Preußisches Obertribunal

The Preußisches Obertribunal, abbreviated PrObTr (English: Prussian Supreme Tribunal), was between 1703 and 1879 either the sole or one of the supreme courts of the Kingdom of Prussia. The court played a significant role in shaping Prussia's legal system and had major influence on the administration of justice in the kingdom.

The court was founded by Frederick I in 1703 as the Oberappellationsgericht zu Berlin (Superior Court of Appeals in Berlin) and underwent several reorganizations. In 1748, it was disestablished and integrated into the Kammergericht, where it became the Kammergericht's fourth senate. In 1782, the tribunal was separated from that court and named Geheimes Obertribunal (Secret Supreme Tribunal). In the wake of the German revolutions of 1848–1849, it was renamed to Obertribunal (Supreme Tribunal), before it was disestablished in 1879 and succeeded by the Reichsgericht—then the sole supreme court of the German Empire.

The Oberappellationsgericht zu Berlin (Superior Court of Appeals in Berlin) was founded in 1703 by Frederick I, after the king had obtained a limited privilegium de non appellando.^[1] The privilegium generale de non appellando limitatum,^[2] which had been granted by Leopold I 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. The privilegium was limited to cases involving not more than 2,500 gold guilders.^[5][4] The court, at least initially, had local jurisdiction for the Prussian provinces of Farther Pomerania, the Duchy of Magdeburg, the Hochstift Halberstadt [de] (a Hochstift), the Duchy of Cleves, the County of Mark and the Principality of Minden [de].^[1][6]

In 1716, the court was merged with Orange-Tribunal (Orange Tribunal), which had responsibilities for Meurs, Lingen und Teklenburg.^[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 [the Secret Judicial Council] and the Ravensburger Appellationsgericht [the Ravensburg Court of Appeals]) with a view to form a single supreme judicial institution for the whole of Prussia.^[8][9]

Under the date 31 May 1746,^[9] the Prussian king obtained an unlimited privilegium de non appellando (a privilegium generale de non appellando illimitatum^[10]) for Prussia from Francis I.^[11] This resulted in the establishment of a new supreme court in 1748, which at first remained unnamed.^[8] This court consisted of four senates (panels), the first three senates being mainly built out of the former Kammergericht (Chamber Court), while the fourth was chiefly formed out of the former Oberappellationsgericht zu Berlin.^[8] Quickly, the first three senates became again known as the Kammergericht, while the superior forth senate emerged as the Tribunal (Tribunal).^[8][12]

In 1772, the fourth senate was renamed to Geheimes Obertribunal (Secret Supreme Tribunal).^[1][8] At this time, only two supreme courts of Prussia remained, the Secret Supreme Tribunal and the Ostpreußisches Tribunal zu Königsberg [de] (the East Prussian Tribunal at Königsberg), which, however, was soon – probably in 1774 –^[13] subordinated to the Geheimes Obertribunal.^[8]

On 30 November 1782, the Geheimes Obertribunal was separated from the Kammergericht.^[1] The Kammergericht was subordinated to the Geheimes Obertribunal and the Geheimes Obertribunal gained local jurisdiction for the whole of Prussia.^[1] The Kammergericht continued its duties with three senates: The Kriminaldeputation (the criminal deputation), the Instruktionssenat (the court of appeal for the Kurmark) and the Oberappellationssenat (the court of appeal for the four high courts of the Margraviate of Brandenburg, i.e. the Instruktionssenat of the Kammergericht, the Altmärkisches Obergericht [de], the Uckermärkisches Obergericht [until 1789] and the Neumärkische Regierung).^[14] The Secret Supreme Tribunal thereby became the supreme Prussian court of appeal in the third instance and heard appeals against decisions by the Oberappellationssenat of the Kammergericht and the other high courts of the Prussian provinces.^[14]

The Secret Supreme Tribunal was directly subordinate to the Prussian Department of Justice or, from 1808 onwards, to the Prussian Ministry of Justice.^[1]

Due to the Congress of Vienna, Prussian made huge territorial gains in 1815.^[1] Prussia now consisted no longer of one unified area of law, but three: The area of French law in the Left Bank of the Rhine and the Duchy of Berg, the area of the ius commune in New Western Pomerania and Ehrenbreitstein [de] and the Prussian law region in the rest of Prussia.^[15] This fragmentation in the law 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:

