My project examines the legal reconstruction of West Germany after the Third Reich. I argue that the writing of the German Constitution (Basic Law) was profoundly shaped by the dual experiences of emigration and war crimes trials. It is my hypothesis that Atlantic emigration of Jewish and anti-Nazi jurists and the war crimes program in occupied West Germany were the impetus for two of Germany’s most important constitutional features: a legally enforceable catalog of basic rights, and a uniquely powerful constitutional court bound to uphold the constitutional system. This resulted in a system one prominent German legal historian has described as a “juridical democracy” in which parliaments have voluntarily ceded enormous power to courts for conflict resolution.
