Editing Paragraph 175 (section)

==Background==
[[File:Burning of Sodomites.jpg|thumb|Burning of the accused sodomites, [[Richard Puller von Hohenburg]] and Anton Mätzler, outside the walls of [[Zürich]], 1482 ([[Spiezer Schilling]])]]
Most sodomy-related laws in [[Western culture|Western civilization]] originated from the growth of Christianity during [[Late Antiquity]].<ref name="Gaylaw">{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BZTnDgeygHkC&q=history+of+sodomy+laws+Christianity&pg=PA161 | title=Gaylaw: Challenging the Apartheid of the Closet | publisher=Harvard University Press | author=Eskridge, William N. | year=2009 | pages=161 | isbn=9780674036581 | access-date=2 November 2020 | archive-date=12 January 2023 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230112154224/https://books.google.com/books?id=BZTnDgeygHkC&q=history+of+sodomy+laws+Christianity&pg=PA161 | url-status=live }}</ref> Germany is notable for having anti-sodomy regulation before Christianity; Roman historian [[Tacitus]] records execution of homosexuals in his book ''[[Germania (book)|Germania]]''.<ref>Gade, Kari Ellen. “HOMOSEXUALITY AND RAPE OF MALES IN OLD NORSE LAW AND LITERATURE.” ''Scandinavian Studies'', vol. 58, no. 2, 1986, pp. 124–141. ''JSTOR'', [https://www.jstor.org/stable/40918734?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents www.jstor.org/stable/40918734] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220420230142/https://www.jstor.org/stable/40918734?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents |date=20 April 2022 }}.</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://facultystaff.richmond.edu/~wstevens/history331texts/barbarians.html|title=Tacitus' Germania|website=facultystaff.richmond.edu|access-date=2019-05-27|archive-date=28 November 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201128072818/https://facultystaff.richmond.edu/~wstevens/history331texts/barbarians.html|url-status=live}}</ref>  Christian condemnation of homosexuality reinforced these sentiments as Germany became baptised.  In 1532, the [[Constitutio Criminalis Carolina]] produced a foundation for this principle of law, which remained valid in the [[Holy Roman Empire]] until the end of the 18th century. In the words of Paragraph 116 of that code:

<blockquote>The punishment for fornication that goes against nature. When a human commits fornication with a beast, a man with a man, a woman with a woman, they have also forfeited life. And they should be, according to the common custom, banished by fire from life into death.<ref>"Straff der vnkeusch, so wider die Natur beschicht. cxvj. ITem so eyn mensch mit eynem vihe, mann mit mann, weib mit weib, vnkeusch treiben, die haben auch das leben verwürckt, vnd man soll sie der gemeynen gewonheyt nach mit dem fewer vom leben zum todt richten." - ''Die Peinliche Gerichtsordnung Kaiser Karls V (Carolina)'', ed. and comm. by Friedrich-Christian Schroeder (Suttgart: Reclam, 2000).</ref></blockquote>

In 1794, [[Prussia]] introduced the ''[[Allgemeines Landrecht]]'', a major reform of laws that replaced the death penalty for this offense with a term of imprisonment. Paragraph 143 of that code says:

<blockquote>Unnatural fornication, whether between persons of the male sex or of humans with beasts, is punished with imprisonment of six months to four years, with the further punishment of a prompt loss of civil rights.<ref>1794, Allgemeines Landrecht of Prussia</ref></blockquote>

In [[French First Republic|France]], the [[French Penal Code of 1791|Revolutionary Penal Code]] of 1791 punished acts of this nature only when someone's rights were injured (i.e., in the case of a non-[[consent|consensual]] act), which had the effect of the complete legalization of homosexuality.{{sfn|Schwartz|2021|p=403}} In the course of his conquests, [[Napoléon Bonaparte|Napoleon]] exported the French Penal Code beyond France into a sequence of other states such as the [[Kingdom of the Netherlands|Netherlands]]. The [[Rhineland]] and later [[Kingdom of Bavaria|Bavaria]] adopted the French model and removed from their lawbooks all prohibitions of consensual sexual acts.{{sfn|Schwartz|2021|p=403}}

The 1851 Prussian criminal code justified the criminalization of homosexuality with reference to Christian morality, even though the prohibited act did not endanger any legal interest.{{sfn|Schwartz|2021|pp=402–403}} Two years before the 1871 founding of the [[German Empire]], the Prussian kingdom, worried over the future of the paragraph, sought a scientific basis for this piece of legislation. The Ministry of Justice assigned a ''[[Deputation für das Medizinalwesen]]'' ("Deputation for Medical Knowledge"), including among others the famous physicians [[Rudolf Virchow]] and [[Heinrich Adolf von Bardeleben]], who stated in their appraisal of 24 March 1869 that they were unable to give a scientific grounding for a law that outlawed zoophilia and [[male homosexual intercourse]], distinguishing them from the many other sexual acts that were not even considered as matters of penal law.<ref name="Wie">{{cite book|author=Jens Dobler|title=Wie öffentliche Moral gemacht wird: Die Einführung des § 175 in das Strafgesetzbuch 1871|language=de|year=2014|publisher=Männerschwarm Verlag |isbn=978-3863001865}}</ref> Nevertheless, the draft penal law submitted by [[Otto von Bismarck]] in 1870 to the [[North German Confederation]] retained the relevant Prussian penal provisions, justifying this out of concern for "[[public opinion]]".<ref name="Wie"/>