The Basic Law prohibits any form of discrimination on the basis of language or on the basis of homeland and origin (Art. 3 para. 3 sentence 1 GG). In addition to legislation, the administration at all levels of government and the courts are bound by this. There is no specific minority article in the German Basic Law so far. The Minority Council, however, has been campaigning for incorporating a minority article into the German Basic Law. An initiative by the federal states of Schleswig-Holstein, Brandenburg and Saxony in 2019 to enshrine the protection of minorities in the Basic Law was initially not pursued in the Bundesrat.

Further federal legislation: Federal Election Law and Party Law

In addition, the Federal Election and the Political Parties Act also contain provisions for the protection and promotion of national minorities.

The so-called five-percent-clause, according to which only those parties are taken into account that achieve at least five percent of the votes or that achieve a direct mandate in at least three election districts, does not apply to the parties of the national minorities (Article 6, paragraph 3, second sentence of the Federal Election Law). The Federal Elections Act also contains special provisions for the district nominations and for the state lists (Section 20 (2) sentence 3, Section 27 (1) sentence 4).

According to the Federal Party Law the parties of the national minorities are privileged in regard to state funding and in regard to raising funds by way of foreign donations (Article 18, paragraphs 3 and 4, Article 25, paragraph 2, sub 3 b Federal Party Law)