Köppel proves that he either doesn´t know German history or otherwise he´s just trying desperately to find anything to justify torture today.

Utterly stupid editorial to repeat myself!

The Weimar Republic wasn´t doomed by its "adherence to the rule of law". It simply was founded during difficult times.

1. It was founded after the defeat in WW1 and the Versailles treaty so a lot of people didn´t really accept the Republic. Especially the conservatives and monarchists.
   
2. In the middle of the 1920s, the conservatives for a time did govern. Let´s just mention Stresemann. Unfortunately England and France were never that "generous" with him than they were later with Hitler.
   

If they had given a tenth of the concessions they later gave Hitler to Stresemann in the 1920s ... :(
3) It experienced a lot of economic problems during its 15 years. The inflation in the early 1920s and the Great Depression in the late 1920s, early 1930s. Adding to the legitimacy problem...

Still, the Republic wasn´t doomed.

1. IIRC votes for the Nazi party in the last free election in late 1932 were going down. Not to mention that they never got a majority (>50%) in free elections.
   
2. In late 1932 the Nazi party according to the Goebbels diaries was almost bankrupt.
   
3. Look at Prussia, the biggest German state back then. For example they introduced todays German "no-confidence vote." Meaning that you can only change the government by voting for a new government leader at the same time. Since Communists and Nazis obviously couldn´t agree on that :), Prussia was politically remarkably stable.

It was just bad, bad luck that the then German President Hindenburg, old and almost senile, was convinced to name Hitler as the new Chancellor in January 1933 by his close friends and advisors.

Not to mention that the Weimar President had a lot, too much, emergency power not checked by parliament.

If the Republic had held out for a few more months it is entirely possible that the Nazi party would have imploded for lack of money. It´s possible that a somewhat authoritarian conservative government still might have come into power. That would have still avoided WW2 and the Holocaust.

In summary, I just fail to see how torture might have avoided Hitler. I mean he openly stated his claim to legally overthrow the Weimar Republic during court trials. You didn´t need to torture him to admit that.

So it´s either waiting a few more months in 1933.
Or a few more constitutional amendments during the 1920s.

1. Nobody can hold the post of President and Chancellor at the same time. (That really killed the Weimar Republic when Hindenburg died in 1934. Hitler declared himself - with the support of the then "cleared" parliament - Chancellor and President in the same person. Giving him control of the armed forces and making him head of the state too.)
   
2. Using the Prussian "no-confidence vote" system on the federal level to ensure that you can´t vote down a government without electing a new one.

We can of course discuss everything mentioned here.
But I´m just totally puzzled how torture might have saved the Weimar Republic given the facts???