Nuremberg Laws, anti-Jewish legislation and the Jim Crow Laws (due Wed., Feb. 2)
 

In a brief few years, the Nazis managed rapidly to put in place a succession of laws--from the Nuremberg laws to the cascade of anti-Jewish acts that swiftly narrowed the rights and options available to Jews living in Nazi Germany.

In the handouts you have today, you read excerpts from Jim Crow Laws in the United States as well as comments about miscegenation (racial mixing) in this country. See http://www.learntoquestion.com/class...es/000630.html

So here's the question--or should I say questions:

Are the actions directed toward blacks that were in place during the twentieth century in the United States in any way comparable or related to the anti-Jewish measures put in place in Nazi Germany? Why or why not? Be specific--and explain!

Moreover, do acts like the responses to the Reichstag fire in 1933 (e.g.---the Enabling Act and related legislation) bear any comparison to the Patriot Act and other actions in response to 9/11 in this country? Again, explain.

In other words, is there a valid comparison to be made between events in the 1930s in Germany and events in the first decade of the 21st century in the United States? Why or why not?

I am really glad we are doing this post because these are the exact questions and concerns that came to my mind when reading the handouts and hearing the similarities between the burning of the Reichstag and the World Trade Center and the ensuing madness, etc etc.

I thought to myself, o my God. This is so scary. The Reichstag burns down, Hitler creates all of these massively scary laws and everyone lets him do so becuase they are in a state of panic. World Trade Center is destroyed, George Bush puts in place some other really scary laws (PATRIOT Act, so on and so forth) and there is little to no protest. Bush has continued to have his way with our country based upon this culture of fear and impending doom. They never caught the guy who burned the Reichstag, we never caught Osama. I know i thought of some more eery similarities but... sufficed to say, it was a little scary to think about.

The one thought that I was consoled with was that Hitler expressley singled out Jews in his control of the country. Okay, now that I try to expand on this point o view, its really not that great. I could say that the Jews had some pretty clear signs that they were being singled out and nothing like that is happening here, but back then , there was no hindsight, like Ms. Freeman said in class, and they had no idea how significant the laws were. I guess the only way I could console myself with the similarity between our situation and that of 1930s Germany is that Bush hasn't singled out any racial group in his revoking of constitutional rights, it just affects everyone. Great!

So, the summarize, yes, the comparisons between 21st century US and 1930s Germany are completely, and chillingly, valid. In both of these turbulent situations,
our countries were stricken with a terrifying, life-altering event, which made people willing to sacrifice certain rights in exchange for safety. The scary part is how Germany has showed us that this concern for safety has the potential to blind us to horrifying events right in front of our eyes.

Now to the first part of the question, concerning Jim Crow laws and miscegenation. The actions towards blacks are most definitely comparable to those towards Jews ten to twenty years or so previous. Both groups were identified as inferior and were forced to be seperate for the "superior" peoples around them. Scientists and various "scholars" agreed that these groups should not be alllowed to intermix or "breed" with other races, in order to keep them pure. Finally, both were thought of as dirty, und subhuman, and prejudice of hem was carried out outrightly.

The question is, at what point did it get out of hand for the jews? Or maybe more so, what characteristic of the different groups caused one to be so much less hurt than the other? That one is hard to answer, and involves many deciding factors such as the character of the German and American people, the events of the time, etc.

But the laws put in place pertaining to these two groups are frighteningly similar. I think one of the most important differences is that in the United States, citizenship was not revoked.

MagdalenFr is right, the events are chillingly similar.

Nazi Germany and twentieth century American policies and views seem extremely similar. And sometimes equally ludacis. Germany was brought together from a confederation of many nations and people, and America prides itself with the diversity of people that makes it up. Yet these laws try to destroy that by singling out group(s) of people.

The seperation idea is similar, especially with the parks, like how they had the jewish- and non-jewish benches too. They both forbid marriages of peope of two races, for the same reasons: racial purity. (side question: If humanity generally sees itself as being far greater than animals, why do they compare themselves to them in issues like this?)

The lengths they go with that are similar too, with Germany the contradictory "what makes you a jew" rules" and in America the blood quota they seem to have going on what makes you white or what. Both have punishments for breaking them, though America (suprisingly...) seems to like fines as their method.

The Reichstag fire and the destruction of the World Trade Center Towers are similar (though again, U.S.->Trade Center->money). The fear and willingness to do more/less anything to rid themselves of it, led people to make some decision, or allow them, that weren't really a good idea. Points 5 and 7, of the 25 points seem eerily relevant to the U.S. now. (though bush seems to ignore point 15: We demand a generous increase in old-age pensions.)

