What is Carl Schmitt?
[[File:Carl Schmitt 1904 Schulklasse.jpg|thumb|Carl Schmitt during his school years (1904)]] '''Carl Schmitt''' (11 July 1888 - 7 April 1985) was a German political theorist, [[Theology|theologist]] and member of the German [[Nazi Party]]. == Publications == === ''The Dictatorship'' === In this essay, he wrote about the ideas of the [[constitution]] of the [[Weimar Republic]], which was how Germany was often called between [[World War I]] and [[World War II]]. He liked the fact that there was a [[president]] because he thought that it was useful, while he thought that many other parts of the constitution were not useful. He believed the position of president was useful because the constitution let him break the rules and laws in case of emergency. This situation was called the ''state of exception''. Schmitt believed that having a powerful president that could decide to rule as he wanted in emergencies was better than having to go through the trouble of getting the [[legislature]] to agree on how to do things at a time when there is a need to decide things quickly. Schmitt admitted that he was praising what most people would call a [[dictator]], but he explained that dictators are not always bad. He explained that since the law of most places allows somebody to break the law in some special situations, then most places involve dictatorship in one way or another, and so dictatorship is not as bad and unusual as people say.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Vagts|first=Detlev|date=2012-05-22|title=Carl Schmitt's Ultimate Emergency: The Night of the Long Knives|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00168890.2012.675795|journal=The Germanic Review: Literature, Culture, Theory|volume=87|issue=2|pages=203–209|doi=10.1080/00168890.2012.675795|issn=0016-8890}}</ref> He wrote more about this idea: he put into words that there is a difference between a person using violence because the government allowed that person to do so, and a group of people using violence for political purposes without permission from the law because they are an