tA.html. |
| [4] | Two recent studies of censorship in Germany, highly to be recommended: Jürgen Schwab, Die Meinungsdiktatur. Wie “demokratische” Zensoren die Freiheit beschneiden, Coburg: Nation Europa Verlag, 1997, 338 pp.; Claus Nordbruch, op. cit. (note 1). |
| [5] | The Federal Constitutional Court’s decisions were quoted from: Karl-Heinz Seifert, Dieter Hömig (eds.), Grundgesetz für die Bundesrepublik Deutschland, 2nd ed., Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, Baden Baden 1985. |
| [5a] | See on this the legal expert report by the defense lawyer Dr. G. Herzogenrath-Amelung as presented in my Asylum case. |
| [6] | Eduard Dreher, Herbert Tröndle (eds.), Strafgesetzbuch, 47th ed., Beck, Munich 1995, Strafgesetzbuch, 47th ed., MN 18 regarding §130. |
| [7] | Stefan Huster, “Das Verbot der ‘Auschwitz-Lüge’, die Meinungsfreiheit und das Bundesverfassungsgericht”, Neue Juristische Wochenschrift, 1995, pp. 487ff., here p. 489. |
| [8] | Daniel Beisel, “Die Strafbarkeit der Auschwitz-Lüge”, Neue Juristische Wochenschrift, 1995, pp. 997-1000, here p. 1000. |
| [9] | Karl Lackner, Strafgesetzbuch, 21st ed., Munich, 1995, MN 8a regarding §130; the criticisms of this article are legion; cf. Hans A. Stöcker, Neue Zeitschrift für Strafrecht, 1995, pp. 237-240; Manfred Brunner, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Aug. 17, 1994; Ernst Nolte, ibid., Sept. 8, 1994; Ronald Dworkin, Tageszeitung, May 17, 1995; Horst Meier, Die Zeit, Sept. 15, 1995; Horst Meier, Merkur 12/1996: 1128-1131. |
| [10] | Theodor Leckner, in Adolf Schönke, Horst Schröder (eds.), Strafgesetzbuch, 25th ed., Beck, Munich 1997, p. 1111. |
| [11] | Ibid., p. 1103. |
| [11a] | Thomas Wandres, Die Strafbarkeit des Auschwitz-Leugnens, Strafrechtliche Abhandlungen, neue Folge, Vol. 129, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2000. |
| [12] | Federal Minister of Justice Edzard Schmidt-Jorzig, Ruge. NeunzehnZehn: “Ehrenschutz für Soldaten – Gesetz gegen die Meinungsfreiheit?”, 3-SAT, March 10, 1996, 19:10; same, Mut, no. 351, 11/1996: 32-35; Wolfgang Schäuble, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, April 24, 1996, p. 41. |
| [12a] | Bundestags-Drucksache 15/5051, p. 5; http://dip21.bundestag.de/dip21/btd/15/050/1505051.pdf. |
| [12b] | Bayerischer Verwaltungsgerichtshof, verdict of 10 Aug. 2005, ref. 24 CS 05.2053; confirmed and more thoroughly justified by the German Federal Administrative Court (Bundesverwaltungsgericht), verdict of 25 June 2008, ref. 6 C 21.07. |
| [12c] | Press release of 4 Nov. 2009 (based on case # 1 BvR 2150/08); cf. www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/pressemitteilungen/bvg09-129.html |
| [13] | Until 2002, this authority carried the name Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Schriften, BPjS. |
| [14] | The latest “comprehensive listing”, Gesamtverzeichnis indizierter Bücher, Taschenbücher, Broschüren und Comics, Stand 30.4.1993, includes about 2,500 titles. Some 120 more have since joined the ranks. The list of indexed video tapes is about the same length. Added to this are several hundred electronic sound and data carriers. The current indexing lists are published in the periodical of the Federal Review Office for Youth-Endangering Publications, BPjS aktuell. To order: Bundesprüfstelle, Postfach 26 01 21, D-53153 Bonn, Germany. |
| [15] | See the German government website www.bmfsfj.de for more information. |
| [16] | Eckhard Jesse, “Streitbare Demokratie und ‘Vergangenheitsbewältigung'”, in Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (ed.), Verfassungsschutz in der Demokratie, Carl Heymanns Verlag, Cologne 1990, p. 304, cf. p. 289. |
| [17] | Ibid., p. 287; cf. also p. 303: “Liberal society may not stifle or suppress the free exchange of ideas and points of view.” |
| [17a] | Ibid., p. 286. |
| [18] | Udo Walendy, Wahrheit für Deutschland, 3rd ed., Verlag für Volkstum und Zeitgeschichtsforschung, Vlotho 1976; engl.: Truth for Germany, ibid. |
| [19] | Ref. 1 BvR 434/87. |
| [20] | JMS-Report, February 1/1995, pp. 52-54. |
| [21] | Ref. 17 K 9534/94. |
| [22] | In article 244 the German Code of Criminal Procedure provides for the option to refuse evidence if the point at issue is self-evident, which is a fundamental premise on the part of the courts, where the Holocaust is concerned (“judicial notice”). |
