by Michael Fassbender

Created on: July 07, 2011   Last Updated: July 08, 2011

Hans Frank was an early adherent to the Nazi movement.  A lawyer by profession, he spent more than a decade in Hitler’s service in that capacity.  He is best known, however, for his harsh and corrupt rule in Poland after the war began.  

Frank finished his studies in 1926, and soon joined the Nazi movement as a member of the SA.  Before long, it was determined that he could perform more useful services than marching in the street; Hitler was convinced that if he were to take power, he would have to do so within the law, and so he had constant need of solid legal advice.  Frank was the man to give it.

In 1929, Frank was placed in charge of the Nazi legal department.  Such a position ensured that he would not be overlooked after Hitler came to power.  In 1933, he was appointed Minister of Justice in the Bavarian government.  By 1934, he had risen to national prominence as Reich Commissioner of Justice.  He was also made a Minister in the Nazi government, without portfolio, and established the Law Academy, serving as its president.

In these capacities, Hans Frank played a strong role in creating the legal underpinnings of Nazi rule, or more accurately, the illusion of legal underpinnings.  Hitler wished for a system that recognized his will as the only true law, and so there were few substantial theoretical changes.  Practical changes were made to ensure that Hitler and his subordinates could direct society more easily, but broad legal declarations were usually shunned, as they often tied the hands of political leaders.

Two major developments that occurred under Frank’s legal oversight were the transformation of the judiciary and the replacement of the primacy of law by the primacy of national priorities.  In the former case, judges were offered a greater measure of prestige and independence from precedent and procedural nuances, but they were also expected to take the expectations of society into consideration in all cases.  In other words, they were not to be the unbiased interpreters of law, but rather, to advance the priorities of the government, as presented through the Ministry of Justice.

In the second case, the protection of individual rights, as demonstrated in such principles as the rights of the accused in a criminal case, was replaced with the advancement of the community’s rights alone, and such rights were to be interpreted according to the dictates of the Führer. 

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