Chapter II — Fundamental Rights and Duties of Germans
Section I The Individual
Article 109
All Germans are equal before the law.
Men and women have fundamentally the same civil rights and duties.
Privileges or discriminations due to birth or rank and recognized by law are abolished. Titles of nobility will be regarded merely as part of the name and may not be granted hereafter.
Titles may be conferred only when they designate an office or profession; academic degrees are not affected by this provision.
Orders and honorary insignia may not be conferred by the state.
No German may accept a title or order from a foreign Government.
Article 110
Citizenship in the Commonwealth and in the States will be acquired and lost in accordance with the provisions of a national law. Every citizen of a State is at the same time a citizen of the Commonwealth.
Every German has the same rights and duties in each State of the Commonwealth as the citizens of that State.
Article 111
All Germans enjoy the right to travel and reside freely throughout the whole Commonwealth. Everyone has the right of sojourn and settlement in any place within the Commonwealth, the right to acquire land and to pursue any gainful occupation. No limitations may be imposed except by authority of a national law.
Article 112
Every German has the right to emigrate to foreign countries. Emigration may be limited only by national law.
All German citizens, both within and without the territory of the Commonwealth, have a right to its protection with respect to foreign countries.
No German may be surrendered to a foreign Government for prosecution or punishment.
Article 113
Those elements of the People which speak a foreign language may not be interfered with by legislative or administrative action in their free and characteristic development, especially in the use of their mother tongue in the schools or in matters of internal administration and the administration of justice.
Article 114
Personal liberty is inviolable. An interference with or abridgment of personal liberty through official action is permissible only by authority of law.
Persons, who are deprived of their liberty, shall be informed at latest on the following day by what authority and on what grounds they have been deprived of liberty, and they shall without delay receive an opportunity to present objections against such loss of liberty.
Article 115
The house of every German is his sanctuary and is inviolable. Exceptions are permissible only by authority of law.
Article 116
An act can be punishable only if the penalty was fixed by law before the act was committed.
Article 117
The secrecy of postal, telegraphic, and telephonic communications is inviolable. Exceptions may be permitted only by national law.
Article 118
Every German has a right within the limits of the general laws to express his opinion freely by word, in writing, in print, by picture, or in any other way. No relationship arising out of his employment may hinder him in the exercise of this right, and no one may discriminate against him if he makes use of this right.
There is no censorship, although exceptional provisions may be made by law in the case of moving pictures. Legal measures are also permissible for combatting obscene and indecent literature as well as for the protection of youth at public plays and spectacles.