The anti-Semitic pamphlet which has aroused West German officials all the way up to Chancellor Konrac Adenauer was ordered temporarily confiscated yesterday by a Hamburg Civil Court.
The temporary order was issued against the brochure–written by Friedrich Nieland, a timber merchant, and printed by Adolf Heimbach–after the Hamburg Supreme Court declined to act. The action was taken by the lower court at the request of the Central Council of German Jews which contended that the pamphlet was an offense to the Jewish people. Kurt Fiedeking, former Hamburg mayor, represented the Central Council in the lower court.
Dr. A. Kronger, chairman of the Christian Democratic Party in the West German Parliament, said today that his party would study the possibility of introducing legislation against anti-Semitism. It was disclosed today that Dr. Emno Buetzer, chairman of the court which rejected a plea for prohibition of the brochure, has been accused of being himself the author of an anti-Semitic article published in 1935.
Two criminal courts previously had refused to try the merchant, accepting defense arguments that he did not seek to instigate racial hatred but had only criticized “a limited group” of “influential Jews.” The pamphlet blamed “international Jewry” for the fate suffered by German Jews under the Nazis and denied that the Nazis had murdered 6, 000, 000 Jews.
The merchant was not expected to appeal yesterday’s temporary court ban, having stated before he would no longer circulate the pamphlet. He said it had been intended only for “a small circle of readers,” The case meanwhile was under the investigation, on orders of Chancellor Adenauer, by the Bonn Ministry of Justice and by the Federal Attorney General.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