1. the Rheinischer Revisions- und Kassationshof [de] (the Rhenish Court of Appeal and Cassation) – competent for the area of French law,
2. the Revisionshof zu Berlin (Berlin Court of Appeal) – competent for the ius commune-area of the right bank of the Rhine-territory of the Regierungsbezirk Koblenz,
3. the Oberappellationsgericht zu Greifswald (the Court of Appeal at Greifswald) – competent for the ius commune-area of New Western Pomerania,
4. the Oberappellationsgericht zu Posen (High Court of Appeal at Posen) – competent for the Prussian law-area of the Province of Posen and
5. the Geheimes Obertribunal – competent for all other Prussian law-territories of the kingdom.^[16]

In 1833, the pre-eminent position of the Geheimes Obertribunal within the Prussian legal system was, however, fortified once more: Due to an ordinance dated 14 December 1833,^[α] it (re-)gained the sole responsibility to decide certain nullity appeals (Nichtigkeitsbeschwerden) and appeals on points of law (Revisionen) in civil disputes whose subject-matter reached the amount of the appeal.^[17][1]

During the period of 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.^[β] These cases were reassigned to the Kammergericht (in its capacity as Geheimer Justizrat).^[1][18]

The German revolutions of 1848–1849 resulted in the promulgation of the Prussian constitutions of 1848 and 1850 which, inter alia, contained programmatic statements about the organisation of the courts (Article 91 of the 1848 constitution^[γ] and Articles 92 and 116 of the 1850 constitution).^[19] Article 92 of the Constitution of 1850 proclaimed:

Artikel 92: Es soll in Preußen nur Ein [sic] oberster Gerichtshof bestehen.

Article 92: There shall be only One Supreme Court in Prussia.

— 1850 Constitution of Prussia (Verfassungsurkunde für den Preußischen Staat vom 31. Januar 1850)^[δ]

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.^[20][1] Then the unification was brought to life by a law dated 17 March 1852,^[ζ] which in its Section 1 merged the two remaining supreme courts of Prussia, the Rheinischer Revisions- und Kassationshof [de] and the Obertribunal into a new court – again named Obertribunal.^[21] The merger of the courts came into effect on 1 January 1853.^[20][22] The other Prussian supreme courts, the Revisionshof zu Berlin, the Oberappellationsgericht zu Greifswald and the Oberappellationsgericht zu Posen had already been disestablished earlier.^[1]

After the Austro-Prussian War in 1866, the Oberappellationsgericht zu Berlin (Superior Court of Appeals in Berlin) was formed to hear appeals from the new Prussian provinces: Schleswig-Holstein (including Saxe-Lauenburg), Hanover, Hesse-Nassau and the Principality of Waldeck and Pyrmont.^[1] This new court was, however, short-lived and in 1874 it was merged into the Tribunal.^[1]

In 1870, the Reichsoberhandelsgericht was established in Leipzig as a court of the North German Federation and later of the German Empire. As a result, the Prussian Supreme Tribunal lost its final appellate jurisdiction concerning commercial and promissory notes law.^[1]

On 30 September 1879, the Prussian Supreme Tribunal was abolished^[η] as a consequence of the establishment of the Reichsgericht, which – after the entry into force of the Reichsjustizgesetze [de] – was now the sole supreme court of the German Empire.^[23][1]

Following a cabinet order dated 19 July 1832, the Obertribunal had to give reasons for all its decisions,^[24] but its reasoned decisions generally remained unpublished. This was rectified in 1836^[1] or 1837,^[25] when a state publication series for the decisions of the court was installed named Entscheidungen des Königlichen Obertribunals (Decisions of the Royal Supreme Tribunal; often abbreviated to PrObTrE).^[1] At first, only private law decisions were published (because the court had no competencies for criminal law), but after it gained the respective subject-matter jurisdiction, decisions concerning criminal law were also published beginning in 1849.^[26] Of its criminal cases, the 1859 Rose-Rosahl case [de] (PrObTrE 42, 36) concerning the interplay of error in persona [de] and incitement – and factually the accidental murder of a 17 year old student – is especially famous.^[27] According to the German legal scholars Fritjof Haft [de] and Jörg Eisele [de], hardly any other decision has influenced the discussion of (German) criminal law scholarship more than this decision by the Tribunal.^[28]

