Brandeis Association Selects Dunnington Partner Raymond J. Dowd To Commemorate 76th Anniversary of Kristallnacht

Egon Schiele's Town on the Blue River - Krumau (1910)

 

            Dunnington partner Raymond J. Dowd has been selected to speak at “Murder, Mystery & Masterpieces: The Ethical Implications of World War II Stolen Art,” to be presented by the Brandeis Association and the Queens Women’s Bar Association. The event will take place the Queens County Bar Association (90-35 148th Street, Jamaica, NY) tonight at 6:00 p.m., the date being chosen to coincide with the 76th anniversary of Kristallnacht (November 9-10, 1938). A light kosher supper will precede the event, beginning at 5:30 p.m.

 

       The Nazis are infamous for their rampant theft of artworks belonging to Jewish people and others deemed undesirable. Public awareness of this pillaging has only grown in recent years with the release of films such as The Monuments Men (2014) and The Rape of Europa (2006). Additionally, newly opened archives in the United States and Europe have contributed to an ever-increasing number of claims brought by the Nazis’ victims and their descendants. As a result, the body of case law pertaining to such matters is constantly growing and evolving.

 

       Mr. Dowd recently represented the heirs of Holocaust victim Fritz Grunbaum, who was killed at Dachau in 1941, in coming to a restitution settlement agreement concerning the painting Town on the Blue River (Stadt am blauen Fluss – Krumau), painted by Egon Schiele in 1910. The watercolor landscape was among eighty-one works of art by Schiele seized from Mr. Grunbaum’s apartment in Vienna by the Gestapo in March 1938. In 1998, a spotlight was shone upon Mr. Grunbaum’s fate and that of his art when New York District Attorney Robert Morgenthau confiscated the painting Dead City III from New York City’s Museum of Modern Art, where it was on loan from Austria. Because the exhibition was immune from seizure as a result of an international treaty, the piece was ultimately returned; however, the incident was key in propelling the movement to restore Nazi-looted artworks to their rightful owners. Town on the Blue River was auctioned at Christie’s at their Impressionist and Modern Evening Sale on November 5, 2014, where it reached a record high of $2,965,000. The proceeds will be shared by Mr. Grunbaum’s heirs and those of Ilona Gerstel, in whose possession the piece spent nearly a half-century.

     Joining Mr. Dowd in this discussion of art stolen during World War II and the legal and ethical complications in which the restitution of such pieces is mired will be Professor John Q. Barrett of St. John’s University School of Law, who also serves on the Expert Advisory Committee of the International Nuremberg Principles Academy. Following presentation of recent happenings relating to Holocaust-era assets and discussion of their longer-term impact, Mr. Dowd and Professor Barrett will welcome questions from the audience.
The event is free. To register, please click here.

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About the Brandeis Association The Brandeis Association was established in 1969 as a Not for Profit Corporation. The stated purpose of the Bar association, as set forth in both the Brandeis Constitution and Articles of Incorporation, is to encourage friendship and culture among our members, to foster respect for law and legal institutions and to vigorously assert its interest in justice and fair play in the County of Queens and in the City and State of New York. All members of the Judiciary, Lawyers, Court personnel and others who support the Jewish faith and the U.S. Constitution are eligible for membership.
About Dunnington partner Raymond J. Dowd Mr. Dowd’s practice focuses on litigation in federal and state trial and appellate courts, arbitration and mediation for cases involving art law, copyrights, trademarks, cybersquatting, privacy, trusts and decedents’ estates, licensing, corporate and real estate transactions. He lectures frequently on copyright and art-related topics and has presented in many venues, including at the 2009 Prague Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets, where he served on an expert panel, the Jewish Museum in Berlin, Yad Vashem in Jerusalem, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the San Francisco War Memorial, and the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. In 2007, he co-founded the Art Litigation and Dispute Resolution Institute at New York County Lawyers’ Association. Mr. Dowd authors Copyright Litigation Handbook (West 7th Ed. 2013-2014)(updated annually). Currently Mr. Dowd serves on the Board of Directors of the Federal Bar Association, having earlier held the positions of President of the Southern District of New York Chapter (2006-2008) and general counsel of the national organization, and as President of the Network of Bar Leaders.
Dunnington, Bartholow & Miller LLP was selected as a 2014 Top Ranked Law Firm for Intellectual Property by Corporate Counsel/ALM/The American Lawyer. Dunnington is a full-service law firm providing corporate, litigation, intellectual property, real estate, taxation and estate planning services for an international clientele. Find out more at www.dunnington.com.

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Copyright Litigation Handbook (Thomson Reuters Westlaw 2012-2013) by Raymond J. Dowd 

Art Litigation: Jewish Property Declarations: The Law of April 26, 1938

Today is the anniversary of the April 26, 1938 decree by Goering requiring Jews to declare their property.  It is important that any student of the Holocaust read the text of the decree, reproduced in italics below.  There is very little written about this law, which was a critical turning point in the Nazis' adoption of the Final Solution.  First robbery, then murder of the despoiled victims.

