to social, political and economic aspects could not be regulated by codified law alone; especially so, because codified law always lagged one step behind the case in need of settlement of law. Such cases could not, as is possible in “common law,” be regulated and decided on by general concepts of law; they merely gave cause for establishing new legal standards. This one example already reveals the necessity of dealing with the existing German legal system and with plans for reform entertained in Germany for decades. German law will form the basis for all considerations. We will, therefore, also have to deal with constitutional law and the technique of legislation. We shall proceed from the provisions of the Weimar constitution. We shall observe there the legislative functions of the Reichstag, the Reichsrat [Council of the Reich] and the Reich President. It will be shown that, since Bruening was Reich Chancellor, the weight of legislation shifted in ever increasing measure toward the right of the Reich President to issue emergency decrees. The turning point was formed by the Enabling Act [Ermaechtigungsgesetz] of 24 March 1933 which represents the basis for all future legislation. The cabinet was now empowered to pass laws on its own authority and even the right of the Reich President to draft and promulgate laws was abandoned. Thus, under consideration of article 56 of the constitution which allocated powers of policy determination to the Reich Chancellor, the right to legislate was practically conferred upon Reich Chancellor Hitler who, in the absence of time, made increasingly extensive use of it. The lawful passing of a law and its legal effects will necessarily be the subject of presentation. Thus, we are faced with the legal problem of the binding effect of the Fuehrer order. It will have to be examined whether this Fuehrer order was a literal order in the meaning of the Control Council Law, the effect of which is not to be looked upon as exempting from guilt, or, at the most as mitigating, or, whether we are not dealing here with a legislative act, to which this provision of the Control Council Law does not apply.