This article examines how authoritarian contenders use law to advance an agenda geared to exclusive state power in light of a paradigmatic case: the National Socialists’ takeover of the German state apparatus in spring 1933. This case highlights two ways in which an office holder is able to expand his power in an authoritarian fashion through legal dispositions. A conjunctural use of law for authoritarian purposes draws on legal statutes to undercut the political capacity of opponents and competitors, hollow out institutional checks, and crucially hamper civil freedoms. Taking advantage of constitutional provisions that make institutional subversion from within possible (‘constitutional Trojan horses’), a structural use of legal statutes reorders the power structure by reallocating decisional rights. In both cases, law serves as a weapon against the rule of law. These considerations raise the question of the standards by which we are to judge the legality of such acts. Contemporary instances of democratic backsliding are cases in point.

中文翻译：

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违反法治的法律：攻击民主

本文根据一种典型案例研究了威权竞争者如何利用法律来推进针对独占国家权力的议程：国民社会主义者于1933年春季接管德国国家机构。该案例强调了公职人员能够采用的两种方式通过法律处置以威权主义的方式扩大自己的权力。一个推测的独裁目的利用法律借鉴了法律法规，以削弱对手和竞争者，镂空机构检查的政治能力，也是至关重要的一点妨碍公民自由。趁着宪法规定，使制度的颠覆，从可能的范围内（“宪法特洛伊木马”），一个结构法律法规的使用通过重新分配决策权来重新排列权力结构。在这两种情况下，法律都是反对法治的武器。这些考虑提出了我们判断此类行为是否合法的标准问题。民主倒退的当代实例就是恰当的例子。