The Nuremberg Race Laws of 1935 deprived German
Jews of their rights of citizenship, giving them the status of "subjects"
in Hitler's Reich. The laws also made it forbidden for Jews to marry or
have sexual relations with Aryans or to employ young Aryan women as household
help. (An Aryan being a person with blond hair and blue eyes of Germanic
heritage.)
The first two laws comprising the Nuremberg Race
Laws were: "The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German
Honor" (regarding Jewish marriage) and "The Reich Citizenship
Law" (designating Jews as subjects).
Those laws were soon followed by "The Law
for the Protection of the Genetic Health of the German People," which
required all persons wanting to marry to submit to a medical examination,
after which a "Certificate of Fitness to Marry" would be issued
if they were found to be disease free. The certificate was required in
order to get a marriage license.
The Nuremberg Laws had the unexpected result of
causing confusion and heated debate over who was a "full Jew."
The Nazis then issued instructional charts such as the one shown below
to help distinguish Jews from Mischlinge (Germans of mixed race) and Aryans.
The white figures represent Aryans; the black figures represent Jews; and
the shaded figures represent Mischlinge.
The Nazis settled on defining a "full Jew"
as a person with three Jewish grandparents. Those with less were designated
as Mischlinge of two degrees: first degree - two Jewish grandparents; second
degree - one Jewish grandparent.
After the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, a dozen supplemental
Nazi decrees were issued that eventually outlawed the Jews completely,
depriving them of their rights as human beings.
INSTRUCTIONAL CHART