courts, on the other hand, remained largely unaffected, except of course for its drastic decrease in geographic reach. A pair of laws enacted by the emerging republic's provisional government in late 1918 and early 1919 confirmed the Supreme Court in its existence. The only thing the transition really changed was the name: the Supreme Court of Cassation () became the Supreme Court of Justice (). Both the Kelsen Constitution of 1920 and the Austrofascist Federal State of 1934 retained the Court unaltered. Suspension under the Nazis The absorption of Austria into the German Reich in March 1938 made the Supreme Court superfluous and, in fact, inconvenient. For one thing, the German judiciary used the same four-tier hierarchy as its Austrian counterpart. The judicial districts served by German and Austrian local, regional, and higher regional courts, respectively, were roughly comparable in size. Decisions of Germany's 28 higher regional courts were appealed to the Reichsgericht in Leipzig; there was no strong reason for an extra appeals court intermediating between the Reichsgericht and the paltry 3 higher regional courts of the Reich's new territorial addition, the State of Austria (). For another thing, the Nazis were already planning to dissolve the State of Austria into a number of unlinked provinces () in the near future; any institution that expressly and specifically served the territory traditionally known as Austria would eventually have to be disbanded in any case. The Court ceased operations in March 1939. When Austria regained independence in 1945, the Supreme Court was swiftly brought back. Since then, its role and institutional structure have remained largely unchanged. Citations References English books German books Articles PDF files Historical law Contemporary law External links Official website 1848 establishments in the Austrian Empire Courts in Austria Austria Courts and tribunals established in 1848