Speech at the opening of the Munich office of abante Vergabeanwälte
On 29 January 2026, Dr. Christoph Kins, Managing Director and specialist lawyer for public procurement law, gave the opening speech at the opening of the Munich office of abante Vergabeanwälte.
Below is the text of the speech.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Dear guests, dear friends of our law firm,
I am delighted to welcome you here today to the opening of our Munich location — in Ganghoferstrasse.
We don’t start with small talk, but with the question:
Why is this place actually interesting?
Ludwig Ganghofer, the most famous namesake of the master builder Ganghofer, after whom this street is named, Ludwig Ganghofer was one of the most successful popular writers of the first half of the 20th century. A literary star of his time. And at the same time a close friend of Ludwig Thoma — lawyer, satirist, publicist, provocateur.
The two not only shared a friendship, but also a deep understanding that language has an effect. And that it doesn’t always have to adhere to the boundaries of good taste, or even be allowed to.
In 1905 Ganghofer had to provide legal assistance to his friend Thoma (in the following I rely on Otto Gritschneder, Weitere Randbemerkungen, Munich 1986, p. 95 ff.).
The occasion: a poem.
The previous year, a conference of German morality associations had taken place in Cologne, followed by an international conference against “immoral literature”. Thoma had not attended and did not know the Protestant pastors involved. Nevertheless, he published a diatribe in Simplicissimus — under the pseudonym Peter Schlemihl — in which he called them, among other things, “god-awful bed-stealers”, “evangelical un-slit candles” and “grace-delivering shouting clubs”.
The judiciary reacted sensitively.
The main hearing took place in Stuttgart. Ludwig Ganghofer appeared as an expert witness. He eloquently explained what should be possible in the name of artistic freedom.
The judges were not convinced.
Thoma was convicted and spent six weeks in Stadelheim in 1906. After all, he wrote the comedy “Moral” and the “Stadelheim Diary” there. So it was not without consequences — but it did not destroy his livelihood either. Not even threatening his existence. Ludwig Thoma was already doing very well economically back then.
Let’s jump forward a good hundred years.
Today, no one goes to prison for such vilification.
On the contrary.
In 2019, Bundestag member Renate Künast had to take legal action all the way to the Federal Constitutional Court to obtain the data of people who had called her “you old green dirty pig”, “old perverted dirty pig” and “paedophile trulla” in the first place. The Berlin Regional Court and, in part, the Court of Appeal considered all of this to be permissible expressions of opinion (decision of 21.01.2020 — 27 AR 17/19; for further proceedings: KG, decision of 11.03.2020 — 10 W 13/20; BVerfG, decision of 19.12.2021 — 1 BvR 1073/20). Even the quite clear call for the use of violence “I could smash these people’s faces with such statements” was considered to be “crossing the line”, but at the “level of polemical and pointed criticism” (see Kammergericht loc. cit. para. 99).
We are well aware of the real-world justifications:
That’s just the way social media is. You have to live with it. Especially as a politician.
And this is where it gets legally interesting.
Because the public prosecutor’s office would actually be responsible. Insult is a criminal offense. The state not only has the right to intervene here, but also the duty to do so.
In fact, however, the public prosecutor’s offices do not succeed for a variety of reasons:
Overload, prioritization, problems with evidence, delimitation difficulties. Some things are also typical of the times. Keywords here are: Part-time work. Or perhaps an over-problematization and oversimplification typical of the generation.
In any case, proceedings are discontinued and those affected are referred to private prosecution.
And it is expensive. Too expensive for a politician’s salary. And above all: structurally ineffective against mass attacks.
If the state does not act, a vacuum is created.
And the market is trying to fill this vacuum.
This is where models like So Done come into play: success-based, mass, automated. They lower barriers to entry — but they also create false incentives. Mass instead of impact. Quantity instead of control. Law enforcement based on quantity. Legally not unproblematic (see Drygala, NJW 2025, 279 ff.), socially ambivalent.
On the other hand, there are funding models such as HateAid. Non-profit, state-supported, politically desired. But they also have limits: they may be pursuing their own goals, and they are allowed to do so. And their exponents, such as Anna-Lena von Hodenberg, are themselves in the fire. As is well known, Ms. von Hodenberg is no longer allowed to enter the USA.
In other words:
The market is overdrawn.
The funding is not enough.
And the state therefore remains structurally below its means.
If we zoom back again — this time to 1921 — we can see where such a failure can lead.
Ludwig Thoma was no longer a liberal satirist. His transformation came in 1914. Despite his advanced age, he went off to fight in the First World War. He now wrote nationalistically, polemically against the centrist politician Matthias Erzberger, among others. He called him “Erzlu…” (Alexander Jungkunz, Wie Ludwig Thoma tödlichen Hass schürte, nordbayern.de from 25.08.2021, retrieved on 26.01.2026).
Erzberger — a democrat, signatory of the armistice, someone who had taken responsibility to prevent further deaths.
Erzberger was murdered on August 26, 1921.
Shot by assassins from the Consul organization. A few shots to the torso. Erzberger, who had long expected to be executed, crawled down the slope in the small town in the Black Forest where he was staying. No chance. One of the assassins came after him, two shots to the head (source: wikipedia entry on Matthias Erzberger, retrieved on 26.01.2026).
The first in a series of political murders in the Weimar Republic.
The “Erzlump”, as a certain Adolf Hitler later called him, was dead.
Ludwig Thoma also died on this very day. Albeit without violence, from cancer. His friend Ganghofer delivered the eulogy. The two are buried next to each other in Rottach-Egern.
We are well aware of where this development has led.
Let’s jump back to the present.
There’s more than a hundred years between “bed-stealer” and “moron”.
But the basic question remains the same:
Who protects the integrity of democratic office — and how?
And that brings me to the twist in terms of public procurement law.
We are a public procurement law firm.
And we are interested in the purchasing side of the state. The coverage of demand.
Reputation protection is a service today.
And you can buy services when you need them.
The state should not refer its exponents to private legal action to defend themselves. At least not if the defamation is clearly related to the exercise of office and the performance of official duties. In these cases, the state should procure reputational protection services institutionally: transparent, bundled, in line with the award of contracts. As a framework agreement.
Just like he buys communications consulting.
The way he buys public relations.
And yes — just as he buys make-up and photographic art, on which considerable sums are regularly spent.
So why not also protect those who bear responsibility for the state?
Such procurement would make success-based business models superfluous, prevent excesses and at the same time enable real control. It would show: The state not only protects its buildings — but also the integrity of its institutions .
Please understand me correctly. The state should not pay for every minor insult. But the state must take responsibility for massive insults or even incitement to violence, which are clearly related to official conduct. It must bear the costs of criminal charges and, if necessary, private prosecution. This can be controlled wonderfully with the means of public procurement law. As the politician and complainant concerned is and remains a private individual, a multi-partner framework agreement or open house procurement is a good option. The democratically legitimized bodies can stipulate in the award conditions, which can be reviewed by the courts, what is to be paid for — and what is so minor that the politician concerned should please arrange it privately.
Perhaps that is the lesson to be learned from Ganghofer, Thoma and, of course, this new address from abante Vergabeanwälte:
In 2026, law enforcement and reputational protection will not begin in criminal proceedings, but in procurement proceedings. Thank you very much.
Dr. Christoph Kins
Managing director, specialist lawyer for public procurement law
abante Rechtsanwälte
Opening speech at the inauguration of the Munich site, January 29, 2026