With the war this seems very relevant too: 18. We demand that ruthless war be waged against those who work to the injury of the common welfare. Traitors, usurers, profiteers, etc., are to be punished with death, regardless of creed or race.

Restrictions of freedoms and rights too. The Nazis mention any news, etc. going against the common ideas; the governments ideas are to be quashed. The Patriot Act seems to be going down that road as well.

It's scary how valid a comparison can be made between the two.

Sharing in milliways and MagdalenFr’s creeped out-ness, I am also astonished at how similar these laws are. It just proves that history repeats itself, in various ways and under various circumstances.

Different public areas for Jews remind me 100% of the Jim Crow segregations. As Americans, we’ve all seen many pictures of water fountains, lunch counters or bathrooms labeled “WHITES ONLY”, yet now we’re learning that this stupid idea existed decades before. Sharing benches or bathrooms and sharing spouses, also something that is strikingly similar. The idea of interracial breeding was illegal in both cases. People feared so much that their blood lines would be marred by a black person, someone seen as subhuman just as Germans feared the marrying of Jews and “good” German citizens. After all everyone knows that “the hybrid product is inferior to the better strain” as Richard W. Edmonds said in 1957 in his Segregation Is It Justified?. The idea of what a Jew/Black person can or cannot do for work is interesting and similar. A black man couldn’t be the barber to a white female. A Jewish male couldn’t employ a German “Aryan” to work in his house. Maybe they thought a black barber would try to kill the women or the Jew would try to rape and impregnate the German woman. Both stupid and prejudice ideas.

Also quite similar are the responses to terrorist attacks in both the US and Germany. Seventy-two years apart, yet similar. Someone pointed out that neither the man in charge of 9/11 (good ol’ Osama) or the leader of the attack on the Reichstag have/were not caught. From fear came instability and from this vulnerability. Both the citizens of the US and German citizens allowed for policies enacted that seemed to violate their rights. However, we (Americans) have a lot more rights, and we’ve had them for longer so perhaps we value them more. Yet the Patriot Act legislation was met with little opposition. Hitler’s laws also had the same fate. If we have anything to be quasi-thankful about, it’s that the black population in the US never met the same doom as the many millions of Jews, homosexuals, Roma-Sinti and the disabled.

I think that the Nuremberg Laws and the Jim Crow laws were way to similar. While the laws itself were not word the same at all they were both created to make it perfectly clear that one group was better than the other. While in the Jim Crow Laws were basically to say ok we have to live with you but your still not as good as me. So here are the boundaries, we will live completely segrated. On the other hand the Nuremburg Laws basically said you don't want to be Jewish and if you are your not a citizen. Also if you interact witha Jew in any way shape or form then you are a Jew and you are not a citizen. Their actions, while similar and to basically prove the same point, were not exact. The african americans were treated horrible and we told they couldn't mix at all with white people. The Germans essentially wanted to do the same thing, but it was much harder to keep jewish people from intergrating into the german people, becasue they were already so intergrated. The Germans laws were also a bunch of crap, they essentially were to tell people if they were jewish. While the Jim crow laws functioned as a can and can not do list.

The reaction to the Reichstag fire was almost paralle to the reactions to 9/11. Both were extremly fightening events that left the nations wounded. In response peolpe gave up some basic rights, both the Patriot Act and the Enabling Act, leaving the leader of the country, Bush and Hitler, in total control of their countries. Both took away rights so that we could restore the saftey, but in Germany the problem was inside the country whereas in the US it came from an outside enemy.

So basically there are many comparisons that can be made between Germany and the US in that time. They both treated people living there unfairly, and made extremly ridiculous rules that treated those people as less than human. The part where it differs is that the US never tried to purposely exterminate its citizens to purify the country. Germany did. I believe the factor that allowed then to do that was that the US is made up of different types of people, that's what makes it what it is. One group maybe targeted, but it would very hard to exterminate people who weren't pure americans, because there really is no pure american, besides native americans. Germany went over board with it's "pure" obsession, and it also helped that their leader was insane to say the least. While I am no George Bush fan I must admit that I would much perfer him over Hitler.

While there are some eerie resemblances between the Jim Crow laws and the Nuremburg laws, there are also some important differences.

One similarity is the idea driving it, to maintain the purity of “White Race” or “German Race”. The analogies to breeding and outright pseudo-science to justify these legislations are clearly faulty, but people believed it with their greatest conviction.

