The legal history of the “Third Germany”

 

With the Confederation of the Rhine Napoléon, for a short period of time, established a Third Germany in addition to Austria and Prussia and pushed for the incorporation of his Cinq Codes in the states of the confederation. Bavaria, Württemberg and Baden partially took over the French law, while it was fully adopted by the short-lived 'model states' of Westphalia, Berg and Frankfurt. This was how, in the first years of the 19th century, the influences reached the German legislation for the first time that would shape the German legal history through until the implementation of the Reichsjustizgesetze in 1879 and pave the way for an independent, state of law administration of justice with a strict separation of executive and judicial branches, equality of all citizens before the law and courts, publicity and orality of process and an own prosecution service. Therefore, while the 'Third Germany' only lasted a few years, the influence of French law in Germany was lasting.

The research project 'The legal history of the 'Third Germany'' will focus on the development of procedural law and the judicial institutions in the former Confederation of the Rhine states as well as the debate concerning judicial and legal theory of the 19th century. It looks at the concept of judges in the south German states of early constitutionalism as well as the efforts to overhaul the procedural law and the creation of a state of law legal constitution concerning the courts until the Reichsgründung and the influence the development of the former Confederation of the Rhine member states over all of Germany. This will be pursued without limitation, so that it will also be possible for the formation of specialised courts to be the subject of the research. Furthermore, judiciary analysis will be included, as this is essential for the assesment of interaction of legal, economic and social history of the 19th century.