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In his book published in 1939, the constitutional lawyer Roger Bonnard proposed an analysis of German racism, as “theorized” by the National Socialist legal doctrine, engaging in a particularly “unrealistic” piece of dogmatic exegesis. The present article proposes to place Bonnard’s point of view in its ideological, professional, and political context: in the intellectual itinerary of the professor of public law; in the attempts to grasp Nazism “from the outside” during the 1930s, in France as well as in other countries; in the strategies of communication and distinction within the legal field, wherein expertise on Germany plays a significant role.