I. Identity Documents and Genocide: Case Studies 36 Due to the dynamics of the Dual State during the early period of Nazi rule, the bureaucratic effort was initially “beset by clashes of interests and problems of coordination and labor power,” compounded by insufficient staff to use the collected data.35 The clashes additionally reflected the conflicting priorities of the military, which wanted to be able to quickly mobilize men for its purposes, and those groups pushing a eugenics agenda, which sought to purify the “race” through a combination of positive and negative measures (e.g. pro-natalist policies in the case of pure “Aryans” and marriage prohibitions and forced sterilizations for all others).36 The next major development towards the racialization of identity in Nazi Germany occurred in September of 1935 with the unanimous passage of two pieces of legislation commonly known as the Nuremberg Race Laws.37 The laws officially defined “Jewishness” for the first time and did so solely in terms of ancestry, meaning that religiosity, cultural practices, and self-identification were rendered irrelevant. The first, the “Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor,” forbade marriage and sexual intercourse outside of marriage between Jews and Germans.38 Security forces relied on ordinary people serving as informants to identify cross-racial relationships and then punished those who violated the law.39 Interestingly, the Nazi regime did not dissolve already existing interracial marriages. However, it did discriminate against them and apply pressure on the non-Jewish spouse to divorce the Jewish spouse.40 The second, the “Reich Citizenship Law,” restricted citizenship to “only one who is of German or kindred blood, and who, through his behavior, shows that he is both desirous and personally fit to serve loyally the German people and the Reich.”41 As part of this effort, the Nazis partially denaturalized everyone already categorized as Jewish. However, these individuals were not rendered stateless. They were stripped of their citizenship rights, but able to retain their passports.42 These two laws, in combination with those already in place as well as those that soon followed, had devastating socio-economic impacts on the Jewish community. Non-Jews stopped purchasing goods at Jewish-owned businesses, and Jews working for the civil service or regulated professions (e.g., law, education, and medicine) were fired.43 The Nazi regime compounded these financial pressures with several further orders. In August 1938, for instance, an order required all Jews in Germany to change their names to include either Israel, if a man, or Sarah, if a woman, on all of their identity documents. The regime also published a list of “Jewish” names that parents had to henceforth choose from when naming their newborns.44 A later order, issued in September 1941, required all Jews in Germany, six years old and older, to wear clearly visible symbols of their identity. Yellow badges in the shape of the Star of David sewn 35 Caplan, “‘Ausweis Bitte!’ Identity and Identification in Nazi Germany,” Identification and Registration Practices in Transnational Perspective: People, Papers, and Practices, p. 227. 36 Gotz Aly, The Nazi Census: Identification and Control in the Third Reich, trans. Edwin Black, (Philadelphia: Temple University, 2017). 37 On September 15, 1935, the Nazi regime announced two laws: The Reich Citizenship Law, 1935; and the Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honor, 1935. 38 Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor, 1935, secs. 1 and 2. 39 Id. at Sec. 5. 40 Many inter-racial married couples refused to divorce, and the continued union provided protection to and enabled the survival of the Jewish partner. Fortify Rights communication with Lindsay MacNeill, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, May 13, 2022. 41 The Reich Citizenship Law, 1935, Art. II, no. 1. 42 See, Ibid. 43 The Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, passed earlier, provided the basis for these dismissals which occurred over time. Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service, 1933. See also, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, “Timeline of Events,” website, https://www.ushmm.org/learn/timeline-of-events/1933-1938/ law-for-the-restoration-of-the-professional-civil-service. 44 Robert Rennick, The Nazi Name Decrees of the Nineteen Thirties (New York: Taylor and Francis, 1970), p. 76.