| [23] | Franz J. Scheidl, self-pub., 6 vols., Vienna 1967. Most of the books mentioned here can be found on the web site vho.org, some of them even in an English translation (at least linked to). |
| [24] | Emil Aretz, Verlag Hohe Warte, Pähl 1973. |
| [25] | Ingrid Weckert, Grabert, Tübingen 1981; ordered seized and destroyed in 1995; in English: Flashpoint: Kristallnacht 1938, Institute for Historical Review, Newport Beach (CA) 1991. |
| [26] | Steffen Werner, 2nd ed., Grabert, Tübingen 1991; ordered seized and destroyed in 1995. |
| [27] | Arthur R. Butz; in German: Verlag für Volkstum und Zeitgeschichtsforschung; in English: The Hoax of the Twentieth Century, Institute for Historical Review, Newport Beach (CA) 1976, 1992. |
| [28] | Gesamtverzeichnis indizierter Bücher, Taschenbücher, Broschüren und Comics, Stand 30.4.1993, p. 8: Index No. E 2765, Bundesanzeiger no. 95 of May 22, 1979. |
| [29] | Thies Christophersen, “Die Auschwitz-Lüge”, Kritik issue no. 23, Mohrkirch: Kritik Verlag, 1973, available today from Vrij Historisch Onderzoek, Berchem Belgium. |
| [30] | The leftist Tageszeitung (Berlin) reported on this in a surprisingly fair manner, Dec. 12, 1995. |
| [31] | Bundesanzeiger of Sept. 30, 1994. |
| [32] | Wigbert Grabert, of Grabert Verlag in Tübingen, to the author. |
| [33] | Abendzeitung (Munich), March 7./8., 1998: “The remaining copies are occasionally being burnt in a wast incinerator.”, regarding R. J. Eibicht, Hellmut Diwald; cf. Zur Zeit (Vienna), no. 9/1998 (Febr. 27): “65 years ago this happened publicly, today this is being achieved on the quiet in waste incinerators.” |
| [34] | Admission of the Federal Government, Bundestagsdrucksache 13/4222, March 26, 1996, p. 6. Germar Rudolf tries to compile a list of books confiscated in Germany, see vho.org/censor/Censor.html. Due to lack of official information, this list is necessarily incomplete. Links to confiscated books that are available online can be found there, so no further URLs are given for them in this article’s footnotes. |
| [35] | Richtlinien für das Strafverfahren und das Bußgeldverfahren (Guidelines for penal procedure and fining procedure), No. 208, II + IV; according to Gerd Pfeiffer (ed.), Karlsruher Kommentar zur Strafprozeßordnung, 3rd ed., Beck, Munich 1993, p. 2174. |
| [36] | Cf. Wigbert Grabert (ed.), Geschichtsbetrachtung als Wagnis, Grabert, Tübingen 1984; see also DGG, “Bundesverwaltungsgericht im Dienste der Umerzieher. Erstmalig Doktorgrad aus politischen Gründen aberkannt”, in Deutschland Geschichte und Gegenwart 36(3) (1988), p. 18 (online: vho.org/D/DGG/DGG36_3_2.html); DGG, “Unglaubliches Urteil im Fall Dr. Stäglich”, ibid., 36(1) (1988), p. 7 (online: …/DGG36_1_1.html); DGG, “Vernunft wird Unsinn … Späte Rache für den ‘Auschwitz-Mythos'”, ibid., 31(1) (1983), pp. 19f. (online: …/DGG31_1.html); DGG, “Ende der Wissenschaftsfreiheit?”, ibid., 29(3) (1981), p. 38 (online: …/DGG29_3_1.html). |
| [38] | However, the black-listing of two of these issues is mentioned: Historische Tatsachen no. 23 (“Zigeuner bewältigen eine 1/2 Million”), Decision No. 4208, Bundesanzeiger 204 of Oct. 31, 1991, and Historische Tatsachen no. 36 (“Ein Prozeß, der Geschichte macht”), Decision No. 4029, Bundesanzeiger 64 of March 31, 1990. |
| [39] | Jürgen Graf, Auschwitz. Tätergeständnisse und Augenzeugen des Holocaust, Neue Visionen, Würenlos 1994; confiscated by the Mannheim County Court, 41 Gs 2626/94, released by the Mannheim District Court, 5 KLs 7/95. |
| [40] | Landtag (state parliament) of Baden-Württemberg, 12th session, Paper 12/334, Parliamentary question by Rep. Michael Herbricht REP, “Appell der 500” Stuttgart, Aug. 27, 1996. Position of the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Justice, Stuttgart, Sept. 23, 1996, Ref. 4104 – III/185, Dr. Ulrich Goll. |
| [41] | “Appell der 100 · Die Meinungsfreiheit ist in Gefahr!”, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, May 17, 1996; in the Stuttgarter Nachrichten and the Stuttgarter Zeitung on July 19, 1996, with 500 signatures; in the Westfalen-Blatt on Sept. 13 and 18, 1996, with 1,000 signatures each. |
