Rutgers Miller Center Fellow to Keynote Commemoration of Nuremberg Trials Anniversary

NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. — Stephan Kramer, President of the State Domestic Intelligence Service of Thuringia, Germany, and Visiting Fellow at the Rutgers Miller Center on Policing and Community Resilience, will deliver the keynote address at an international program marking the 90th anniversary of the Nuremberg Laws.

The event, presented by the International March of the Living in partnership with the Miller Center, reflects on one of the darkest turning points in modern history and explores how its lessons remain urgent today.

Kramer’s keynote lecture, titled “From Nuremberg Laws to Nuremberg’s Lesson: 90 Years On,” will underscore how quickly democracy can erode when the law itself is weaponized. “On September 15, 1935, at the Nazi Party Rally in Nuremberg, the German Reichstag convened for a single, chilling purpose: to convert hatred into law,” Kramer says. “Two statutes—the Reich Citizenship Law and the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor—reduced German Jews from citizens to ‘subjects.’ Those laws did not appear from nowhere; they were the legal cornerstone of a years-long campaign to strip, isolate, and finally annihilate a people.”

Rutgers’ Leadership in Holocaust and Genocide Education for Law Enforcement

In his address, Kramer highlights Rutgers’ groundbreaking initiative, “Operationalizing Never Again —Not on Our Watch,” chaired by Paul Goldenberg of the Miller Center. The program equips police leaders worldwide with tools to address antisemitism, bias, human rights challenges, and ethical dilemmas in democratic societies. The initiative, run by the Miller Center and its partners, provides tools to ensure that the lessons of the Holocaust inform modern policing and reinforce law enforcement’s role in protecting democracy and vulnerable communities.”

Paul Miller, founding donor of the Miller Center and alumnus of Rutgers University, stressed that the work, while rooted in history, remains critical. “Ninety years ago today, Nazi Germany enacted laws stripping Jews of German citizenship and (preventing them) from interacting with the German people. These laws were later extended to include Black, Roma, and other minority communities, and led to arrests, imprisonment, executions, and the horrors we know as the Holocaust,” Miller said. “The Rutgers Miller Center is committed to working directly with administration officials and campus police, as well as with community leaders and police, to protect Jewish and other minority students and community members from discriminatory acts. It is our belief that actions such as these are critical to ensure that what the world promised after the Holocaust — ‘Never Again’ — will truly mean ‘Never Again.’”

A Global Lens on History and Democracy

The commemoration also comes at a moment of rising extremism and antisemitism worldwide. In his lecture, Kramer draws a stark contrast between the police of Nazi Germany, who implemented discriminatory laws, and today’s democratic police forces. “The police were not neutral enforcers of order; they were active agents of persecution,” he says. “Today, the situation is fundamentally different. The police are sworn to uphold the U.S. Constitution, protect equal rights, and defend democracy. Where the police once enforced exclusion, today their task is to enforce inclusion: to guarantee that every citizen, regardless of origin, faith, or identity, can walk the streets without fear.”

Earlier this year, the Miller Center and the University of Virginia’s Center for Public Safety and Justice led the largest-ever international delegation of law enforcement executives to the International March of the Living in Poland. More than 60 leaders from across North America, Europe, Asia, and beyond marched alongside Holocaust survivors and their families to mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.

How to Watch the Event

The keynote lecture and commemoration program will premiere on September 15, 2025 and can be viewed here.

Click here to visit the International March of the Living website for more details.