Advokaten 1938
March 7 | 7 PM
Please RSVP here
Join us for the presentation of the 2nd edition of the aforementioned book. This event is organized in cooperation with the “Association of Research of the Professional History of the Members of the Austrian Bar Association which were Discredited Between 1938 and 1945 – Advokaten 1938”. Austrian violinist Lena-Marie Stoger will accompany the event with musical pieces by Johann Sebastian Bach.
**Evening Program**
Welcome
Dr. Susanne Keppler-Schlesinger, Director, Austrian Cultural Forum New York
Mag. Helene Steinhaeusl, Consul General, Austrian Consulate General New York
Dr. Armenak Utudjian, President Austrian Bar Association (ÖRAK)
Accompanying Words of Sponsors
Prof. Mag. Hannah M. Lessing, Secretary-General of the National Fund of the Republic of Austria for Victims of National Socialism
Accompanying Words of the Editor
Dr. Alix Frank-Thomasser, Attorney, Founder of the Law Firm ALIX FRANK and President of the Association ”Advokaten 1938“
Book Presentation
Univ.-Prof. Dr. Ilse Reiter-Zatloukal, Head of the Institute of Legal and Constitutional History at University of Vienna and Author of “Advokaten 1938”
Closing Remarks
About Lena-Marie Stoger
Austrian violinist Lena-Marie Stoger is a senior at Rice University Shepherd School of Music, studying with Kathleen Winkler. She is an avid chamber musician and has shared the stage in chamber music concerts with renowned musicians including James Dunham, Brinton Smith, and Jon Kimura Parker. Receiving the Jack Kent Cooke Young Artist Scholarship enabled her to purchase her beloved violin.
Background
The downfall of Austria as an independent state and its annexation to the German Reich in 1938 implied for many lawyers the end of their career. On March 13, 1938, 2,605 lawyers were registered in the list of the Austrian Bar Association in Vienna. By the end of that year, only 771 of them remained. On the basis of the regulation of March 31, 1938[1], it became possible to ban Jewish lawyers and solicitors from the exercise of their profession, depriving them of their livelihoods. As of September 1938, also “half-breed Jews” had to be deregistered from the list of the Austrian Bar. The dimension of the terror and injustice linked with these grueling developments are brought to light with this new and comprehensive compendium that serves as a memorial book as well as a critical analysis. The “Association of Research of the Professional History of the Members of the Austrian Bar Association which were Discredited Between 1938 and 1945” has been founded by all the regional Chambers of Lawyers of Austria including the ÖRAK (Österreichischer Rechtsanwaltskammertag) and has the duty to investigate the professional fates of lawyers’ existences lost between 1938 and 1945. What is the story of these colleagues, what was their personal history as lawyers, how did their lives develop? These and other questions will be explored in the course of this event which aims at thoroughly revisiting this part of the history of the Austrian lawyers. The book “Advokaten 1938” was published by the Association in November 2010. Since then, more archives and their digitalization have enabled them to continue their research and to document the personal and professional history of about 400 colleagues whose lives could not be documented sufficiently well in the 1st edition of the book. Moreover, the new edition includes the documentation of the professional lives of all lawyers in training (“articled clerks”: had to pass a mandatory traineeship in order to become admitted to practice). The results of this recent research were published in a 2nd edition of the book “Advokaten 1938” in English language. This 2nd edition includes further information about Nazi propaganda specifically concentrated on the legal profession of lawyers in various propaganda newspapers with a lime light on propaganda displayed in “Völkischer Beobachter”.
[1] RGBl I page 353