| [42] | Expert reports by Prof. Dr. Ernst Nolte and Dr. Joachim Hoffmann, Tübingen County Court, Ref. 4 Gs 173/95; the latter was published in Vierteljahreshefte für freie Geschichtsforschung, 1(3) (1997), pp. 205ff.; an English translation was printed in G. Rudolf, Dissecting the Holocaust, 2nd. ed., Theses & Dissertations Press, Chicago, IL, 2003, pp. 563-566 (online: www.vho.org/GB/Books/dth/fndHoffmann.html); a translation of Nolte’s expert report appeared in the book G. Rudolf, Resistance Is Obligatory, Castle Hill Publishers, Uckfield 2012. |
| [43] | As a reaction to the appeal referred to in note 41 during the parliamental session referred to in note 40, see IDN, “‘Appell der 500’ vor Landtag”, DGG 44(4) (1996), S. 9f. (online: vho.org/D/DGG/IDN44_4.html); VHO, “Zur Wissenschaftsfreiheit in Deutschland. Justizminister Württemberg: Wissenschaftsfreiheit ist nicht existent”, Vierteljahreshefte für freie Geschichtsforschung 1(1) (1997), pp. 34-37 (online: vho.org/VffG/1997/1/VHOWiss1.html) |
| [44] | Federal Constitutional Court, ref. 1 BvR 408f./83, reprinted in W. Grabert, op. cit. (note 36), pp. 287ff. |
| [45] | Karl Raimund Popper, Objektive Erkenntnis, 2nd. ed., Hoffmann & Campe, Hamburg 1984. |
| [46] | See notes 7-9, 11a. |
| [46a] | Grabert’s copy editor Dr. Rold Kosiek told me this in 2000 after I had inquired about the state of the case, since I had hoped that the confiscation of my book would eventually be dealt with by the German Constitutional High Court. |
| [47] | Cf. G. Herzogenrath-Amelung, op. cit. (note 5a). Incidentally, this American citizen, Frederick A. Leuchter, was arrested in Germany shortly before he was to appear on a major German television show. He fled to the United States when he was released from pre-trial detention, to await his trial in freedom. |
| [48] | G. Anntohn, H. Roques, DAGD/Germania Verlag, Weinheim 1995; cf www.vho.org/D/Deckert. |
| [49] | Oberkreisdirektor Herford, ref. 32/33.31.10. |
| [50] | Historische Tatsachen, Verlag für Volkstum und Zeitgeschichtsforschung, Vlotho, No. 1 (LG Dortmund, KLs 31 Js 270/78) (www.zundelsite.org/german/dsmrd/dsmrdgerman.html), 15, 23 & 24, 36, 38, 44, 52 & 53, 59 & 60, 1new & 64, 66, 67, 68. Walendy has published a separate issue on his own case: Historische Tatsachen no. 69: “Ausgehebelte Grundrechte”, and no. 77 “‘Vv’-Strafhäftling Walendy”, Verlag für Volkstum und Zeitgeschichtsforschung, Vlotho/Weser 1996/1999. Cf. G. Herzogenrath-Amelung, op. cit. (note 5a). |
| [51] | Apart from the present website with ample documentation, see also: Wilhelm Schlesiger, Der Fall Rudolf, Cromwell Press, London 1994 (Engl. online at www.vho.org/GB/Books/trc); Herbert Verbeke (ed.), Kardinalfragen zur Zeitgeschichte, Vrij Historisch Onderzoek, Berchem 1996 (Engl. online at www.vho.org/GB/Books/cq); G. Rudolf, Kardinalfragen an Deutschlands Politiker, Castle Hill Publishers, Hastings 2005. Needless to say that the need to distinguish carefully between facts and the subjective opinion of the author(s) applies in this case as well. |
| [52] | Hans Schmidt has also reported on this: Jailed in “Democratic” Germany. The Ordeal of an American Writer, Milton/FL: Guderian Books, 1997, 490pp. Again, it is necessary to distinguish carefully between facts and the author’s subjective opinion. The Australian citizen Dr. Fredrick Toben shared Schmidt’s fate in spring 1999 when he traveled to Germany in order to challenge the censorship of the German authorities. He was subsequently arrested and sentenced; see www.adelaideinstitute.org. |
| [52a] | Against the books Feuerzeichen, Die 2. babylonische Gefangenschaft, Attilas Enkel auf Davids Thron and Vorlesungen über Zeitgeschichte due to the statute of limitations without, but against Grundlagen zur Zeitgeschichte, In Sachen Deutschland, Wolfsgesellschaft and Hellmut Diwald with criminal proceedings and eventual convictions. |
| [53] | R. Dworkin, “A new map of censorship”, in Index on Censorship, 1/2 (1994), pp. 9-15; cf. R. Dworkin, “Forked tongues, faked doctrines”, ibid., no. 3 (1997), pp. 148-151. |
| [54] | G. Rudolf, “Discovering Absurdistan”, The Revisionist 1(1) (2003), pp. 203-219 (online: vho.org/tr/2003/2/Rudolf203-219.html and slightly updated right here ). |
