Ernst Müller-Meiningen Jr. grew up in Munich as the son of Ernst Müller-Meiningen (1866-1944), a lawyer, liberal member of the Reichstag, and Bavarian Minister of Justice and Deputy State Premier (1919/20), and his wife Frida, née Steinhard (1879-1941). After graduating from the humanist Theresien high school, Müller-Meiningen Jr. began studying law at the University of Munich in 1926.
Despite graduating with honors in 1933, he was denied entry into the civil service and admission to the bar after the Nazi takeover. Having earned himself a doctorate in law, he found a job as a paralegal at the Bavarian Mortgage and Exchange Bank. Deemed 'unfit for military service' because of his Jewish mother, he made it through the war years with his family in Munich.
He first made his voice heard after the end of the war with a paper on denazification, drawing the attention of the editors of the Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ). From 1946 to 1979, Müller-Meiningen Jr. worked as a journalist and editor for the SZ and played a decisive role in steering the course of the newspaper. In sharp-tongued commentaries and articles critical of the times, he called for Nazi crimes to be dealt with under criminal law, denounced Nazi continuities in the Federal Republic, and cautioned against forgetting the lessons of history and against neo-Nazism and right-wing extremism. He doggedly advocated for liberal democracy and the rule of law. As long-standing chairman of the Bavarian Journalists' Association (1951-1971) and a member of the Bavarian Broadcasting Council (1950-1978) and the German Press Council (1956-1970), he also campaigned for freedom of the press and broadcasting and emphasized the public role of the media as guardians of democracy who are critical of the authorities. Müller-Meiningen Jr. played a significant role in the establishment of investigative journalism in postwar Germany.
