[Frick, Wilhelm (1877–1946)] Pfundtner, Hans (1881–1945), ed.  Dr. Wilhelm Frick und sein Ministerium: Aus Anlaß des 60. Geburtstages des Reichs- und Preußischen Ministers des Innern, Dr. Wilhelm Frick Am 12. März 1937.  Munich: Zentralverlag der NSDAP, F. Eher Nachf., 1937. 29 cm; 202 pp. illustrated. A large volume (4to), bound in gilt-stamped red velvet. Covers worn: a very good or better copy.

FRICK'S OWN COPY, with his bookplate, inscribed to him by his deputy on the day of publication:

Herrn Reichsminister Dr. Frick / zum 60 Geburtstag / zugleich im Namen aller / Mitarbeiter / in dankbarer Verehrung überreicht / von seinem Staatssekretär / Hans Pfundtner / am 12. März 1937.

L to R: Wilhelm Frick, Adolf Hitler, and Hermann Göring on the day Hitler was named Chancellor of Germany, 30 January 1933

A superbly well-educated bureaucrat, Frick formulated many of the laws that established Nazi power. As a member of the Bavarian civil service, he was an early supporter of Adolf Hitler, helping him to gain German citizenship, and participating in the Beer Hall Putsch of 1923. In Mein Kampf, Hitler named Frick as one of the only government officials “who have the right to be considered as having taken active part in the creation of a national Bavaria.” When Hitler reorganized the Nazi Party in 1925, he drafted Frick to serve in its leadership corps, and when he became chancellor in 1933, he appointed Frick to his cabinet as Minister of the Interior.

Frick signing the administrative incorporation of the Sudetenland, October 1938

In this official capacity, Frick drafted such landmark legislation as the Enabling Act of 1933, granting Hitler plenary powers, and the antisemitic Nuremberg Laws of 1935, which established a legal basis for the Holocaust. He facilitated the eugenic extermination of “unproductive eaters” – Germans with mental and physical disabilities – and supervised the operation of concentration camps and the building of Auschwitz. It was Frick who organized the Gestapo, appointing Heinrich Himmler to run it, and Frick who introduced the yellow star to stigmatize Jews. He also promulgated laws banning what he called “nigger jazz” and tried to introduce Nazi prayers in school. They are reprinted in this volume.

Frick would be replaced as Interior Minister by Heinrich Himmler in 1943. After the war, he was tried for crimes against humanity and executed.

The lawyer disbarred, behind bars, and awaiting judgment at Nuremberg

Hans Pfundtner, the editor of this and other Nazi publications, had a long bureaucratic career before being appointed Frick's deputy in the Reich Ministry of the Interior. Trained as a lawyer, he helped to draft the Nuremberg Laws and other measures furthering the Final Solution. He and his wife committed suicide in 1945. 

Pfundtner and Frick sharing a moment

This collection of celebratory essays published in honor of Frick's 60th birthday is illustrated with portraits of the subject and the contributors, including Himmler. Brought to the United States as war booty by a Jewish G.I. from New York City, the book serves as a chilling relic of one of the most significant figures behind the rise of the Third Reich, and perhaps the paradigmatic exemplar of what Hannah Arendt famously termed "the banality of evil."

Selected References

• Bronner, Kevin M. Hitler's lawyer: Wilhelm Frick. Bronner, 2022
• Neliba, Günter. Wilhelm Frick: Der Legalist des Unrechtsstaates. Paderborn: Schöningh, 1992
• Lachmann, K. E., Trial Brief of Wilhelm Frick, Donovan Nuremberg Trials Collection, Cornell University. <https://digital.library.cornell.edu/catalog/nur00981>
• Read, Anthony. The devil's disciples: Hitler's inner circle. New York: Norton, 2004
• United States. Office of Chief of Counsel for the Prosecution of Axis Criminality. Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression, Volume 2, Chapter XVI, Part 9 <https://avalon.law.yale.edu/imt/chap16_part09.asp>