Holocaust Denial Case
Germany Federal Constitutional Court
90 BVerfGE 241 (1994)
- Written by Kelly Simon, JD
Facts
In 1991, a regional group of the far-right National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD) (plaintiff) held a meeting featuring David Irving. Irving was a revisionist historian known for denying that the mass killing of Jewish people under the Third Reich had occurred. The Bavarian government (defendant) permitted the meeting to occur, as long as the thesis that the Holocaust was a hoax was not promoted. In Germany, the Assembly Act allowed the government to prohibit meetings at which criminal violations were likely to occur. At an NDP meeting with Irving, it was likely that violations relating to the denigration of the memory of the dead, criminal agitation, and criminal insult would have occurred. The NPD held its meeting but claimed the restriction on topics discussed at the meeting was an unconstitutional intrusion on its right to freedom of expression. Lower courts rejected the NPD’s complaint. The Germany Federal Constitutional Court eventually reviewed NPD’s constitutional complaint.
Rule of Law
Issue
Holding and Reasoning (Herzog, Henschel, Seidl, Grimm, Söllner, Kühling, Seibert, Jaeger)
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