Another interesting similarity is the qualification of what exactly makes a legal “negro” is. In some laws it is not specified, but others come up with the cut off: “1/8th or more negro blood”. I guess 1/16th negroes get all the breaks.

However there are some differences that make it so these laws are not completely analogous. Firstly there is the fact that blacks went from slaves to being second class citizens, whereas Jews went from being citizens to not being citizens at all. Secondly there was in America the “separate but equal” doctrine. Although it is clear that separate was inherently unequal, at least there was some pretense of equality. I don’t think the Nazi cared about giving the Jews some “looks nice on paper” fake equality that America gave to blacks.

While the laws are not entirely the same, I agree that it is enough to give anyone the creeps.

NurembergLaws:JimCrow:.ReichstagFire:_____
 

I must agree with my fellow classmates, on the similarity of the Jim Crow and the Nuremberg laws. I suppose, though, it should make sense. The rules stemmed from long held beliefs that one race (Aryan or white) was superior to another "race". With the knowledge that we have about eugenics, is it really any suprise that the fear of race mixing would lead to similar laws? I ust say that the one, really scary, statement, was the last quote, writte in 1964 about the UGeorgia students. This was twenty years after the Holocaust, and still these thoughts existed!

I must poitn out that the difference between the US and Germany was that the Jim Crow laws were enacted by states, where as the Nuremberg Laws were sent down from the Top of the German gov. I don;t know what is more frightening, a government that writes these laws, or one that turns a blind eye to them.

I have to disagree with the almost unamimous opinion that the Patriot Act is erily similar to the Enabling Act following the Reichstag Fire. I wonder how many of my classmates have read the Act in its entirty, or even read a summary of it? I will admit to being a bit ignorant myself, and have just read a summary of the Act ( see http://www.fas.org/irp/crs/RS21203.pdf for what I read).

So, form what I have garnered the simililarities betwene the Enabling Act and the Patriot Act are these: 1) that they both were enacted after a major tragedy in the nations 2) they both have euphimistic names:Law to remedy the misery of the people and the country and Patriot Act. The Patriot Act, however, does not give total contol of the government to George Bush, or any president for that matter (where as the enabling act placed the power in the hand sof the Chancellor and gave him the ability to change the constituyion). The Patriot Act tries to make the tracking and punishment of terrorists more easy, the unhappy side effect of this is the way that the act makes it easier for the government to acess private information: ie. voicemails.

While there are similarities, I would not say that they are in any way the same. Its not a simple analogy (Danke SAT) (see title of this post)

Scary Similarities????
 

So when reading the Jim Crow laws and the statements by various govt officials concerning miscegenation and race purity in the US- there was indeed a haunting similarity to Hitler's Nuremburg Laws.

- No interacial marriage- both the Nazis and the officials of many US felt thta the " mixing" of the bloods resulted in the lowering of the racial integrity of the nation- thye felt that like with " animals" ( hey Hitler siad that) mating a superior Human ( ie white/ Aryan ) with a lesser human ( ie black/ Jewish/ the myriads of other groups Hitler deplored) reuslted in a child somewhere in between the two parents and that was a go no go.

- They both thought the way to avoid this was segregation- In the US whites/ black only bus waiting rooms, restaurant counters, drinking fountains, schools...In Nazi Germany seperate benchs, yellow stars of David to identify Jews. Aryans not allowed to be employed by Jews, later seperate schools.

- They both had random ways of deciding what made someone " black" or Jewish" , someone was black if they had 1/8 Black heritage- 1/8!!!! That means you were black if one, count it if one of your Grandparents was black! In Germany you were Jewish- for a whole myriad of reasons- including having a Grandparent who was a member of the Jewish community, or being married to a Jew-or any number of confusing things- esentially it seemed you were Jewish if you had ever spent more than a few hours with a Jew.

- The African Americans in the Us were second class citizens in Germnay the Jews were not citizens at all- sure it can be argued that because of Southern tricks ( poll reading tests etc) and racism that blacks were disenfranchised- but under the Constitution ( 13th and 14th Ammendments) they had all the same rights as US citizens- of course thi swas ignored for the majority of the years following restoration. The Jews on the other hand had none of this, when their citizenship was revoked they were made foreigners in an inhospitable land.

