Civil servants, as agents of the state, need to be seen as loyal to their employer. Hence, in the ideal world individual political preferences should not play a role in the world of civil service. But what happens when a state treats private political allegiance as a determinant of loyalty and bans civil servants based on their politics? This paper examines the effects of Radikalenerlass (Anti-Radical Decree) introduced in 1972 in the Federal Republic of Germany. While the ban prohibited people associated with all “extremist” groups from taking office, in practice it mostly applied to the supporters of extreme-left parties. The ban was controversial and was gradually revoked on a state-by-state basis, with the last state, Bavaria, ending the practice in 1991. I concentrate on the effects of the ban on two groups: students and civil servants. This allows me to establish the effects that the ban had on (1) limiting the participation of “extremists” in the civil service, (2) self-selection into office and (3) job satisfaction once hired. To address these issues quantitatively, I employ data from the German Socio-Economic Panel 1984-2020, as well as the German Student Survey 1983 – 2016. The findings of this paper are important for several reasons. First, it allows to evaluate the effects of party bans in civil service that are frequently implemented in the process of transitional justice after regime change. Second, it highlights the role of political ideology in motivating selection into civil service and job satisfaction while working.