Metadata: Law Firm Margulies Emil, Dr., Litoměřice
Collection
- Country:
- Czechia
- Holding institution:
- State District Archives Litoměřice located in Lovosice
- Holding institution (official language):
- Státní okresní archiv Litoměřice se sídlem v Lovosicích
- Postal address:
- Terezínská 909/59, Lovosice, 410 02
- Phone number:
- 00420 477 755 922
- Reference number:
- 472
- Title:
- Law Firm Margulies Emil, Dr., Litoměřice
- Title (official language):
- Advokátní kancelář Margulies Emil, Dr., Litoměřice
- Creator/accumulator:
- Emil Margulies
- Date(s):
- 1895/1938
- Language:
- Czech
- German
- English
- Hebrew
- Extent:
- 2.8 linear metres
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
- The fonds consists of records arising from the activities of the law firm of Dr Emil Margulies in Litoměřice. These records relate mainly to individual cases of clients on regional and state-wide levels. The personal files of Emil Margulies can be found under inventory numbers 1-6. Among other things, they relate to membership of organisations such as Jewish benefit societies, the Human Rights League and the Czechoslovak Palestinian Chamber of Commerce (inv. 1); the “cult tax” for the Jewish religious community (Jüdische Kultusgemeinde) of Litoměřice (inv. 4); and an invitation to a lecture on Zionism by Emil Margulies (“Der Zionismus, das Programm des jüdischen Volk”) and an electoral list from 1931 - No. IV with Emil Margulies -(inv. 6). The documents filed under inventory numbers 10-18 relate to matters and disputes concerning Jewish issues: a dispute between Zionists and Orthodox Jews in Slovakia, 1920-30 (inv. 10); the appearance of allegedly forged banknotes at the Zionist Congress in Karlovy Vary, 1921-22 (inv. 12); disputes over the sale of the Encyclopedia Judaica, 1931-32 (inv. 13); the Jewish religious community of Podmokly - a libel case in 1929 (inv. 14); the Jewish religious community of Chomutov - a military loan in 1921 (inv. 15); the Jewish religious community of Úštěk - a dispute with Rabbi Schulz in 1933 (inv. 16); and matters concerning the Zionist newspaper Die Selbstwehr (Self-Defence), 1911-14 (inv. 18). Other cases relating to the firm involve representing the factory owner Friedrich Neuburg of Litoměřice, 1924-25 (inv. 37); Rudolf Brettschneider - libel, attacks on Jews, 1927-28 (inv. 54), the Jewish physician Jakob Traubner - libel, neglect of duty - pursuit directed by the Nazis, 1931-35 (inv. 55); the Jewish religious community of Úštěk in its dispute with a rabbi over the matter of salary and with the lawyer Bäckr in a case of libel in 1933 (inv. 69); the case of the Hungarian Jewish student Isidor Braun - for the opportunity to study, dissemination of Trotskyite literature, 1937-38 (inv. 75); the Erik J. Hanussen case - defence, 1916-29 (inv. 91), representation - probably - of the Jewish immigrant Samuel Kurz - a libel case in 1936 (inv. 122). The part of the fonds that has not been arranged contains correspondence from Zionist and other Jewish associations addressed to Dr Emil Margulies, records of meetings held by the Central Zionist Commission for Western Austria, the statutes of the Theodor Herzl Děčín Association - Podmokly, the statutes of the Zion Teplice-Šanov Association, correspondence with a Jewish publishing house in Berlin and printed materials - Zionist organisation reports, invitations to lectures on Zionism and Jewishness in Austria and printed materials of Zionist and Jewish associations - all from 1912-13.
- Archival history:
- After 1945, records relating to Litoměřice-based lawyers, including Emil Margulies, were probably transferred initially to the Bohemian Lawyers' Association. After 1949 they were somehow added to the records of the district court of Litoměřice. In 1963 they were handed over to the district archives in Litoměřice, where they were inventoried in 1985.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- Born into a Jewish family in the town of Sosnowiec in present-day Poland in 1877, Emil Margulies was a Litoměřice-based lawyer, Zionist activist and Czechoslovak politician. During his studies in Vienna he met Theodor Herzl and started to become involved in the Zionist movement. He had his own legal practice from 1909 onwards, initially active in Prague, moving in August 1910 to Litoměřice, where he lived until 1938. Dr Margulies was a leader of the Jewish religious community in Litoměřice, a member of the presidium of the Supreme Council of the Federation of Religious Jewish Communities in Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia in the 1930s, and from 1931-35 was chairman of the Jewish Party. In 1938 he moved from Litoměřice to Prague, then in 1939 to Palestine. He settled in Tel Aviv, where he continued his legal practice until his death in 1943.
- Access points: locations:
- Litoměřice
- Úštěk
- Access points: persons/families:
- Margulies, Emil
- System of arrangement:
- The fonds consists of 22 boxes of files. The first to be arranged are the personal files of Emil Margulies (1 box), then the files concerning his legal practice. Boxes 2 and 3, in particular, contain files relating to Jewish matters and disputes. The records concerning his legal practice are arranged initially by geographical area and then alphabetically by client name.
- Access, restrictions:
- The collection is only partly accessible.
- Finding aids:
- Moravec J.-Štíbr J.-Tomas J., Attorneys Litoměřice - město 1895-1949. Sdružený a skupinový inventář, 1985, 15 s., ev. č. 139.
- Yerusha Network member:
- Jewish Museum Prague
- Author of the description:
- JMP Survey, 2015.