-So why- if they were so different did the US not resort to such drastic acts like the Nazis in Germany to handle their " problem". It appears in the US that blacks were never regarded as a parasitic blight on humanity- sure in the South their live s (lynching) were not regarded in high esteem- but in the North where life still stunk for most Blacks- they were an integral part of society- and had more abiltiy to exert their rights. It appears as though everything was right in Germany- all the ingrediants for Genocide were there- anti-semtism- eugenics, fear, depression anger.... luckily these ingrediants never appeared simultaneously in the US -and hopefully never will.

So the Patriot Act. Sorry but I do not see the cataclysmic terrifying similarities between it and the Enabling Act after the Reichstag burnt down. Sure both were issued post traumatic Nation changing events. 9/11 and the fire at the Reichstag were similair in the fact that they terrified their respective nations-as both were attacks by " subversive groups" against the very foundation/ government of the nations. But Hitler' enabling act called into effect the exit clause in the Weimar constution- which allowed him in times of crisis to revoke all the rights of the German citizens and gave him supreme power. The Patriot Act does not revoke the rights of US citizen ( it may or may not depending on your stand point infringe on them), instead it trys to set up a system to hunt " terrorists" this includes sharing info between the CIA and the FBI, and a whole myriad of other provisiosn involving finding and prosecuting terrorists. In the intrest of this post I scanned some of the Act- and found a very interesting clause...
SEC. 102. SENSE OF CONGRESS CONDEMNING DISCRIMINATION AGAINST ARAB AND MUSLIM AMERICANS.
(a) FINDINGS- Congress makes the following findings:
(1) Arab Americans, Muslim Americans, and Americans from South Asia play a vital role in our Nation and are entitled to nothing less than the full rights of every American.
So it does not traget jsut Arab Americans etc. The other thing is though ti does extend Presidential Authority- he does not have tyrannical control like Hitler. Moreover- in Nazi Germnay people were getting arrested all the time for publishing pieces which spoke anti- Hitler- or making subversive Art. I don't know anyone who has been arrested for things concerning the Patriot Act.
End Idea- Do i think The Patriot Act is some Great Lovely Perfect Protective law like amny Germnas thought Hitler's Enabling Act was- no- I think it is a little sketchy- but I don't think it is a great conspiracy to deny Americans of their rights and give Bush total power.

Yes there were similarities between Germany and the United States. The Jim Crow laws and the Nuremberg laws shared the same legal discrimination and they used "science" to try to back it up (the 1/8 rule etc.). Germany did go into more detail with the scientific aspect and really tried to justify it more than the US did. All these laws were meant to keep the targeted group inferior and seperate - to paint them as lessers and outsiders. Different bathrooms, schools, benches: if such seperaters existed it would be impossible not to see Jews or Blacks as different.

However, there are important differences. The Jim Crow laws were designed to make blacks an inferior race so as to check any equality that might have arisen out of their newly achieved freedom. They had recently been slaves without any rights so whites preferred them to be beneath them, working under them. While the Nuremberg laws insinuated the same ideas, they took it a step further: Jews had been previously considered regular, first class citizens of Germany. With the Nuremberg laws, they were suddenly deprived of citizenship.

Also, the Nuremberg laws were created by the national government and it was nationally enforced. In the US, the Jim Crow laws were passed only in former slave-states, not the entire country. The laws were unconstitutional, and the fact that nothing was done to prevent their passing and enforcement is chilling, but it is an important difference.

As to the Patriot Act being compared with the Enabling Act, there are similarities. Both were passed after tragedies and both governments played on the fears of the people to get the acts passed. While I agree that the Patriot Act does limit our basic freedoms, it is less direct than the Enabling Act. The Enabling Act is clear in its intent. The Patriot Act's alleged attempt is to aid in the capture and prevention of terrorists by bettering communication between our protective forces. However the Patriot Act is used in non-terrorist purposes and due to loopholes in it, people can exploit it to limit basic first ammendment rights. It also has random sections that have nothing to do with terrorism such as amendments to computer fraud laws.

But these infractions of rights which I find oh-so terrible do not really compare to how limiting in rights the Enabling Act was. There are eery connections, but not enough to make me think we are turning into Nazi Germany.

America Vs Germany; Bush Vs Hitler
 

In a way the blacks and Jews can be seen as similar victims. Both are forced to be segregated and separated as if some disease. Both also have very explicit laws stating what is a Negro or Jew and how much blood/ancestry one has to have to be labeled as such. Both certainly have prohibition against intermarriages and interesting enough both have laws prohibiting against contact with females. Prohibition to employ females and probation to cut white female hair.

