the nationality of all inhabitants of the czech provinces and ...

Chapter VII The Transfer and its Legal Aspects
provide Czechoslovak citizens with
deposits from the state allocations for
damages caused to fixed and moveable
assets which were suffered in direct
connection with “any act of war of any
side, of their fighting units or members
thereof.” Deposits were provided only for
registered and proved damages by
Provincial National Committees
according to the appropriate decree, and
only to socially disadvantaged persons.
RETRIBUTION DECREES
The Presidential Decrees adjusting state
citizenship, and confiscating or
nationalising property, operated with
retribution concepts already established by
the London Retribution Decree. This
decree was, with minor adjustments,
replaced in the liberated Republic by
Decree 16/1945 Coll. of June 19, 1945
(the so-called Major Retribution Decree).
In Slovakia, for political reasons which
arose from the different nature of the
retribution representatives of the wartime
Slovak State, Directive SNR33 on the
punishment of Fascist criminals,
occupying forces and collaborators, and
the creation of a public legal system,
remained valid. On October 27, 1945,
Decree 38/1945 Coll., concerning crimes
against national honour (the so-called
Minor Retribution Decree) was passed.
The Major Retribution Decree ordered
the severest penalties for the criminal acts
listed in the decree, committed during the
time of increased danger to the Republic,
i.e. from May 28, 1938 to December 31,
1946, except for a few exceptions also
punishable under pre-Munich law.
According to the Czechoslovak Major
Retribution Decree, among the new
punishable acts were, for example,
membership of, and acting in leadership
positions in, Nazi or Fascist organisations
(not only German, but also Czech, Slovak,
Hungarian and Polish such as Vlajka (The
Flag), Český svaz pro spolupráci s Němcy
(The Czech Union for Co-operation with
the Germans), Hlinkova garda (The
Hlinka Guard), Svatoplukova garda (The
Svatopluk Guard) and so on), propagation
of Fascist or Nazi movements, and
disruption of activities in foreign lands
248
aimed at the liberation of the Republic.
Property dealings of benefit to the
Germans was seen as an exceptionally
punishable act, as was being an informer,
which was punishable by death if a loss of
human life resulted. Besides incarceration,
the courts could sentence people to lose
their citizenship rights, or assign them to
special forced labour units. Property could
also be confiscated in favour of the state.
For the most serious crimes, the special
people’s courts could impose the death
sentence. The decree provided for special
people’s courts to sit in the District
Courts, and also made changes to existing
trial law which were aimed mainly at
speeding up proceedings while
maintaining at least some of the basic
rights of the accused. In practice, the
biggest impact of the whole process was
on the investigations carried out by the
security forces and the Security
Commissions of the District National
Committees, whose determinations
greatly influenced the final verdicts of the
special people’s courts. It was these
commissions that examined the thousands
of denunciations, gathered evidence,
arrested suspects and then decided which
cases should go to trial. The activities of
these Investigative Commissions of the
District National Committees were to be
supervised by Commissions of the
Provincial National Committee, and from
June, even by the Commission for Internal
National Security of the Provincial
National Committee in Prague.
The Czechoslovak understanding of
the punishment of war criminals and
domestic collaborators, even the
retroactive nature of the punishments, was
not so different from French, Dutch,
Belgian, Polish or Norwegian
retributions. There, too, extraordinary
courts were used to shorten and accelerate
criminal trials, and criminal acts were
similarly defined. A common
characteristic of retribution in the
European states was also a marked
harshness of criminal sanctions, including
frequent use of the death penalty. In a
number of states, the accused were
interned and after sentencing used as
forced labour for regenerating