On 2 June 1932, Gürtner was nominated as Reich Minister of Justice under Chancellor Franz von Papen. After serving in the cabinets of Papen and Kurt von Schleicher, Gürtner was retained by Hitler in his post, and made responsible for coordinating jurisprudence in the Third Reich. Although Gürtner was not a Nazi, he shared the increasingly authoritarian bent of most of his DNVP colleagues.