In the PrObTrE approximately 500 of the courts most important decisions were published.^[29] The series had major influence on contemporary Prussian jurisprudence.^[1][25]

No.	Portrait	Name	Tenure	Ref.
1		Eusebius von Brandt [de] (1642–1706)	20 December 1703 – 1706	[30][31][32]
2		Christian Friedrich von Bartholdi [de] (1668–1714)	30 January 1707 – 1714	[33][31][32]
3		Ludwig Otto von Plotho [de] (1663–1731)	1 October 1714 – 1731	[34][31][35]
-		Balthasar Conrad zum Broich	5 September 1731[θ]	[31]
4		Samuel von Cocceji (1679–1755)	19 September 1731 – 1737	[36][37][38]
5		Georg Dietloff von Arnim-Boitzenburg (1679–1753)	23 January 1738 – 21 May 1748 (dissolution of the court)	[39][40]

No.	Portrait	Name	Tenure	Ref.
6 (1)		Georg Dietloff von Arnim-Boitzenburg (1679–1753)	1748 – 1748	[41]
7 (2)		Heinrich IX, Count Reuss of Köstritz (1711–1780)	21 January 1752 – 1763	[42][38]
8 (3)		Maximilian von Fürst und Kupferberg [de] (1717–1790)	31 October 1763 – 1770	[43][44][38]
9 (4)		Karl Abraham Zedlitz (1731–1793)	18 November 1770 – 18 January 1771	[45][46]

No.	Portrait	Name	Tenure	Ref.
10 (1)		Ernst Friedemann von Münchhausen [de] (1724–1784)	5 February 1771 – 1784	[47][43][38]
11 (2)		Eberhard von der Recke [de] (1744–1816)	30 December 1784 – 1785	[48]
12 (3)		Wolfgang Ferdinand von Dörnberg [de] (1724–1793)	1 March 1785 – 1788	[49][38]
- (Recke's second term)		Eberhard von der Recke [de] (1744–1816)	1788 – 1802	[50][48]
13 (4)		Johann Friedrich von Koenen [de] (1767–1805)	28 December 1802 – 3 June 1805 (his death)	[51][52]
14 (5)		Heinrich Dietrich von Grolman [de] (1740–1840)	1805 – 7 January 1833	[53][52]
15 (6)		Wilhelm Friedrich Sack (1773–1854)	21 January 1833 – 30 September 1844	[54][52]
16 (7)		Heinrich Gottlob von Mühler [de] (1780–1857)	1844 – 20 December 1854	[55][52]
17 (8)		Alexander von Uhden [de] (1798–1878)	1854 – 1878[ι]	[57][52]

• Wilhelm Bornemann [de]^[29]
• Karl Friedrich Eichhorn^[1]
• Georg Friedrich Puchta^[1]
• Hermann von Schelling [de]^[1]
• Carl Gottlieb Svarez^[1][29]
• Benedikt Waldeck^[1]

