What Makes Someone a Jew According to the Nuremberg Laws? 6
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Samuel Polston August 4, 2015 HST 101: Global History Since 1500 Section # 41866 Sources of World Societies Chapter 30-3
The Nuremberg Laws were aimed at preserving the purity of the German race. One of the intentions of the Nuremberg Laws was to provide for who was considered to be a Jew or what it meant to be a Jew. This paper therefore examines the Nuremberg Laws, with an aim of answering the comparative question of what it meant to be a Jew according to the laws.
The Nuremberg Laws stemmed from the Nazi Racial Legislation of 1935, which was aimed at upholding the perceived Germanic racial superiority, and promoting …show more content…
For instance, under Section 3 of the Nuremberg Laws, no Jew was allowed to employ a female German national or kindred blood as a domestic worker (Ward & Gainty, 2012). This was construed by Höss (2013) as a way of preventing incidents of master-servant abuses (e.g. sexual abuse of female German national domestic servants by their Jewish masters), and which could, in some cases, lead to the breach of Section 2 of the laws. The Jews were also prohibited from associating with both the Reich and the German national flag. For instance, Section 4 of the Nuremberg Laws prohibited any Jewish person from hosting the Reich and/or national flag as well as hosting the colours of the Reich (Ward & Gainty, …show more content…
In addition, the supposed punishments for acting in breach of the various Sections of the laws were controversial, and so depended on the mood and attitude of whoever was presiding over as the ‘judge.’ For instance, Section 5(3) of the laws fell short of defining what constituted a fine as a punishment for acting in breach of Sections 3 and 4 of the laws. The implication thereof is that a ‘judge’ may sometimes impose a fine that is not commensurate with the offence