Metadata: Judicial Institutions and Notaries
Collection
- Country:
- Ukraine
- Holding institution:
- State Archive of the Chernivtsi Region
- Holding institution (official language):
- Державний архів Чернівеської області
- Reference number:
- Фонд 15, Опис 1-2, 4
- Title:
- Judicial Institutions and Notaries
- Title (official language):
- Установи юстиції та нотаріату
- Creator/accumulator:
- Prefecture of the Chernivtsi District (Czernowitz, Cernauti) County
- Date(s):
- 1910/1939
- Language:
- Romanian; Moldavian; Moldovan
- German
- Polish
- Extent:
- 31,278 archival units/folders (5 inventories)
- Scope and content:
-
This collection contains the records created by the Romanian National Congress on the Organisation of Power in Bukovina. It deals with all the bureaucratic procedures that occurred as Bukovina transitioned from a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire to a part of Romania, including the liquidation of Austro-Hungarian institutional structures. It covers the government’s relations with the local Jewish community on six main topics: business operations, citizenship issues, Jews prosecuted for criminal activities, Jews petitioning the government, post-WWI affairs, and government regulation of Jewish organisations.
Citizenship Issues (Inventories/Описи 1 and 2): Instructions and directives on how to treat Jews, issued in the book of citizenship in 1918; a 1921 order on collecting census data on various nationalities; requests from Jews for Romanian citizenship and supporting documents; residency permits for Jews; requests for passports for Jews for emigration purposes to destinations such as America, Austria and Poland and requests for certificates of ethnic origin, starting in 1927. In 1920 the Romanian government issued orders to expel residents of “Jewish origin” who “illegally” moved to Bessarabia from Ukraine. The collection contains information about Jews who were prosecuted for forging documents and about local Vital Statistics and Records officials who accepted bribes. The citizenship question was reinvestigated by the Romanian government in the 1930s and the collection includes cases of Jews stripped of citizenship and requests for documents that could prove the right to Romanian citizenship. In 1938 the government requested a list of all Jewish citizens from Chernivtsi for a “revision” of Romanian citizenship status.
Business operations (Inventories/Описи 1, 2 and 4): The collection provides detailed information about Jews involved in local trade, including requests for business permits and documents on the Romanian regulation of Jewish commerce. Local Jews were active in the liquor business and the collection includes a large number of requests for permits to sell liquor and special permits to sell liquor on Sundays and Christian holidays. In 1924 the government declared a monopoly on the sale of hard liquor and many Jewish tavern-owners protested. In 1938 the government stripped permits to own and operate taverns from all Jews without Romanian citizenship. In some cases Jews were prosecuted for violating Romanian trade laws, exploiting land and conducting other business operations without the proper permits. Jews were also arrested for speculation, failure to pay taxes, failure to treat workers fairly and communist activities.
Post-WWI Affairs (Inventory/Опис 2): Requests from Jewish families for reparations for property destroyed during WWI; documents using war service as a basis for acquiring Romanian citizenship and government benefits.
Regulation of Jewish organisations (Inventory/Опис 2): Requests from residents for the Romanian government to approve the charters of Jewish organisations that existed during the time of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and allow them to conduct their activities. The government honoured the founding of Jewish organisations including Maccabi, Zionist organisations, religious organisations, charities and schools, and gave them permits to conduct their activities. Documents detail the surveillance conducted by local authorities of the organised Jewish community of Boyana. The collection includes Jewish population data, correspondence with local police and officials regarding “methods to fight anti-Semitism” and a decree forbidding government officials from joining organisations of an anti-Semitic or fascist nature. The government also liquidated local Jewish organisations, including religious organisations, and closed a Jewish cinema for showing films translated into Russian. The collection also includes documents investigating local officials’ attempts to forbid celebrations of Jewish holidays in 1925.
The later years of the collection provide information about anti-Jewish measures implemented by the Romanian government in the 1930s (Inventory/Опис 1), including requests for lists of all Jews in Bukovina, all Jews applying for citizenship and all Jews involved in the sale of alcoholic beverages; government-commissioned reports on elements of the organised Jewish community; and legal and police measures including surveillance and liquidation of prominent organisations such as the Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, Zionist organisations and B’Nai Brith, and the establishment of various committees to solve “the Jewish question”.
The collection also features documented responses of the Jewish community of Chernivtsi to these measures, including a resolution passed in 1930 protesting “loss of autonomy” for Jewish citizens and a 1936 petition from Zionist organisations for the government to stop the unlawful arrest of their members.
Documents in the collection include permits, government case files, testimonies, correspondence, government directives, government requisitions, charters, appeal cases, registrations of births, marriages and deaths, files on individuals, committee resolutions, letters of instructions from government officials, settlements, petitions, complaints and self-reports on activities.
- Access points: locations:
- Boyana
- Bukovina
- Chernivtsi
- Romania
- Subject terms:
- American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee
- Antisemitism
- Antisemitism--Antisemitic measures
- Census
- Citizenship
- Expulsion
- Legal matters
- Legal records
- Passports and visas
- Restitution and compensation
- Trade and commerce
- Trade and commerce--Alcohol trade
- Vital records
- World War I
- Zionism
- Zionism--Zionist organisations and parties
- Yerusha Network member:
- United States Holocaust Memorial Museum