Thus one can say that the actions directed toward the groups are similar but the situations are also different. Although both the Jewish and Negro are considered race and both are seen as inferior to the superior race of Aryan and White Race, yet the Jews seem to be in a much worse situation. The blacks had some friends, the abolitionists and other people who want to support a true democracy and thus grant the equality of voting, etc. Jews were stripped of their right to vote and thus live in more of a tyranny while the blacks did have somewhat a small vote, despite the fact they were oppressed into not exercising their right to vote. In short, both the Jews and African Americans were considered inferior and lesser, but the Jews had harsher punishments (hard labor versus 500 dollars fine or 6 months imprisonment) and a much less democratic society than the African Americans.

Instinctively, humans’ first concern is survival and with survival comes safety. So if we had to trade in certain rights for our guaranteed safety, some might just be completely willing to do so. In agreement with my fellow peers, Bush was voted into office and given so much support with the war against of terrorism because of 9/11 just like how Germans supported the Nazi Party after the fire. The Patriot Act also compromises some rights but never to the extreme of the Enabling Act which gave the Nazis and Hitler complete dictatorial powers. Therefore yes in a way the comparison is valid. However, although Bush has greater support after 9/11 to take any measures against the terrorists, some people still opposed and also gave opposition to the Iraq war. Democracy perhaps has dug deeper in her roots and people would continue to voice their beliefs and never subject to a dictator. Thus I do not think Bush will ever be able to achieve the power that Hitler had.

The Jim Crow Laws and the Laws against Jews by the Nazi party have similarities. Jews were not allowed to intermarry the same as blacks weren’t allowed to intermarry. There were separate facilities and the Jewish race was completely alienated from the rerst of society just as the black race was separated from the rest of society.

Some differences that I see, however, is the amount of force used to enforce each set of laws and the time of each culture’s history that the laws were introduced. For African Americans I think that the Jim Crow laws were extremely harsh but with time the lives of African Americans became better. However, for Jews the Nazi laws were just the beginning of the several years of persecution that Jews would receive. Also, the Jim Crow Laws were imposed severely on blacks because whites thought that blacks were inferior and needed masters. Hitler imposed the laws on the Jews because he not only thought that they were an inferior race but a useless race that deserved nothing more than death which he eventually gave them. African Americans were still allowed to work and get educated whereas Jews were eliminated from any facilities that could better themselves. So I guess what I am trying to say is that although the set of laws are similar the way they were used and and the steppingstone they acted as in each(blacks and Jews) history is very different.

On the note of the Patriot Act being similar to Germany’s 1933 reaction to the burning of the Reichstag seem to also be similar. In both sitruations the populations were stricken with fear and put all their confidence and freedom into the hands of basically one man. Hitler led an assault on the Jews as a result and Bush is leading an assault on Arabs as a result. Although Bush’s reaction is more civil it still seems wrong in some ways yet Americans still feeling fear from 9/11 allow Bush to proceed just as German citizens helped Hitler to destroy millions of Jews.

Something that actually makes Jim Crow laws look tame.
 

It has already been made clear that there are definite similarities in the loss of rights that we find under the Jim Crow laws in the American South and the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, most specifically in the terms of the barring of intermarriage. I agree that the Mississippi and Maryland provisions that stipulate one-eighth "Negro blood" as the qualifier of a black person are harsher in some respects than the Nazi definitions of Jewry under Article 5 of the Laws on Citizenship and Race are harsher, but it's kind of interesting to note how the Nazis bother to be very specific (confusingly so) about what exactly constitutes a Jew, whereas the laws in the American South take the definition for granted.

The difference, I think, in the case of the Jim Crow laws, is that they aren't predicated on the idea that black people do not belong in society; it looks like they want the blacks on the low road, the whites on the high road, and never the twain shall meet. Missouri's policy on education, Maryland's policy on miscegenation, and Georgia's policy on parks are all focused on keeping blacks away from whites and whites away from blacks. (Interestingly, Maryland doesn't like people of the "Malay" race as well. I don't quite get what they mean.) The Nuremberg Laws do nothing to create a parallel society for Jews, nor do any of them stipulate the creation of parallel facilities for Jews.

The analogy between the Reichstag fire and 9/11, in my opinion, is more compelling. (Really, this is a question for an entirely separate thread, because it gets Jim Crow laws mixed up in the 21st century, where they really have no place.)

What's really most troubling about the Reichstag fire-9/11 analogy is the fact that by looking at the beneficiaries of the Reichstag fire, modern scholars have supposed that it was set by the Nazis. By the same doctrine, however, it's perfectly possible that the Bush White House facilitated or allowed the 9/11 attacks to happen in order to push forth their agenda. Let's face it: before 9/11, Bush was a whiny one-termer illegitimately installed in office by the Supreme Court, and afterwards he became our great leader. I'm not sure that I believe the idea, but it's interesting — and not impossible.

