[2] Globke was identified as the author of an interior ministry report from France, written in racist language, that complained of "coloured blood into Europe" and called for the "elimination" of its "influences" on the gene pool.
[5] When he finished his secondary education at the elite Catholic Kaiser-Karl-Gymnasium and completing his Abitur in 1916, he was drafted, serving until the end of World War I in an artillery unit on the Western Front.
Globke was not affected by the personnel purges of the Prussian ministerial bureaucracy by the Franz von Papen government, which removed republican-oriented officials after the coup d'état in Prussia on 20 July 1932.
In October 1932, under Globke's leadership, a set of rules, known as the "Ordinance on the Responsibility for Changing Surnames and First Names of 21 November 1932" (German: Verordnung über die Zuständigkeit zur Änderung von Familiennamen und Vornamen vom 21.
[12] This unequal treatment of the Jews in the final phase of the Weimar Republic, in which Globke played a major role, is considered by researchers and in the earlier case law of East Germany to be a precursor to name-related discrimination during the early Nazi era.
"[12] After the seizure of power by the Nazi Party in early 1933, Globke was involved in the drafting of a series of laws aimed at the co-ordination (German: Gleichschaltung) of the legal system of Prussia with the Reich.
[23] By registering the population regarded as Jewish, Globke created the administrative prerequisites that facilitated to a great extent the rounding up and deportation of Jews during the Holocaust that, began at the end of 1941.
Globke also served as chief legal adviser to the Office for Jewish Affairs in the Ministry of Interior, headed by Adolf Eichmann, that performed the bureaucratic implementation of the Holocaust.
The historian Peter Schöttler suspected that Globke was probably the author of a memorandum to Hitler in June 1940 discussing the idea of State Secretary Stuckart proposing a far-reaching annexation of the East French and Belgian territories, which would have involved the deportation of about 5 million people.
Immediately following this visit, the government of Slovakia announced the introduction of the so-called Jewish Code, which provided the legal basis for the later expropriations and deportations of Slovak Jews.
He was the informant of the Berlin Bishop Konrad von Preysing[2] and had knowledge of the coup preparations by the opponents of Hitler Carl Friedrich Goerdeler and Ludwig Beck.
According to reports by Jakob Kaiser and Otto Lenz, in the event that the attempt to overthrow the National Socialist regime had succeeded, Globke was earmarked for a senior ministerial post in an imperial government formed by Goerdeler.
Globke's key position as chief of staff to Adenauer, responsible for matters of national security, made both the West German government and CIA officials wary of exposing his past, despite their full knowledge of it.
[45] Globke left office together with the Adenauer administration in 1963, and was awarded the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany by President Heinrich Lübke.
[54] Federal Interior Minister Gustav Heinemann (CDU) referred in his answer to the exonerating testimony of the Nuremberg prosecutor Robert Kempner, that Globke had served with his willingness to testify.
[56] In the opinion of the journalist Harald Jähner, Globke's continued presence led to "disgraceful state measures to prevent criminal prosecution and obstruction of justice" and repeatedly offered the GDR a welcome opportunity to describe the Federal Republic as "fascist".
[57] This was especially true after 1960, when the Israeli intelligence service Mossad tracked Adolf Eichmann down in Argentina;[58][59] thus, loyalty to Globke increasingly proved to be a burden on Adenauer's government.
[62][63] In the early 1960s, there was a vigorous campaign in East Germany, led by the Politburo member Albert Norden of the Ministry of State Security, against the so-called "author of the Nuremberg Blood Laws" as well an "agitator and organiser of the persecutions of the Jews".
[75] The fact that much of the criticism of Globke came from the Soviet bloc, and that it mixed genuine information with false accusations,[76] made it easier for the West Germans and the Americans to dismiss it as communist propaganda.
After his retirement, Globke decided to move to Switzerland, where his wife Augusta had bought a property in Chardonne VD on Lake Geneva in 1957 and built a holiday home on it.
The Swiss Federal President Ludwig von Moos said before the National Council that "in view of this declaration" the government had "refrained from issuing an entry ban".
[80] The collection proved that Globke had helped to draft several anti-semitic laws during the early 1930s, years before Adolf Hitler had come to power and had later become one of Eichmann's most important functionaries.
[80] During his trial, Eichmann was given the book by his lawyer Robert Servatius and had written 40 pages of commentaries on 15 December 1961[62] that detailed his relationship to himself and tried to prove that Globke had more authority than he did[80] while downplaying his role.
When a court then discovered two minor mistakes (the publisher had caused one of them by abbreviation), it imposed a restraining order and Bertelsmann came to the decision to cancel the new edition of the book.
However the federal government, already worried about the campaign in East Berlin, contacted the CIA to ensure that any material regarding Globke was removed from the Life coverage.
[95] The Der Spiegel research examined a memorandum issued on 16 March 1962, that described Gehlen requesting that measures be taken to stop Globke being called as a witness.
[95] An Israeli government memo from 26 April 1961 states that Gideon Hausner, at the time the Attorney General, had informed ministers of the request and Servatius was asked if Globke was really needed and he thought about it and decided not to call him.
[96] However, Globke's actual relationship to Nazism and his influence on the government of Adenauer are not really clarified, which, according to reviewer Hans-Heinrich Jansen, is not conclusively possible, "in view of the sourcing, which for many central issues, turned out to be slim, after all".
[97] The background of the Stasi campaign against Globke remains largely unknown;[98] however, this aspect of Lommatzsch's biography was in any case only intended as a digression,[99] since it requires separate treatment.
However, Lommatzsch mentions a number of examples of Globke campaigning for the persecuted, his commentary on the Nuremberg Laws was aimed at defusing the regulations, and he had not played the dominant role in the postwar period the Adenauer opponents had assumed.