Conclusion

From the end of the nineteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth century, fruitful and diverse extrajudicial legal aid was realised in Germany. A background for this movement was the process of industrialisation and urbanisation.

With this development, extrajudicial legal aid flourished in Germany in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century. Providing legal advice was primarily the domain of lay lawyers, who had knowledge and understanding of the problems faced by economically and socially disad­vantaged people. At the same time, there was little presence of practising lawyers in the field of legal advice for workers and economically and socially disadvantaged people.

Legal aid was not limited to the “poor,” but also to “socially disadvan­taged people.” The activities of the Legal Protection Centres for Women illustrate this side of legal aid very well. The first Legal Protection Centre for Women was established in Dresden, motivated by the lectures of Emilie Kempin, who had lived in the United States for a short time. Thus, we can examine this legal support for women also in the context of the interna­tional women’s movement. We can see some similarities with the legal support for women in the United States. For example, female lay lawyers (middle- and upper-class women) in both countries were providing legal counselling and support—not only simple legal advice but also substantial support, such as negotiating with counterparts. Moreover, there was a similar development regarding the transformation of legal aid from chari­table activities to the practice of professional lawyers.^[455]

The Business Act and the economic freedom embodied in it provided a wide space to lay lawyers, who provided legal advice commercially, the so-called corner advocates.^[456] Practising lawyers regarded the “corner advocates” as enemies to eliminate. On the other hand, the activities of the organisations of extrajudicial legal aid and the interests of practising law­yers essentially did not overlap. However, the potential conflicts between them gradually increased, especially after 1925. After the Great Depression, because of general economic difficulties, mass demand for legal advice for the economically disadvantaged grew, to such an extent that the organisa­tions of extrajudicial legal aid could not meet it. At the same time, practis­ing lawyers needed to increase their fields of activities to overcome their economic difficulties. In these circumstances, the collective participation of practising lawyers in extrajudicial legal aid began. Thus, the profession- alisation of extrajudicial legal aid began in the early 1930s and continued through the National Socialist era and into the Federal Republic of Germany. With this development, the diversity and pluralistic period of the provision of legal aid by various entities came to an end.