The USA PATRIOT Act is clearly a less offensive piece of legislation than were the Enabling Act and Hitler's miscellaneous 1933 decrees. Yes, the Fourth Amendment no longer exists, and the Act hides most of its objectionable features by describing how words are inserted into existing provisions in the USC (also, 150 pages, by God), but it doesn't give George Bush unlimited power to save the state. But why?

Frankly, I think the biggest similarity between post-9/11 and post-Reichstag legislation is that they both have produced specimens that are as horrible as the political climate would allow. Suspension of habeas corpus or the Constitution, in the absence of something as pandemic as a nuclear attack on the United States, is simply not possible in the 21st century — the government's assault on our liberty in the name of terrorism needs to be more insidious, and those charged with the erosion know it.

Is the 21st-century United States similar to Weimar and post-Weimar Germany? Absolutely. A wave of unprecedented prosperity, tolerance, and inversion of social paradigm in large cities followed by a catastrophic event, a faceless and poorly-defined enemy, and a conservative backlash. The only thing lacking is a stated agenda similar to Mein Kampf. Nevertheless, all analogies are necessarily limited, and we need to recognize that, barring an incredible gradualism on the part of Bush and the neoconservatives, domestic and international absolutism aren't exactly on the menu.

Agreed with all others: creepy.

I must admit, I read the title "Jim Crow Laws" and could immediately think of some obvious reasons we would get this list of laws: racial segregation of course, and we talked about intermarriage earlier in the year and today in class. But some of the other ones were much more shocking, of the "Insert American/German here and Black/Jewish there." The barber one struck me as most similar to the German law preventing Aryan women to work for Jewish men.

With these laws, comparison is DEFININTELY, 100% COMPARABLE--I don't see how you could say they aren't. The phrasing is "eerily" (popular word in this thread) similar to Nazi laws, and they come from the same source of racial superiority (on the other side of the handout, there was a quote about how humans should not breed like animals, but the white race needs to be protected) and were used to serve the same purpose of denying the "other" group citizen rights and basic human standing in the eyes of the government. Also, both set of laws is adamant about specifying the technicalities of their racial classifciations, JUST in case you didn't know you were Jewish or black.

As for the Patriot Act, I think less of a comparison can be drawn. First of all the circumstances are different, even if the reasons can be sort of connected. Hitler had much more power and of course, what he did eventually turned out terribly for millions of people. The Patriot Act has not NEARLY done as much damage. the reaction of the people are also extremely different. I think we would all agree the Patriot Act is nothing like what Hitler did, but many are crying foul about how it infringes upon rights. Hitler suspended the whole constitution and all rights. Much more extreme. Of course, Hitler COULD do that, whereas Bush does not. They're similar in regard to both coming after catastrophes and suspending some rights, but other than that, it's a bit of a stretch in my opinion to say they are alike.

I think that the actions aimed at blacks in the US in the 20th Century in some ways are comparable to the Anti-Jewish measures in Nazi Germany and in ways very different. The discrimination against the Jews in the Nuremberg laws parallels the discrimination against the blacks in this country as stated in the Jim Crow Laws. In both documents, the government determines who is black and who is Jewish. In both documents, the government determines who they can and cannot marry. The attitudes are somewhat the same in both sets of laws, especially because the people who proposed them wanted to keep the white race “pure”. Blacks threatened this idea according to supporters of the Jim Crow laws, and Jews threatened this idea in Germany. What’s the main difference? I think that the main difference between actions toward these groups of people is that in Germany it was more hard core. I know in this country that people were very much against blacks, but hatred against Jews in Germany was much more national. What comes to mind was Kristallnacht. This was an organized event that occurred all around Germany in the late 1930s. I know there was violence against blacks, especially in the south, but nothing compared to this attack. This kind of attack was well organized and efficient compared to the orgies of attacks that occurred against blacks in this country.

Yes, I do think that the reaction to the Reichstag fire is similar to how Americans reacted to 9-11, and once again no. After Reichstag, more power was given to Hitler. After 9-11, Bush didn’t necessarily have more power. Bush also didn’t use the event as a reason to have more control nor did he use it for selfish reasons like Hitler. But when it comes to the people, reactions were similar. Reactions like panic and outrage. But the Patriot act is different from the enabling act. The Patriot Act, even with its faults, was introduced primarily to protect US citizens as a result of the failure of the country to do just that. Where the Enabling act was just an excuse to give Hitler more power and that’s it.

