The West German Budestag, the Lower House of Parliament, approved today with one dissenting vote a bill urging 72 ex-Nazis now serving in the West German judiciary to resign. The House coupled the action with a warning that, if the advice was ignored, a constitutional amendment would be sought authorizing removal of such former Nazis with loss of pension rights and possible trial.
The measure is aimed specifically at judges and prosecutors who were involved during the Nazi period in court cases ending in “illegal death sentences. ” The measure called on such former Nazis to resign “voluntarily” before June 1962, and it assured full pension payments to those who did so.
The threat of removal action came in a declaration by the House that the constitutional amendment would be sought, under which procedures would be established to find which of such judges and prosecutors had been responsible for “inhuman and illegal” death sentences.
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.
