Preußisches Obertribunal

The court played a significant role in shaping Prussia's legal system and had major influence on the administration of justice in the kingdom.

[1] The privilegium generale de non appellando limitatum,[2] which Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I had granted on 16 December 1702,[3][4] allowed Prussia to establish a supreme court, whose decisions could not be appealed to the two supreme courts of the Holy Roman Empire – the Reichskammergericht and the Aulic Council.

[7] With an order (Patent) dated 18 May 1748, the Oberappellationsgericht zu Berlin was abolished together with all other superior courts in Berlin, except the Geheimer Justizrat (Secret Judicial Council), and the Ravensburger Appellationsgericht (Ravensburg Court of Appeal) with the goal of forming a single supreme judicial institution for the whole of Prussia.

[15] This legal fragmentation resulted in the formation of new supreme appellate courts in Prussia, thus ending the supremacy of the Tribunal.

[15] At this time, five Prussian supreme courts existed: In 1833, the pre-eminent position of the Geheimes Obertribunal within the Prussian legal system was fortified once more: Due to an ordinance dated 14 December 1833,[α] it regained the sole responsibility to decide certain nullity appeals (Nichtigkeitsbeschwerden) and appeals on points of law (Revisionen) in civil disputes if the amount of the action in question reached the sum necessary for appeal.

[17][1] During the Vormärz, the Geheimes Obertribunal, however, lost its appellate jurisdiction in certain criminal cases of a political nature by virtue of a Cabinet Order dated 25 April 1835.

[19] Article 92 of the Constitution of 1850 proclaimed: Artikel 92: Es soll in Preußen nur Ein [sic] oberster Gerichtshof bestehen.

Before the envisaged unification of the Prussian supreme courts was set into motion, the Geheimes Obertribunal was first renamed to Obertribunal (State Tribunal) by virtue of an ordinance dated 2 January 1849[ε] to take into account the new principle of publicity (Öffentlichkeitsgrundsatz [de]) in German procedural law.

As a result, the Prussian Supreme Tribunal lost its final appellate jurisdiction concerning commercial and promissory notes law.

[29] The Tribunal decided that the error on the part of the perpetrator regarding the identity of the murder victim (error in persona) is irrelevant for the criminal liability of the instigator, as the confusion of the victim by the perpetrator is within the limits of what is foreseeable and that the instigator should therefore be punished for incitement to murder.