The Jim Crow Laws and the Nuremberg Laws are very similar, but I really am not surprised by this. Both the blacks in the US and the Jews in Germany were considered a "lower class" and both were prosecuted, so is it really that odd that the laws to oppress them are similar. What is scary is that the Nuremberg laws were similar to laws passed HERE, in America.

There are many reasons as to why the two sets of laws are related. Intermarriage laws are similar for both countries. Here, marriage between white and black people was forbidden, while German 'Aryans' and Jews were not allowed to marry in Germany. Here, even passing out flyers to promote intermarriage was illegal, and people were punished like people were in Germany for supporting Jews.

America even had strange ways of defining whether a person was black or not, like the Nazis did for the Jews. Anyone who had 1/8 "negro" blood in them was black, just like how if someone had three Jewish grandparents in Germany they were defined as Jews.
Segregation was practiced in both societies also.

The difference between the two situations was that the Southerners were pissed that they actually had to do work since slavery was abolished, and the Germans were mad because the Jews supposedly held jobs while they were constantly unemployed.

As for the Patriot Act, I do not believe it is that similar to the Enabling Act. Sure it is an invasion of privacy, but I mostly agree with what IHEART4SEAT says:

The Patriot Act does not give the powers to Geroge Bush that Adolf Hitler recieved, and it certainly does not allow him to be a dictator. So I do not think there is a comparison between today and Germany in the 1930's...at least not yet.

There are similarities........... and differences
 

Specific Jim Crow laws bear many similarities with the anti-Jewish legislation of Nazi Germany. For example, the Nazis and Jim Crow law-makers have a unique interest in fractions and percentages.

There are also serious discrepancies as mentioned by Mrs. Darcyand Winston84, in reference to how exactly the respective legislations came to be and the different cascading social positions of Jews as opposed to the slow ascent of African Americans; I'll reference their lists of differences included in their posts to save space.

- Ultimately it is easy to compare and group together the two legislations in a certain sense, as Germany and the U.S.'s responses to their concieved "racially inferior" citizens were very alike. It even seems as though, when looking soley on the information that we have before us, that The U.S. and Nazi Germany seem to be on parallel roads of unique eugenic-based racism. In reality, such bleak and ignorant myths about race superiority were common throughout the world, most commonly in the West as such notions began there. What is imperative to note is that public opinion has changed dramatically over time: our handout testifies that public opinion has changed significantly even over the last forty years (Wesley George). Women themselves only achieved sufferage little more than ten years before Hitler's ascension into office, and that was in the United States. The depravity of Eugenics was all the rage in that time, and like a pair of handome heels, were worn everywhere even though they were proven to be uncomfortable, and a bad fit (Jessie Owens beating his "Arayan" competitors). Therefore perhaps analyzing to what ends the Eugenic manure was used in our country and theirs, would provide a more accurate representation of the real motives of the government.



The Reichstag fire and the Patriot Act were both consequences of panic, and a concieved need for immediate action. Both were made under the protective umbrella of the law, and were enacted for the common good. Essentially the motives are different though, I would hope. Hitler's ambitions, and reasons for creating the Enabling Act to us today are quite clear, let's pray that the President wasn't orchastrating another Watergate

Similarities+Differences ...
 

There are strong similarities between the Jim Crow laws and the Nuremberg laws. They were both created to keep the lesser humans from a superior group. Both had seroius punishments for anyone who disobeyed the laws. Whites couldn't marry blacks and "pure" Germans couldn't marry Jews. Things were kept segregated.

The differences between them are that the Jim Crow laws were trying to eep the neewly freed slaves from acquiring their rights as citizens and the Nuremberg Laws were tryig to deprive theJews of their rights as citizens. Althought htye were trying to accomplish different things they had the same idea behind them,, keep two groups segregated. The Nuremberg law tries to identify a Jewish person more than the Jim Crows tried to identify a Black person, which made the law more confussig because they contradicted themselves. We alos have eto remember that not all of the United staes had Jim Crow laws and All of Germany acted on the Nuremberg Laws.

I think that the Nuremberg laws is somewhat like the Patriot Act. They were created in a time where people were scared and confused. I think that if the U.S didn't have so much control over what the president can do ( checks and balances) then we might have gone a little further like the Nurembreg laws. The Reichstag fire is like 9/11. They triggered fear which made people give up their rights so they can be safe. In our case that happened w/o anyone reading the act and in Germany no one dared oppose Hitler at the time.