• "Geheimes Staatsarchiv: I. HA Rep. 97a: Obertribunal 1749 - 1910: Inhaltliche Charakterisierung". Prussian Privy State Archives (in German).
• Bohlander, Michael (2008). Principles of German Criminal Law. Hart Publishing. ISBN 9781841136301.
• Czeguhn, Ignacio (2017). "Obertribunal, Preußisches". In Cordesed, Albrecht; Lück, Heiner; Werkmüller, Dieter (eds.). Handwörterbuch zur Deutschen Rechtsgeschichte (in German). Vol. IV (2 ed.).
• Giese, Friedrich (1920). Preußische Rechtsgeschichte (in German). Berlin and Leipzig: De Gruyter. doi:10.1515/9783112342503. ISBN 9783112342503.
• Haft, Fritjof; Eisele, Jörg (2003). "Wie wirkt sich ein error in persona des Haupttäters auf den Gehilfen aus?". Gedächtnisschrift für Rolf Keller (in German). Mohr Siebeck. pp. 81–101. ISBN 9783161477508.
• Holtze, Friedrich (1896). Lokalgeschichte des Königlichen Kammergerichts. Beiträge zur Brandenburg-Preussischen Rechtsgeschichte (in German). Vol. IV. F. Vahlen.
• Holtze, Friedrich (1913). 500 Jahre Geschichte Des Kammergerichts. Schriften des Vereins für die Geschichte Berlins (in German). Verlag des Vereins für die Geschichte Berlins.
• von Hymmen, Johann Wilhelm Bernhard (1780). "Geschichte des hiesigen Tribunals". Beyträge zu der juristischen Litteratur in den preußischen Staaten (in German). 6: 225–286.
• Perels, Kurt (1908). Die allgemeinen Appellationsprivilegien für Brandenburg-Preußen. Weimar: Böhlau.
• von Rönne, Ludwig (1864). "Das Ober-Tribunal als oberster Gerichtshof für die ganze Monarchie". Das Staats-Recht der Preussischen Monarchie (in German). Vol. 2. Brockhaus. p. 248.
• Rückl, Frauke (2018). "Das Kammergericht in der ersten Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts: Mehr als ein Gericht!". In The President of the Kammergericht (ed.). Jubiläumsschrift – 550 Jahre Kammergericht (PDF) (in German). pp. 79–116.
• Ruschel, Matthias (2019). Das Preußische Erbrecht in der Judikatur des Berliner Obertribunals in den Jahren von 1836 bis 1865 (PDF) (PhD thesis) (in German). University of Potsdam. doi:10.25932/publishup-52779.
• Sonnenschmidt, Friedrich Hermann (1879). Geschichte des Königlichen Ober-Tribunals zu Berlin (in German). Berlin: Heymanns.
• Starke, Wilhelm Friedrich Karl (1839). "Das Geheime Ober-Tribunal". Darstellung der bestehenden Gerichtsverfassung in dem Preussischen Staate (in German). Heymann. pp. 145–151.
• Temme, W. (1859). "Review of Die Präjudicien des königl. preussischen Obertribunals zu Berlin seit ihrer Einführung im Jahre 1832". Kritische Vierteljahresschrift für Gesetzgebung und Rechtswissenschaft (in German). 1 (2): 306–309. ISSN 0179-2830. JSTOR 43126024.
• Weill, Herman (1960). "Judicial Reform in Eighteenth Century Prussia: Samuel von Cocceji and the Unification of the Courts". American Journal of Legal History. 4 (3): 226–240. doi:10.2307/844051. JSTOR 844051.

• "Obertribunal, geheimes, zu Berlin". Brockhaus Conversations-Lexikon (in German). Brockhaus. 1825.
• Obertribunal. In: Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon. 6th edition. Vol. 14, Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig/Vienna 1908, p. 874.
• Koch, Christian Friedrich (1855). "Das geheime Obertribunal". Der preussische Civil-Prozess (in German). Berlin: J. Guttentag. pp. 84–91. ISBN 978-3-11-239687-2.
• Mund, Wiebke (2008). Das preußische Ehescheidungsrecht in der Judikatur des Berliner Obertribunals von 1835 bis 1879 (in German). Frankfurt: Peter Lang. ISBN 9783631580868.
• Schmüser, Simone Leona (2007). Die Anwendung der Vorschriften des Allgemeinen Landrechts für die Preußischen Staaten über die eheliche Gütergemeinschaft in der Praxis des Königlichen (Geheimen) Obertribunals in der Zeit von 1837 bis 1879 (in German). Peter Lang. ISBN 9783631558713.
• Stölzel, Adolf (1888). Brandenburg-Preußens Rechtsverwaltung und Rechtsverfassung dargestellt im Wirken seiner Landesfürsten und obersten Justizbeamten (in German). Vol. I. Berlin: Franz Vahlen.
• Stölzel, Adolf (1888). Brandenburg-Preußens Rechtsverwaltung und Rechtsverfassung dargestellt im Wirken seiner Landesfürsten und obersten Justizbeamten (in German). Vol. II. Berlin: Franz Vahlen.

•  German Wikisource has original text related to this article: Verordnung, betreffend die Uebertragung preußischer Rechtssachen auf das Reichsgericht
•  German Wikisource has original text related to this article: Preußisches Obertribunal - Rose/Rosahl
• Digital versions of the 86 volumes (1837–1879) of Entscheidungen des Königlichen Obertribunals (Decisions of the Royal Supreme Tribunal)