The Halved Constitutional State: The early FRG from the point of view of the past policy

Today's critical discussion about the Nazi past is regarded as a national policy in Germany. However, there remains a void that still needs to be publicly addressed. The judicial handling of Nazi crimes, which is a key issue in Germany's dealing with its past, belongs to an area with significant gaps that need further elucidation in the general perception of the Third Reich and academic research. The indicator of this handling is the criminal prosecution of violent crimes by the totalitarian regime, namely mass murder. The problem is that the criminal prosecution, which is the first step in the judicial reckoning of the Nazi past, was delayed. In the early Federal Republic, where more emphasis was placed on reconstruction through integration than thorough denazification, the process of uncovering and punishing Nazi crimes started late and ended with results far from true reckoning with the past. The delay in trials for Nazi crimes as judicial reckoning reflects the social and historical characteristics of the time. Due to personal continuity, the cohesion of the 'national community' established by the Third Reich persisted among the members of post-war German society. This meant that society was not ready to be outraged by the crimes committed by the illegal state, and the capacity for such outrage was minimal. Instead of a critical and unrelenting historical investigation under the deliberately propagated web of Nazism, social self-justification and subsequent self-exoneration were the main concerns. The result was 'belated prosecution.' The criminal prosecution of Nazi mass murders proceeded slowly, and the judgments were very lenient. The delay in judicial reckoning in the early Federal Republic hindered the development of post-war Germany into a constitutional state and democracy. It cannot be overlooked that the 'successful democracy' initially operated as a 'formal rule of law.' Considering the incomplete 'substantive rule of law,' the early Federal Republic is assessed as a 'halved constitutional state.'