Today, the consequences of this law are still being litigated in the United States.  US museums are successfully clinging to artworks stolen pursuant to the April 26, 1938 decree and the subsequent measures.  The Jewish Property Declarations were sealed by Austria from 1945 until 1993.   Now US museums are suing Jewish descendants of Holocaust victims to "quiet title" to the artworks in their collections, in violation of international law and the United States' commitment to return Nazi spoils  to their victims.

DOCUMENT 1406-PS
1938 REICHSGESETZBLATT, PART I, PAGE 414
~ Decree for the Reporting of Jewish Owned Property of 26 April
1938
On the basis of the Decree for the Execution of the Four Year Plan of 18 October 1936 (RGBl I, 887) the following is hereby decreed:
Article 1
1. Every Jew (Article 5 of the First Regulation under the Reich Citizenship Law of 14 November 1935 (RGBI I, 1338)) shall report and evaluate in accordance with the following instructions his entire domestic and foreign property and estate on the day when this decree goes into force. Jews of foreign citizenship shall report and evaluate only their domestic property
2. The duty to report holds likewise for the non-Jewish marital partner of a Jew.
3. Every reporting person's property must be given separately.
Article 2
1. Property in the sense of this law includes the total property of the person required to report, irrespective of whether it is exempt from any form of taxation or not.
2. It does not include movable objects used by the individual or house furnishings as far as the latter are not luxury objects.
Article 3
1. Every part of the property shall be valued according to the usual valuation it has on the effective date of this regulation.
2. No report is necessary when the total worth of the property to be reported does not exceed 5000 marks.
Article 4
The report is to be presented on an official form by 20 June 1938, to the administrative official responsible at the place of residence of the reporting individual. When such a report is not possible by this date the responsible official can extend the period. In such case, however, an estimate is to be presented by 30 June 1938, together with a statement of the grounds of delay.
Article 5
1. The reporting individual must report, after this decree goes into force, to the responsible office, every change of said individual's total property as far as it exceeds a proper standard of living or normal business transactions.
2. The reporting requirement applies also to those .Jews who were not required to report on the effective date of this regulation but who have acquired property exceeding 5000 Reichsmarks in value, after this date. Article 1 (1) clause 2, shall apply respectively.
Article 6
1. The administrative offices responsible under this reguhttlon are in Prussia-Highest Administrative Officer [Reierungspraesident] (in Berlin the Police President) ; Bavalria Administrative Officer [Regierungspraesident] ; Saxony---Tivoli District Head [Kreishauptmann]; Wurtemberg-The Minister of the Interior; Baden-The Minister of the Interior; ThueringenReich Governor [Reichsstatthalter]; Hessen-Reich Governor; Hamburg-Reich Governor; Mecklenburg-Ministry of the State, Interior Department; Oldenburg-Minister of Interi01•; Braunschweig- Ministry of Interior; Bremen-Senator for Administration of Interior; Anhalt-Ministry of State Interior Department; Lippe-Reich Governor (Land Government); SchaumburgLippe-Land Government; Saarland-The Reich Commissioner for the Saar.
2. Austria-The Reich Governor has jurisdiction. He may transfer his authority to another board.
Article 7
The Deputy for the Four Year Plan is empowered to take such necessary measures as may be necessary to guarantee the use of the reported property in accord with the necessities of German economy.
Article 8
1. Whoever wilfully or negligently fails to comply with this reporting requirement, either by omitting it, or making it incorrectly, or not within the time specified, or whoever acts contrary to any instruction issued pursuant to Article 7 by the Deputy of the Four Year Plan shall be punishable by imprisonment and by a fine or by both of these penalties, in particularly flagrant cases of wilful violation the offender may be condemned to hard labor up to ten years. The offender is punishable notwithstanding that the action was in a foreign country.
2. Any attempt to commit such actions is punishable.
3. In addition to the imposition of the penalties under (1), the property may be confiscated, insofar as it was involved in the criminal action. In addition to hard labor confiscation may be made. Where no specific individual can be prosecuted or convicted, confiscation may be decreed independently, where the prerequisites for confiscation warrant it.
Berlin, 26 April 1938
The Deputy for the Four Year Plan
Goering
General Field Marshal
The Reich Minister of the Interior
Frick

Adolph Eichmann set up the Zentralstelle in Vienna in August 1938.  He described it as a "conveyor belt".  You put a Jew and his property on one end and the Jew emerged with a passport and no property on the other end.  Eichmann is considered the "father" of spoliation for profit and the creation of the "Vienna model" of despoiling Jews before exporting them or murdering them.   The problem arose that no country wanted to accept Jews that had been completely spoliated.  Murder thus became the next logical step.

Nazi Era Laws - Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression - Translated


More information on Bakalar v Vavra, a recent Second Circuit case interpreting the April 26, 1938 Jewish Property declaration decree here.

More on Austria's violations of the Austrian State Treaty here.

A report on how the Museum of Modern Art in New York is the largest repository in the nation of Nazi looted art coming in through Switzerland here.


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 Purchase Copyright Litigation Handbook 2010 by Raymond J. Dowd from West here