* We have to remember that history repeats itself and that ideas are still there!*

SiMiLARiTiES . .
 

As everyone has been saying the Jim Crow Laws are very much like the Nuremburg laws. In the U.S. blacks were the victims. In Germany, Jews were the victims. Pure Germans, Aryans were not allowed to marry Jews or associate with them. Jews couldn't employ these " pure people. " White people in the U.S. could not even have their hair cut by a black barber. You never know what might happen if someone of a less satisfactory race cuts your hair !! NOT THATTT !! These people are not lepors or diseased in anyway as a race, so why treat them that way? It makes me very angry to see how people have treated eachother in the past and since history repeats itself [ Jim Crow Laws and the Nuremburg Laws; prejudice against blacks and jews ] it is very possible for something like these two instances to happen again.

The similarities between the Reichstag fire in 1933 and the horrible attacks on 9/11 are very interesting. In class we discussed how the Reichstag fire might have happened in order to cause fear. The Germans were already in an economic slump and when things are bad people swing to the sides and the radicals, so why not set fire to the capital. This was good for the Nazis because they were deffinately not in the center. 9/11 was a scare and caused all of America to turn to eachother for help and comfort. They were both enacted after a horrible incident. I agree with IHEART4SEAT and I don't think that there are major similarities like the Jim Crow Laws and the Nuremburg Laws.

The Jim Crow laws as many have explained had their similarities to the Nuremberg laws. All the stuff about the not mixing of the superior race with the lesser race all rings fairly true in both. A particularly striking similarity was that between White females not being allowed to go to Black barbers and Aryan females not being allowed to go to work in Jewish homes. I would guess for the same reasons that the inferior race was sex crazed loonies!

There is an important difference however. Where as the Nuremberg laws were instated with the idea that Jewish race was a plight on society, people in the South of America knew there was a good use for black people. I mean, you need someone to be cheap labor share croppers don't you? After all they had found their usefulness worth fighting an entire war over (granted not only reason but it is so much fun to say the civil war was all about slavery!)

The enabling act does not hold many similarities with the patriot act. Sure the patriot restricts some of our liberties but it is not an enabling act. Bush still can't suspend my right to citizenship because I am a bleeding heart liberal.

So are we in danger of becoming a Nazi Germany? it is always something to watch out for but not worried too much. Though once the ACLU is officially disbanded I will start worrying.

I think it is more than clear that there are creepy similarties between the Jim Crow Laws and the Nuremburg Laws, namely, like many said, the preservation of the "white" and "German" race, especailly when it came to blacks and Jews, respectively.

Reading through these today makes me wonder about just how things actually were then, because the government seems to be allowed/able to make up these laws and stipulations that are really just incredibly crazy. I mean, don't get me wrong, there are PLENTY of descriptions on how to tell if someone is of the "Jewish Race" or has at least one black grandparent, making them 1/8 black and therefore a black citizen...

I completely agree with those who said that it clearly doesn't stop at the similarities. The differences really stand out, because it shows the vast disagreement in the two governments in what they were really trying to accomplish. The blacks were taken from slavery and given "freedom" but basically no rights whatsoever. The Jim Crow Laws did nothing more than completely segregate the two races all together, however, the US did try to keep things as equal as possible...i guess, though we learn that seperate is inherintly unequal, but that's another story all together.

The Germans on the other hand, had a completely different way of looking at this. For the most part, especailly post-Treaty of Versailles, the Jews were the majority of the first-class citizens. They had all of that taken away from them with one word (or well, document) from their government. They were in a country which has just removed them from its citizenship, however, everywhere else in the world that they can possibly turn to considers them German, and will of course, come back in a very bad way when things become rough, as we learned in class today.

There is another very important difference that we learned in class and that others have already touched on. While the Reichstag Burning can be with US' 9/11 the power of the leaders is exponentially different. Bush can only do so much through his own wishes/desires, there is a certain procedure that needs to be followed before another a drastic step can be taken. With Hitler, he was able to just change what he wanted when he wanted. He created these euphamistic laws and discounted their constitution. The fact that there was absolutely no balance of power with Hitler clearly creates a problem that never really should have been there.

Yesterday we were asking "what if" well I have another one today...What if Hitler had to answer to someone else and wasn't able to get rid of everything that Germany believed in and lived by. What would have happened if the German system was more like the American system? Would obiedience shine through, or would have others in the government put a stop to what he began to do with these Laws?